Cold Fusion: Twelve Days, Ch 4
So this is a fairly short chapter, because if I didn't cut it where I did, it would end up being somewhere in the vicinity of fifteen thousand words instead of five, and as much as I like the long chapters (and I've decided I do rather like the long chapters), there is such a thing as too much. And there is some incredibly personal stuff coming up, backstory-wise, and I don't want to cut Chapter 4 too early too early and have to open 5 with things like…well, like suicide triggers, as a random (non-specific) example. (Not spoilers. Trigger warnings. Totally different.)
No road trip stuff in this chapter, sorry folks, but you get a lot of that in chapters 5 and 6. And this way, Chapter 5 will be up really soon, like maybe as early as a week from today, because it's already almost completely written! Yay!
A note about Ginger, the Friendly Mountain Man: he is in no way based off a grizzled old-timer it was my pleasure to meet while visiting relatives in West Virginia a few years ago. This guy was an absolute riot. He asked me what the difference between the Mountaineers and cheerios was, then told me one belonged in a bowl and the other didn't. The joke itself wasn't that funny, but his face while he told it was just so delighted that I nearly died. Ginger is not based off him. Nope. Not at all.
Thank you so much to everyone who reviews. And everyone who rants with me over PMs. You are spectacular. I love you. The end.
COOKIES FOR EVERYONE.
Chapter 4
He should be able to be back before dark.
Famous last words. Two miles later he's still going strong, but now it's uphill and he's stuck in trees again, and it's getting harder to navigate even though when he turns around in the clear areas he can still see where he came from. Luckily, the pines are thick and close together and there's not more than a couple inches of snow in most places, so walking isn't too hard.
When he stops to catch his breath and look around, all he sees are silent trees standing close together, lichen-covered stones jutting from the ground between them. Nothing moves. The treetops bend with the wind, but he's mostly sheltered from that, and down by the ground, the air is almost totally still. He's alone.
It makes him profoundly uncomfortable.
Think about something else. Well, there's walking. There's walking through trees, that's one thing, and then there's walking through trees up a mountain without a path while there's snow on the ground in Colorado while wearing the disguise generator and that's something else entirely. Usually he doesn't need to look at his feet when he walks-Megamind, of all people, always always knows where his feet are and where he is putting them and if it will move-but apparently the rules for walking are slightly different on rocks and small crunchy frozen shrubs. Also, his feet are not quite in the same places as Pavel's in relation to knees and bone ratios and things of that nature, and he's stumbled four times, and he's had about enough of that.
The disguise generator isn't strictly necessary at this point. Its muttering flash touches the green needles and paints them blue, but even the soft sound doesn't go very far in this air, and great, now he's back on the silence again. He huffs, irritated with himself, and glances around.
Then he freezes. Something is moving in the trees. Some kind of animal.
On one hand, he's not alone in the forest. On the other hand, he's not alone in the forest. He isn't sure how he feels about this.
He can only see its back moving up the hill on the other side of a fallen pine and some rocks. Low to the ground, it's too short to be a deer but too large to be anything else. Bear, he thinks, but it's too small for that and it doesn't move like he thinks a bear would. He doesn't breathe. He's downwind of whatever it is; it doesn't know he's there and it's only thirty yards away.
His fingers creep towards where his de-gun should be, but no, no, it's still in his suitcase in the cabin. Stupid!
Then it moves clear of the brush and he sees it-an absolutely enormous cat, with a long thick tail and dark ears, its heavy winter coat blending perfectly with the ruddy brown of the pine trunks.
He sucks in a reflexive breath, disbelief mingling with fear, and it turns its head and looks straight at him, stops moving with one foot still raised.
Megamind and the lion stare at one another for a long few seconds. Then it puts its foot down and stares harder, ducks its head a little as if trying to get a clearer look at him. Megamind doesn't move.
But I was joking, he thinks dizzily, I was joking about the mountain lions; I didn't mean-aren't these things terribly threatened?
It turns slightly towards him, moving slowly, its great feet making no noise at all in the snow, and for the first time in Megamind's life, all thought stops. Tension gathers in its rear legs when he closes his mouth, which has been hanging open, and it turns the rest of the way in his direction.
It's the largest animal he's ever seen, and it's close. Bigger than any dog, even the ones York keeps with him. And it could kill him.
One rear leg comes up as it turns and it hesitates, moving its head again to see him better, and there's one heart-stopping moment when it's facing him head-on before he realizes what's actually going on here.
