As You Were: Part Three
If he'd had any sense at all, Nate thought, he'd have taken Dane's advice after that less-than-productive conversation with Stef and gone home. Or at least taken Dane up on his offer and gotten shit-faced drunk for the second time in two days. The latter had been at least a little appealing, but he'd decided to refrain. Once, under the circumstances, was maybe understandable, but twice was the beginning of an unhealthy trend.
Besides, he wanted to find Clare. The computer had her listed on seventy-two hours leave, just like him, but it also said she was still in the Tower--not that he'd needed it to tell him that. Unmasked, the blue-silver presence that no telepath who'd touched her mind even once would ever mistake for anyone but Clare Summers burned like a star on the astral plane.
But the computer had also told him, when he'd asked, that she was in one of the Danger Rooms, and that was definitely a helpful piece of information. With how crowded the Tower was today, it would have taken some scanning on his part to narrow down her exact location telepathically, and he wasn't sure he wanted to risk too much mind-to-mind contact with her at the moment. Nate grimaced. He wanted to tell her about Stef's threat - he'd almost convinced himself it had to be bluster, but he still thought Clare should know - but there were things he definitely didn't want to talk about, and his shields were in no better shape than they'd been this morning.
He'd half-expected to find her on the firing range. There were standard weapons proficiency requirements for all XSE officers, but Clare took them more seriously than most. Something she'd gotten from her parents, most likely. The firing range was where she usually went when she wanted to unwind, but as he got closer to the Danger Room in question and his sense of her presence grew stronger, it was obvious that she definitely wasn't trying to unwind. If anything, Nate thought, wincing at the ferocity of the emotions he was sensing, she seemed to be doing her very best to wind herself up.
He paused in front of the door, wondering just where his common sense had gone. Sleeping with Zara had been bad enough. Giving Stef another opportunity to manipulate him had been stupid. Walking in there and facing Clare while she was in the middle of what had to be a monumental rage was--well, probably more or less insane. He should never have gotten out of bed this morning, that was the problem.
The door was locked. Frowning, he tapped in his security code, overriding the lockout. It slid aside and he stepped in, feeling even more unsettled as he took in the scene. The program seemed simple enough, composed of nothing more than a single sparring ring in the middle of the room. Clare, flushed and sweaty in gray sweat pants and a white tank-top, her hair escaping from where she had it knotted at the base of her neck to keep it out of the way, was fighting a single holographic opponent.
Not that Nate needed his telepathy to tell that her opponent was holographic, because her opponent happened to be Stef.
Oh, this is terribly, terribly healthy. He shook his head slowly and watched, soon realizing that the Stef-appearance was just the upper layer of a completely different holographic template, one programmed with fighting skills that the real Stef didn't have.
The holo-Stef lashed out with an uppercut that snapped Clare's head back and sent her stumbling backwards, but she regained her balance swiftly, taking it down with a spin kick that had to have a little telekinesis behind it, to judge by how hard the holo-Stef hit the mats. But it recovered nearly as quickly as she did, sweeping her feet out from under her.
She fell heavily, and the holo-Stef sprang at her with the unnatural speed of a top-level fighting sim, pinning her to the mats. It had one hand around her throat and was gripping her left wrist with the other. Clare made a shockingly feral sound and smashed her other fist into the holo-Stef's face--once, twice, three times.
The blows visibly shattered the sim's cheekbone, but its only reaction was to tighten its grip on her throat. Clare gave a choked gasp, and any resolution Nate might have made not to interfere died a premature death.
"Computer, deactivate program!" he said sharply, taking an alarmed step forward. But the holo-Stef remained, still doing its calm best to choke the life out of Clare, and Nate swore, striking at it with his own telekinesis and sending it flying back out of the ring. As soon as it crossed the boundaries of the circle, it disappeared, and Nate dashed forward, going to his knees at Clare's side and helping her sit up as she gasped for air.
It didn't take her long to regain her composure. "Don't--touch me," she wheezed almost instantly, striking his hand away and glaring at him. Judging by the red marks on her throat, she'd have a nice set of bruises shortly. "Thought you had--better manners then to stick your nose in someone else's p-program, Guthrie!"
Nate wished bitterly that he could be more surprised at her reaction. But then, he hadn't really expected a thank-you. "Well, pardon the fuck out of me," he said as neutrally as he could, not moving to touch her again but not moving away, either, "but your program was getting a bit carried away."
"I was handling it. Asshole." But Clare broke eye contact as she mumbled the words. That and the sudden lack of anger in her voice was as good as an admission that she'd just lied through her teeth.
Under normal circumstances, Nate would have dropped it there and let her save face, but there was no way he was letting her off the hook this time. There were certain levels of self-destructive behaviour he just wasn't prepared to tolerate.
"Did you even have the safety protocols on?" he asked tightly. Clare looked up at him, her gray eyes bleak, and he scowled fiercely at her. "You didn't. That's just great, Clare--you're supposed to have a spotter!" Disengaging the safety protocols in the Danger Rooms was generally frowned up, but people did it anyway, of course. The one iron-clad, if unofficial rule was that you were supposed to have someone there who could shut down the program in case of trouble. "I should report you," he threatened half-heartedly. "And why didn't the computer shut the damned thing down when I told it to?"
Clare rubbed at her throat. "I voice-locked it," she said hoarsely. Swearing in frustration, Nate got to his feet and backed away a couple of steps, knowing that if he didn't get out of range, he was going to give in to the urge to shake her for being so stupid. "Don't look at me like that," she muttered, drawing her knees up to her chest, her shoulders hunched defensively. "I just didn't want to give myself an easy out, okay?"
Nate growled and reached down, hauling Clare back to her feet. "What's the matter with you?" he snapped, infuriated. Wincing, she tried to pull away, and his eyes widened, his grip slackening automatically as he saw the fresh bruises all over her arms and shoulders. "Damn it, how long have you been at this, Clare?" he asked, his voice unsteady. The side of her face looked swollen, too, and there were splotches of blood on her white tank-top and on the wrappings on her hands. Why hadn't he noticed that immediately?
Clare wrenched free, glowering at him. "Since your father tracked me down and informed me I was grounded," she said.
She sounded pissed. Probably because I had the gall to call her on the fact that she's acting like an idiot. "It's called leave, Clare," he said, forgetting that he hadn't been all that thrilled with the idea himself. "And you're not the only one. We're both getting an extra-long weekend, so don't take it personally."
"Well, go--do something with the weekend," Clare snapped, gesturing at the door. "Enjoy yourself. I'd like to go back to my program and kill a few more holographic DaCostas, so if you'll excuse me--"
"No, I will not excuse you," Nate said, flinching inwardly. A few more? Suddenly he was glad he hadn't come looking for her any sooner. The idea of watching her slaughter her way through a series of virtual Stefs was not at all appealing.
Clare's eyebrows headed for her hairline. "That wasn't a request," she said through gritted teeth. "I was just trying to be polite."
"Oh? To what do I owe the privilege?"
"Don't be a smart-ass."
"Fine," Nate grumbled, and decided that was time to put his money where his mouth was. Arguing with her wasn't going to get him anywhere. "You want to work out some frustration?" he asked, shrugging out of his uniform jacket and tossing it out of the ring. "Why don't you give the holo-systems a rest and try a live opponent, then? I'm much less likely to choke you to death." She raised an eyebrow, and he managed a tight, humorless smile. "Accidentally, at least."
"What part of 'I want to kill someone' didn't I make clear?" she muttered, beginning to circle him with a malevolent expression on her face that he didn't like at all. He was going to be lying on the ground moaning in a minute, he just knew it--
"Well, I'm not leaving you in here to kill virtual Stefs on your own," Nate went on determinedly, very carefully visualizing the structure of a TK shield he could throw up at a moment's notice if she decided to hit him from behind.
But the attack he'd half-expected never came. She came back around in front of him, a nasty little smile playing on her lips. "Can we kill virtual Stefs together, then?" she asked sweetly.
"No," he said firmly.
"You're no fun at all, Guthrie."
"Is that why you're here?" Nate asked her roughly, taking a tentative jab at her. She moved out of the way smoothly, the smile gone as if it had never been there in the first place. "To have fun?"
"Come to think of it, no," she said calmly, and moved so fast that he was still only beginning to react when her first punch landed. He rocked backwards, managing to block the second, but it left him open for a solid kick to the midsection, and he found himself flat on his back, trying to remember how to breathe.
"That--wasn't nice."
"You didn't say I had to be nice."
"True." He got back to his feet, swaying a little. She hadn't held much back, but then, he hadn't really expected her to. When Askani-trained fighters sparred, bruises were an expected part of the experience. Generally, it was considered good manners to avoid breaking bones, but that was about it in terms of boundaries. "Killing holographic replicas of him isn't going to make you feel any better, you know," he said as calmly as he could manage, knowing he was pushing.
But Nick had done the same to him, or tried. So had his father. And Nate knew damned well that Clare wasn't liable to talk to anyone else about this, no matter how much they pushed. Harry, maybe, but Harry wasn't here, was he?
Clare was glowering at him again. Picking up on his thoughts, for all he knew; it wasn't as if the gaping holes in his shields had gotten any smaller in the last few minutes. "Who said I was trying to make myself feel better?" she snapped, and tried to kick him in the head.
Nate ducked, blocked the follow-up punch, and finally managed to land one of his own. Clare's head snapped sideways and she staggered back a step or two, nearly losing her balance. Nate wondered just how much longer she could keep this up. Surely it wouldn't be long before fatigue won out, from the looks of her. If she'd been at it since his father had found her to tell her she was on leave--well, that had to be a couple of hours ago at least, to judge by the state she was in.
"Then what were you trying to do?" he asked, trying to keep his voice mildly curious and hide how much the thought of her putting herself through this for hours on end in some sort of masochistic frenzy bothered him.
"Get some exercise?" Clare suggested as she wiped blood from the corner of her mouth. Then she was lunging at him, whirling and striking in a classic Askani attack pattern, moving so fast that he immediately went on the defensive, trying to stay within the boundaries of the circle as she drove him inexorably back.
But she soon overreached herself - fatigue, again - and he seized the opportunity, driving a fist into her solar plexus. She went to one knee, gasping, and Nate backed away, instantly wishing he'd chosen a less forceful counter. Just because she was angry and not pulling her punches didn't mean he had to follow suit.
Then again, Clare did have a notoriously thick skull. Sometimes the best approach was the most direct. "Bullshit," Nate said conversationally, although he was breathing pretty hard himself. Even when she wasn't at her best, she wasn't an easy opponent.
Clare coughed, took a deep, painful-sounding breath, and then hauled herself back to her feet, visibly swaying. "You--went to see him, I gather?" she wheezed, beginning to circle him again. The fact that she didn't attack him again immediately was another sign of how tired she was, and Nate started to wish he had finished this when he'd had the chance.
"Stef? Yeah." Not much point in denying it, although he hoped she didn't press him for details.
She jabbed at him half-heartedly, and he blocked it easily. "Bad call," she said with a short, breathless laugh that sounded almost despairing. "Going anywhere near him, I mean."
"I know," Nate said more softly, keeping his eyes locked on hers, willing her to keep talking. "We both should have kept our distance."
Clare shrugged, but her expression was too bleak for the diffidence of the gesture to be even semi-convincing. "'What is, is', right?" she said hoarsely, and Nate found himself warding off another flurry of blows as she threw herself grimly into the task of driving him out of bounds.
But there was less strength behind her movements this time, and her speed was dropping noticeably. Nate chose to stay on the defensive, letting her chase him around the ring for a minute or two longer and wear herself down further, until she was all but tottering. Finally, she took a wild swing at him, and he ducked beneath it and kicked her feet out from under her.
She crashed awkwardly to the mats, swearing weakly as she turned over onto her back and laid there, her chest heaving. Nate moved to stand over her, and mustered a disapproving look. "That was sloppy," he started to say. Only he never quite finished getting the words out, because she kicked out, hard, and he suddenly found himself flat on his back, too, staring up at the ceiling and wondering with mild bemusement how he'd gotten there.
Clare popped into sight above him, kneeling at his side. She grasped his collar with one hand, drawing the other back in a fist. "And that was careless," she grated, sweat-damp hair hanging limply around her face. "Yield?"
Nate gazed up at her, contemplating the situation. She was right, he decided. Only what had she expected him to do? Deliver the coup de grace? "Why the hell not," he finally sighed. Clare relaxed infinitesimally, extending a hand to help him up. Nate took it--and yanked her down onto the mats beside him. "I lied," he said as cheerily as he could, and shifted to pin her down before she could recover. "Yield?"
She called him several thoroughly foul names in Askani. "Get off me," she finally growled, looking infuriated.
"I didn't hear the magic word."
Her eyes were glowing. That wasn't a good sign. "Get off me before I leave you a soprano for the rest of your days," Clare hissed up at him, shifting beneath him in a way that indicated she was quite serious.
"No need to get nasty," Nate murmured, and prudently moved away before she either carried out her threat or lost her temper completely and blew him through the ceiling. He'd expected her to move away as soon as he let her, but instead she just laid there, breathing raggedly as she stared up at the ceiling. "Hey," he said more gently, bending over her. She stared blankly up at the ceiling, her eyes huge in a too-pale face. "Talk to me," he urged helplessly, not sure whether or not to touch her.
"Why?"
Her voice was so lifeless that a spasm of real fear went through him, and he laid a hand over hers. She shivered, but didn't pull away, didn't even blink, and his stomach twisted. "Because I hate it when you space out on me, okay?" he said hoarsely.
Clare's hand curled around his, squeezing tightly. "I'm not spacing out," she said, sounding exhausted, almost irritable. She tugged on his hand, and he pulled her up to a sitting position, trying to keep the nervous smile off his face. Her eyes were full of dull anger as she met his, but he couldn't help but think it was an improvement. "I just don't particularly want to talk about it."
Nate wasn't sure he believed that. She was still here, after all. "Maybe I'd like to talk about it," he murmured.
Her expression went flat. "Fine. I'm listening."
She was fully prepared to wait him out, too, he realized. Nate sighed, fighting the urge to sink his face into his hands. "All right, so I was actually hoping you'd do the talking--"
"Hypocrite." Astonishingly, the corner of her mouth twitched upwards in a humorless smile. "I have to spill my guts about what I'm feeling, but you're not going to reciprocate?"
"I didn't say that," he protested. "It's just--"
"You think I have more to spill?" She leaned back on an elbow, wincing, and rubbed at the spot on her chest where he'd hit her. "Hey, the bastard wasn't MY childhood buddy--"
Nate frowned fitfully. She was trying to turn it around on him, and that wasn't what he'd had in mind at all.
"I wasn't the one he killed, either," Clare said, and gazed at him with a calm that surely wasn't as perfect as it looked. #The paradox notwithstanding, of course.#
"Point," Nate muttered, and swallowed a laugh that would have come out sounding more than slightly hysterical. Nothing about the situation should be funny, but there was something perversely amusing about the fact that he and Stef hadn't even talked about that.
Perversely amusing, yet telling. Watching himself die had been a profoundly disturbing experience, made worse by the knowledge that Stef had pulled the trigger. Nate was expecting his full share of nightmares on the subject. But what had enraged him was how close Stef had come to killing Clare. Finding out he'd been the one to set her up in Rio had just put the seal on it all.
She seemed to take precedence. For both of them. After all, Stef hadn't tried to shift the conversation elsewhere either, had he? The two of them had been fixated, as if what had happened had been all about her--
"Funny," he said without thinking, as she continued to watch him. "But killing me wasn't what he was gloating about."
Clare recoiled, looking away. "I'm not surprised," she said after a long, awkward moment of silence. Her voice wavered a little as she went on. "You don't gloat about something you regret. Deep down, DaCosta still cares about you. I'd be willing to bet he has nightmares about pulling the trigger on your doppleganger."
Nate shifted uneasily. Part of him wanted to believe that she was still trying to turn things around on him, but he knew this was her attempting to be comforting, in her own unique way. He wanted to believe her, too, which only made things worse.
"I may have seen it happen," he said slowly. She looked up at him, and he knew he wasn't imagining the defensiveness in her eyes. He could sense it, as if she were bracing herself for a blow. "But it didn't really happen to me." Not like Rio had happened to her, and maybe that was the difference. It was going to take him a while to deal with what he'd seen in that Tinex chamber, but what Stef had done to Clare was history, in the worst and more irrevocable sense of the word.
Clare stared at him, her eyes very wide suddenly. "I wanted to kill him, you know," she finally said, the words quivering with tension. "I really did. I don't know how I managed to stay out of that cell."
"But you did."
She gave a gasping laugh, shrinking in on herself--and edging away from him, as if she felt the need to put some distance between them. "So I did. What does that make me?"
"I don't know," Nate said awkwardly, not sure what answer would provide some thin shred of comfort, and which would provoke an explosion. She was so unreadable when she chose to be. The only other telepath he'd ever known who could close themselves off so completely had been her father. "Civilized?
"Oh, yay me. Really." Clare stared blankly into empty air for a moment, and then swore viciously, slamming a fist into the mat beside her. Nate nearly jumped out of his skin. "I don't feel civilized," she said tightly. She looked up at him, smiling bitterly. "Sometimes I admire Zara's approach to things."
"You scare me when you say things like that," Nate said faintly, his heart doing an odd little flip-flop in his chest. Clare gave him a suspicious look, and he couldn't stop himself from looking away, even though he knew breaking eye contact was a bad idea.
He could feel her eyes still boring into him. Squirming was entirely unnecessary, he told himself frantically. Thinking of something else would also be a good idea. Happy thoughts. Trees, flowers, sunlight--
#YOU SLEPT WITH ZARA?#
"Shit," Nate muttered faintly, his hands shaking. Clare scrambled to her feet, and he looked up at her, flinching at the utter disbelief on her face. Why did he feel so guilty? he wondered despondently.
"You slept with Zara?" Clare repeated aloud, her voice cracking. He watched her wrestle her features back under control, until she was no longer gaping at him but simply glaring, her eyes glittering dangerously. "I don't believe this!" she said furiously. "What were you thinking?"
Nate quailed inwardly, but spread his hands wide in a helpless gesture. "I wasn't! I was drunk, and--"
Clare's eyes narrowed alarmingly. "Zara got you drunk?" she demanded sharply, and Nate jerked backwards at the sudden barrage of images he was picking up, all revolving around what Clare was planning to do to Zara if he said yes.
Why that provoked a distant, less-panicked part of his mind to chuckle softly in satisfaction and sit back to watch the show, he really didn't know. "No," Nate said, relieved he didn't have to lie. Clare folded her arms across her chest, clearly expectant, and Nate grimaced and got up. "Don't look at me like that," he said awkwardly. "Nick and I were--uh, he thought I needed to unwind a little--"
Clare looked appalled. "NICK got you drunk? And then left you alone with Zara?"
Okay, so explaining things wasn't helping much. "Well, yes," Nate said hesitantly. "But he really didn't--"
"Shit!" Clare erupted, going from pale to red in an impressively short space of time. "I thought Nick had better sense than that!" She turned away, one hand going to her temple as if a headache had just hit, and Nate twitched nervously at the high-pitched laugh that escaped her. "He got you drunk and left you alone with Zara. That idiot. I'm going to kill him."
"It wasn't Nick's fault!" Nate sighed, and caught himself copying Clare's gesture unconsciously, mostly because he did feel a headache coming on. Stress, undoubtedly. He really hadn't expected her to turn violently overprotective, and he had no clue what sort of convoluted thought process on her part had led to that particular reaction. He wasn't about to take a peek to see if he could figure it out, either. "Would you just settle down and listen to me?" he pleaded, letting his hand fall back to his side. "It's not as if she took advantage of me."
Clare turned back to him, giving him a suspicious look. "Are you sure?"
"YES!" Nate exclaimed, feeling more than a little insulted. He wasn't that weak-willed, and damn it, Zara wouldn't stoop that low. "Come on, give her a little credit, would you?"
"Oh, I'll give her credit. Next time I see her, she's going to get more credit than she can handle."
"Clare!"
"Nate, you can't tell me you honestly wanted to sleep with Zara!" Clare said, her voice still overly loud, and scornful enough to make him cringe. "You've spent the last twenty-odd years doing your best to stay OUT of Zara's bed!"
Put like that, the situation seemed even more ludicrous. "I know," he muttered wretchedly, flushing. He was never going to live this down.
Clare was shaking her head slowly, staring off into empty space as if she were seeing images there and not liking them very much. "You and Zara," she muttered, her hands clenching convulsively at her sides. "You and Zara. I AM going to kill her."
"Clare--"
Her eyes snapped back to meet his, and Nate took a step back as the link opened up. He felt her reach down from her end, looking for--well, he knew damned well what she was looking for. Gritting his teeth, he pushed her forcefully out of his mind and reinforced his shields.
"No," he growled, angry at her presumption. Her face went chalk-white again, save for two feverish spots of color high on her cheekbones, and Nate swallowed hard at the flash of fear he sensed from her, so strong it was almost nauseating. Her mood swings could be exciting things to watch if you weren't the reason. Or the target. "You want to know something, you ask. I know you're upset--"
"Of course I'm upset!" she snapped, indignant again. But the uncertainty was still there, twinned with anger, and Nate wondered at it. "Am I supposed to be congratulating you? You slept with Zara!"
"Who hasn't?" Nate said. It was a particularly feeble attempt at a joke, and Zara would either have laughed or removed a few choice pieces of his anatomy. Clare only made a frustrated noise and turned away again, her shoulders shaking. Nate hesitated for a moment and then took a step closer to her, wondering if he was about to make the situation worse. "Clare, I told you, I was drunk. I didn't intend it to happen--"
She rounded on him so fast that he stumbled backwards. "I thought you had better taste than that!" she snarled.
He tried very hard not to laugh, he really did. But he couldn't manage it, and Clare stiffened, visibly seething. "Fine," she snapped, her voice trembling with something he realized was disgust. "I hope it was a hell of a night, Guthrie, I really do." She turned her back on him again, and all the humor in the situation vanished.
Another few shreds of self-control deserted him, and he reached out, grabbing her arm and ignoring the angry curse she spat at him. "Pardon me for interrupting your tantrum, Commander," he snarled, "but what happened with Zara last night had nothing to do with you." Clare tried to pull away, but he tightened his grip, suddenly furious with her. What right did she have to react like this, when she'd never--when he'd always--
Clare went rigid, her eyes wider than he'd ever seen them as they searched his. "W-What?" she breathed unsteadily. "What was that?"
The link was still open on her end. And he hadn't managed to reinforce his shields all that much.
Had he actually let that slip?
Judging by the look on her face, he'd let that slip.
But he couldn't have let that slip, a little voice gibbered at him from the back of his mind. He'd cut the thought off, just like he always did, and it didn't matter what she thought she'd heard, because he would never have let her hear it. Never. Patchy shields or no patchy shields. So she had to be imagining things, or maybe he wasn't hearing her right, but she certainly hadn't--
"Oh, I did," Clare said faintly. "I definitely did." Her eyes were still too wide, the expression in them now almost dazed. At a loss for words, Nate looked away, and Clare made a sound that might have been a laugh. "Well?" she asked, her voice high and strained. "Are you going to say anything, or should we both pretend I didn't catch that?"
Nate swallowed. "Is that an option?" he asked hoarsely, meeting her eyes again and flinching as he sensed her shock beginning to give way to unease. He'd liked it better when she was shouting at him; that, he knew how to deal with.
"I was being facetious."
"I know." Of all the times to let this happen! he raged at himself futilely. It would have been a stupid, awkward slip of the mind under normal circumstances, but right now, while they were both trying to deal with Stef and everything he'd done, it was liable to be the straw that broke the camel's back. He'd been so stupid not to let her walk away.
Clare shook her head slowly, her eyes never budging from his face. "Next time you meditate," she said tightly, just a trace of the usual acerbity in her voice, "maybe you should have a little talk with your subconscious. Timing like this is never accidental."
"Point," Nate said numbly. He'd have to remember to do that, when he finally settled down enough to meditate again. If he ever did. Clare kept watching him, as if she expected him to come out with some new revelation, and he shifted awkwardly, letting go of her. "Clare," he started hesitantly, still not sure what to say, "I didn't want to--"
"What?" Clare said roughly. Uncertainty tore at him, and as he gazed down at her unhappily, her expression hardened. "What, Nate?"
Nate took a deep, shuddering breath, clenching his hands into fists at his sides to still their shaking. "I don't know," he admitted, the words coming out a little wild. He'd never even rehearsed this moment in his mind, because he'd never intended to tell her. They were friends, partners, and he'd always told himself that was enough, that he didn't need to push for anything more. "I really don't know what to say to you."
Clare gave another not-quite laugh. It was far from a happy sound. "You know," she said, "I actually think the feeling's mutual."
"I just--I didn't intend this to happen. I never meant to tell you." Nate bit his lip, remembering Zara's little crack about courtly love. Maybe it was a little too close to the truth after all.
"Oh, that's just great," Clare snapped bitterly, but her eyes were too bright suddenly. Suspiciously bright. "What, were you planning a deathbed confession?"
"Don't," Nate said tiredly. He was exhausted, damn it. Too many emotional ups and down in the course of a few days, and the week wasn't precisely looking up, to put it mildly. "Please don't. Do you have to be so damned sarcastic all the time?"
Clare swallowed visibly, then rubbed at her eyes and looked away. Something flashed down the link from her end, a flare of strangely anguished, mostly self-directed anger. "Fine," she said, her voice breaking. "I won't."
And she vanished in a flash of blue-silver light. For a long moment, Nate stared blankly at the place where she'd been, and then swore wearily, sitting down hard on the mats and letting his head fall forward onto his knees.
"Stupid," he muttered desolately. "You stupid bastard."
***
Nate had teleported from the Tower to his parents' New York apartment often enough that he hardly needed to visualize the front hall any longer. Sloppiness on his part, maybe, but he rarely ran into problems. His mother very carefully kept the area around the front door clear of every obstruction, sort of a 'safe area' for people teleporting in; it had been her personal policy, ever since the time Sulven had nearly brained herself on the open closet door.
Despite the familiarity of the route, he was tired enough that it was more of an effort that it should have been. A wave of dizziness hit him as soon as he reemerged, and Nate leaned back against the wall, breathing heavily as he waited for his vision to clear. A taxi would have been a much better idea, he told himself wearily, pulling himself back upright and doing a light scan of the apartment. That was harder than it should have been, too.
"Mom?" he called a bit hoarsely, sensing her thoughts.
"In here, Nate!" was the cheery response from the vicinity of the kitchen. Nate smiled faintly and stopped to hang up his uniform jacket before he headed down the hall.
"Hi, Mom," he said, stepping into the large, airy kitchen and stopping short as his other self's memory of the kitchen as it had looked fifteen years ago came flooding up out of nowhere. The memory wasn't all that pleasant, given the fact that he'd been bleeding to death from a gunshot wound to the chest at the time. No, not him, Nate reminded himself harshly. The other him. "Something smells good," he said a bit feebly.
"Well, I should hope so," Dana Hawkes-Guthrie said with a chuckle, giving the salad one last desultory toss before she came over and hugged him tightly. "Hi, sweetheart," she murmured, projecting gentle concern, and Nate closed his eyes, almost relaxing. "How are you doing?" she finally taking, taking a half-step back and looking up at him intently.
"I'm fine," Nate said automatically. She raised an eyebrow and he flushed a little, shifting under the sudden sharpness of her gaze. "I'm dealing with it," he amended, and then sighed heavily as she gave him a faintly skeptical smile. "Okay, not very well."
"That's better," his mother said calmly, although her gaze was troubled as she patted him lightly on the cheek and then went over and took a bottle of wine out of the refrigerator. "Honesty is always the best policy," Dana said almost whimsically, pushing white-streaked brown hair back behind one ear. "It requires much less damage control after the fact."
A strangled laugh slipped out before Nate could stop it. "Don't I wish," he muttered, and only then noticed what she was wearing. The long black skirt and green silk blouse seemed a little dressy for a quiet family dinner. She was wearing make-up, too. She almost never wore make-up. Nate frowned fitfully, hoping his father hadn't forgotten to mention this was a dinner party or something. He really didn't feel up to much company tonight.
"What was that?" Dana asked, struggling with the corkscrew.
"Nothing," Nate said hurriedly, really not wanting to get into it. He cast a measuring look around the kitchen, surprised by the general neatness. His mother usually got very messy when she cooked. "Anything I can do to help?" he offered.
Dana pursed her lips thoughtfully. "Chicken's in the oven, dessert's in the fridge, and the salad dressing doesn't go on until right before I serve it." She gave him a teasing smile, and finally managed to pop the cork. "No, nothing to distract yourself with, honey. Too bad. Want a glass of wine?"
"Sure," Nate said, and came over as she filled a glass for him. As he passed the door to the dining room, he glanced in at the table, and his stomach twisted. "Mom," he said tentatively, "you've got four places set?" He knew the other wasn't for his sister, because Alison was off in the field - Algeria this month, he thought - and wasn't precisely in the position to come home for dinner. Unless his father had sent an XSE teleporter out to get her--
"Your father figured we needed a fourth," his mother said guilelessly, handing him the glass. "I think he has poker in mind for after dinner." Nate took a nervous gulp of the wine - which was nice, if a little dry - and she frowned at him, obviously picking up on his reaction. "Okay, what's the matter?"
Nate forced himself to relax his grip on the glass a little. "He didn't--I mean, did he invite Clare?" It occurred to him as soon as he said it that he could have just plucked the identity of their 'company' out of her mind and saved himself from having to explain. Crap, he thought peevishly. He needed to get some sleep before his mind stalled on him completely.
"No," Dana said slowly, filling her own glass and giving him a peculiar look. "Why would it have been a bad thing if he had?"
"Well," Nate muttered distractedly, "I just didn't--um, no reason," he trailed off feebly as she frowned at him again.
"Tell me another one," she said. "Did you and Clare have some kind of argument?" Their empathic link quivered with real worry, laced with a profound regret that made look away, rubbing doggedly at his suddenly stinging eyes. "Not about this business with Stefano, I hope."
"No--it wasn't that." Realizing as soon as the words were out of his mouth that he'd just tacitly admitted he and Clare had argued, Nate tried not to grimace.
His mother chewed on her lower lip for a moment, and Nate could sense her mulling whether or not to push him for more details. "I won't nag," she finally said with a sigh, taking a sip of her wine. "Just so long as there was no hitting."
Nate gave a guilty start. "Um, well--"
"I know you and she and the twins call it sparring, but don't think I don't know that's just to make the rest of us feel better." She folded her arms across her chest and leaned back against the counter, a faint smile playing on her lips. "I'd like to know just where we parental types went wrong that you all respond to stress by jumping in a sparring circle and smacking each other around."
"Sulven always thought it was healthy," Nate offered, too relieved that she wasn't going to push him about Clare to mind the teasing.
"She would," Dana said a bit darkly, and then crossed the distance between them, reaching up and laying a faintly glowing hand along the side of his face. Nate managed not to jump as his bruises and scratches twinged once more, then seemed to vanish. His muscles were still sore, but he knew that was due to fatigue, nothing his mother's healing power could do anything about. "I was wondering why I was sensing all these little aches and pains from you."
"I'm okay," Nate said, managing a suitably grateful smile. She opened her mouth, and he sensed the question before he could ask it. "Clare is, too." Well, Clare would probably be pretty damned sore in the morning, but it had been her choice to run the sparring program for that long, and Nate doubted she'd have let his mother heal her even if she'd been here. It would have defeated the whole masochistic purpose of the exercise, after all.
"Well, I'm glad to hear that, at least," Dana said wryly, letting her hand fall back to her side. Shaking her head, she went over and opened the oven door to check on dinner, lifting the foil cover over the casserole dish and sniffing experimentally. "I just hope the two of you kissed and made up." Nate nearly choked on the sip of wine he'd just taken, and she straightened, looking at him with a mixture of suspicion and amusement. "Is there something you want to tell me?"
He was saved from having to answer when he sensed the appearance of two more people in the apartment, and the little ripple on the astral plane that meant a psi had teleported them. One was his father, and the other was--Nate hesitated, flushing bright red. Well, it wasn't Clare, he told himself weakly. That was something, wasn't it?
"Honey, ah'm home!" his father called sunnily.
His mother rolled her eyes. "In here, darling!" she called back sardonically, and smiled a bit sadly at Nate. Your father's trying very hard to be peppy today, she thought at him, and Nate took another gulp of his wine to hide the pang he felt at her words. Exhaustion was no excuse for self-absorption; he needed to remember he wasn't the only one struggling with complex emotions about what had happened with Stef.
His father appeared, smiling widely. He'd managed to lose the uniform somewhere since Nate had seen him this afternoon, and as usual, he looked far more comfortable in civilian clothes. "Smells great, Danes," Sam said cheerfully, crossing the kitchen to give her a kiss.
Behind him, Domino lingered in the doorway, a wry smile flickering across her face as she made eye contact with Nate. She was a lot frailer than she had been, and since Uncle Nathan had died, her hair had gone completely silver, but her violet eyes were as keen as they'd always been. Nate reflected that his mother wasn't the only one he should have been worried would see right through him.
"Says the man who left me to get it ready all by myself," Dana scolded, giving her husband a mock-threatening look before she went over and hugged Domino. "Hey, Dom," she said affectionately. "I'm glad you came."
"Well, I was free this evening, and I haven't inflicted my company on you all for a while," Domino said easily. "You look tired, Dana."
"Hah! Look who's talking." His mother gave Domino a stern look, and Nate reflected that she was pretty much taking her life in her hands, trying to mother Aunt Dom, of all people. "Do I need to get the dictionary again and rub your nose in the definition of 'retired'?"
Domino gave her a baleful look. "You and Scott. He's cut my teaching hours back at the Academy, can you believe that? Interfering old jackass." She turned her attention to Nate, her expression almost challenging. "Well, are you going to give me a hug, kid, or do I have to come over there and spank you for being antisocial?"
Certain his face had to be impossibly red at this point, Nate did as he was told. "Hey, Aunt Dom," he said a bit nervous as he sensed her amusement, very clearly directed at him. He was almost sure he didn't want to know what was funny.
Domino didn't let him in on the joke, just patted him lightly on the back and let him go. "Your mother looks tired, boy," she said more quietly, "but you look like shit. Hard week, I hear."
"Not one I'd want to do over again, at least," Nate said, forcing a strained smile to his lips.
"No, I'd imagine not." Domino gave his mother an inquisitive look. "Anything I can do to help with dinner, Dana?"
"No, no, you're a guest, remember? Though I do need to borrow Sam for a second." Dana filled another glass of wine, handed it to Domino, and then smiled blithely at Nate. "Honey, why don't you and Dom go sit on the balcony or something while supper finishes? It's such a nice day."
Nate gave her a hunted look, but led Domino out through the dining room, all too aware of the fact that his godmother was chuckling softly under her breath as they went. "This is a conspiracy, isn't it?" he muttered darkly, pulling the balcony door aside for her to step through.
"You were always such a bright boy," Domino said fondly, settling herself in the most comfortable of the deck chairs. Nate leaned against the railing, staring blindly out at the city, and she sighed softly. "So," she said after a brief silence. "I don't need to be a telepath to tell you're not happy."
He gave a humorless laugh. "Is it that obvious?"
"I'm not going to push you to talk about DaCosta," Domino went on placidly, as if he hadn't spoken. "If you want to, I'll listen, but I figure you'll get enough of that from Psych Division once you get back from leave."
"I haven't even thought of that," Nate said, his stomach sinking at the idea of a Psych telepath poking and prodding at him to see how he was dealing with bringing his childhood friend down on terrorism charges. If they'd sensed a problem at the debriefing, they weren't just going to leave it alone and hope that three days leave put it right.
"Mmm," Domino said sympathetically. "Can't have command-level officers cracking under the strain. Very bad PR."
"Shit," Nate muttered, rubbing at his eyes as his vision did one of those unpleasant little fading-in-and-out tricks. If he was going to be facing a Psych evaluation when he got back from leave, he definitely needed to spend some serious time meditating, get his head back together. Being taken off field duty would be a real drag.
"I wouldn't worry too much. They won't take you out of the field unless you give them a very good reason." Domino tilted her head, studying him calmly. "That being said," she went on, "I do have one question for you."
"Shoot," Nate said, and mustered another weak smile. "Metaphorically, I mean." It was a very old joke, but Domino still smiled.
And then promptly shattered any impulse he had to make jokes. "What did you do to my daughter?" she inquired mildly.
Nate nearly fell over the railing. "I don't--what do you mean?" he stammered, setting his glass down on the arm of another chair so he wouldn't drop it over the edge. Besides, he thought he'd had quite enough wine for the moment. Something was telling him he was going to need what was left of his wits about him if he was going to survive this conversation.
"I thought the question was fairly straightforward?"
"You--" She was still terribly amused by something, Nate realized dazedly. Not that he was complaining. Aunt Dom was on his list of People Never to Piss Off, simply because he knew she'd find some way to get her revenge if he did. The fact that she was long-retired and no longer able to beat his ass into the ground personally only meant she'd be more creative about it. "You saw her this afternoon?" he finally managed.
"She was waiting for me in my office at the Academy after my last class today," Domino said drolly. "The first words out of her mouth were 'What is it with men?'" Nate winced, and Domino laughed softly. "If it's any consolation, I guessed Harry, DaCosta, and your father before I got to you. But the shade of red she turned when I mentioned your name was a dead giveaway."
"She was angry?" Hadn't he wanted that, though? At least he had some experience dealing with Clare's temper. What had really thrown him for a loop was that she'd run from him. It was so unlike her to back away from anything--
"More unsettled than angry. Mostly angry at herself, too, I think," Domino said thoughtfully. Nate mulled that over, startled to hear something that confirmed his impression from earlier. "What did you say to her?" Domino went on, sounding honestly curious. "It takes a lot to fluster her, and she was very definitely flustered."
"I didn't really--" Say anything, he meant to say, but Domino's eyes had suddenly widened, and he trailed off uncertainly.
"You didn't--" Domino stopped and cleared her throat, then took a sip of wine, as if to fortify herself. "Please tell me you didn't pick today, of all days, to tell her you're in love with her?"
"Oh, for fuck's sake!" Nate nearly shouted, hands clenching spasmodically on the railing. He sensed his parents reacting to the volume of his voice, and bit his lip, wrestling himself back under control. "Is Clare the only one who didn't know that?" he went on a bit more moderately, trying very hard not to snarl at her.
Domino didn't even blink. "Calm down," she said severely, but her eyes were twinkling suspiciously. "I wouldn't go that far. Besides, I'm not sure Clare didn't know, either."
"She didn't act like she did," Nate muttered, struggling with his temper. So he was a bit on edge. That was no excuse for being rude to Aunt Dom.
"There's a difference between not knowing something and not being willing to admit it to yourself," Domino said, and got up from her chair to join him at the railing. "I'm assuming it just slipped out," she said gently.
"Close enough," he said hoarsely, not seeing any need to elaborate on the exact circumstances.
"Hmm," Domino said, laying a hand over his and squeezing gently. "There's hope for you yet."
Nate blinked down at her, completely bewildered at this point. "What?" he said rather stupidly. She was actually looking pleased--what the hell was there to be pleased about? He wished she'd share.
"I worry sometimes about how much you repress things. You and my darling daughter are a lot alike that way."
Nate gave a hollow laugh, but didn't bother to debate the point. Domino was right, even if he and Clare had vastly different reasons for keeping things to themselves. The fact that they usually respected that reserve in each other was one of the reasons they got along as well as they did. "I picked a hell of a day to stop repressing."
"Maybe, but it's done," Domino pointed out bluntly, looking and sounding rather more like the ruthlessly practical Aunt Dom he knew best. "The question you need to answer now is where you go from here."
"Except I don't know what to do." That was putting it mildly. Not only did he have no idea what to do, but running away to a Tibetan monastery was sounding pretty damned attractive.
Domino shook her head at him. "You don't have to do anything right this second," she said, sounding a little exasperated with him for the first time. "You have three days of leave coming, right? So try and relax, and think about what you want to do now." She grinned almost wickedly. "You will have to talk to Clare about it all at some point, though. However long you manage to put it off, the time will inevitably come."
"I know." He'd been avoiding the thought quite deliberately. Fumbling his way through this wasn't an option, not after how badly he'd messed things up. At least a full night's sleep was called for before he even started to think about talking to Clare. Maybe even two.
"Just think very carefully, Nathan." She'd never called him by anything but his full name. 'Nate' was what she'd called Uncle Nathan, after all. "She's my daughter," Domino went on matter-of-factly, "and I love you as if I'd given birth to you myself, but if I catch the two of you indulging in some sort of codependent nonsense, I'll take you both over my knee. Either do it right, or don't do it at all. Clear?"
Nate coughed, but Domino stared at him expectantly, and he relented. "Clear."
Domino looked satisfied. "Romance isn't everything," she said, patting his hand and turning her attention back to the city, a faint smile on her face as if she were relishing the view. "I always looked at it as the icing on the cake. It's the partnership that counts, and the two of you do have that." She shot him a sly sideways look, grinning again. "Even if she's a control freak, emotionally speaking, and you have your doormat tendencies."
"Aunt Dom!"
Domino laughed, and slid her arm around him. "You're such a nice boy," she said affectionately. He stiffened instinctively, unable to help himself, and she sighed but didn't let go. "It'll be okay, you know."
Nate could sense her willing him to believe what she was saying, but he couldn't quite let himself be convinced. "I wish I could believe that," he said heavily.
"Don't be such a pessimist," she scolded gently. "You're tired, and you're reacting to a lot more than what happened with Clare. You need to get some rest. Things will look better in the morning, I promise."
"But--"
"No buts. Let's go in and see what's taking dinner so long."
to be continued...
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