It's only turning around. It's been watching him so closely not because it wants to attack him but because it's not sure what he is or if he poses a threat. It's as surprised to see him as he is to see it, and for a moment he's able to look at it with a sort of wondering shock instead of fear before it simply finishes its turn and trots back the way it had come.
He lets out the breath he hadn't realized he had been holding, as well as a softly fervent, "Shit." It's certainly not an eloquent exclamation and nowhere near his usual standard, but it's honestly the only word in his head. He's grinning like a lunatic.
His next thought is, I wish I'd had the camera with me.
Then his cell phone rings and he nearly jumps out of his skin.
"Sir?"
He breathes, collapsing back against the tree he's been standing under, weak-kneed. "Minion. It's you. Why are you calling? Is everything all right?"
The reply sounds hesitant. "I was going to ask you that."
"I'm fine." Surprisingly enough. He frowns. "Why?"
"I-I don't know, Sir. I just suddenly thought I should call you."
A tinny voice from far away comes through the line: "You're stalling! C'mon, make a move before I die of old age."
Megamind has to blink a few times. Everything just seems incredibly surreal. He's just finished a surprise encounter with a wild mountain lion, of all things, and now suddenly he's talking to Minion, which is such a normal thing to do that it's almost stupefying. "What on earth was that?"
"That was Scott." Megamind can hear his friend rolling his eyes. "He thinks I'm calling you to ask for help with Scrabble."
Well, if that doesn't just beat all. "You're...playing Scrabble with Wayne?"
"He's surprisingly good at it," Minion says dryly. "He's winning, actually. Stuck 'xebec' on a triple word score. I nearly hit him."
"I wouldn't recommend you do that. You'd break your hand and half the parts you'd need to fix it have been discontinued." Megamind shakes his head. "What is a 'xebec'?"
"Apparently it was a kind of Mediterranean sailing ship."
"Minion I am sitting on the best word of all time and I am not a patient man."
"It had better not be 'bumfuckery' again! You know that isn't a word."
"Hey man, you're the one playing all the 'U's, what else am I s'posed to do with them?"
"Well I don't know! You pulled 'xebec' out of thin air; surprise me!"
Megamind has to clap a hand to his mouth to keep from laughing-the state he's in, any laughter is going to be embarrassingly high-pitched. "Well, Minion, I'll let you get back to your game. Everything is fine here."
"Okay." The little fish sounds mildly disgruntled. "Call me if something goes wrong."
"I will. Thank you, Minion."
He hangs up, then stares at his phone for a moment. Minion is playing Scrabble with Wayne. The mind boggles. Ah, well, he thinks, looking up towards the top of the mountain and trying to shake off the adrenaline from his brief encounter with the local wildlife and his scare with his phone, up we go.
Half a mile later, he's finally struggling out of the trees when his phone chirps at him, alerting him to a text message.
tell me unaus isn't a word
He grins and turns his attention to the brightly-lit screen, trying not to think about how it's getting dark outside and he's three miles from where he started and there's a mountain lion somewhere out there. It's a kind of two-toed sloth.
DAMMIT SIR
He really does laugh, then-Minion swearing is always funny-and then he looks up and stifles a yell, his heart drumming a frenetic tattoo against his ribcage all over again. The man with the truck isn't half so composed, and lets out a bellowing "Jayzus Keeryst!"
Megamind leaps back, slips, and bruises his tailbone on a snow-covered stone. For a moment, he and the red-bearded man stare at each other with eyes like saucers. Eventually he laughs awkwardly and starts to get to his feet, but the other man stumbles backwards, white-faced.
"Sorry," Megamind says, "I-I wasn't expecting to see anybody up here-"
"Yer one o' them space aliens."
He stops dead. "I beg your pardon?"
The man shakes his head, never taking his eyes away from the startled creature opposite him. "Jim said he seen 'em, but I never did…I never…"
The disguise generator. He must have forgotten to turn it back on. Slowly, he raises his hands. "I, uh. I come in peace?"
He stares at him for another long minute, taking in the wool coat, the boots, the scarf, and then he starts to laugh. "I jist bet you do," he wheezes. "Criminy, son, you look colder'n a well digger's ass. Where you from?"
Megamind points. "Staying with the Underhills," he says, trying for an approximation of the man's accent. Nonthreatening. I am nonthreatening. "You know the place?"
"Bob and Lucy? I oughta know the place, their youngest's my son-in-law."
Megamind lowers his hands and replaces his disguise. "Well, sir," he says slowly, "I'd be real appreciative if you'd give me a lift. Got myself a little turned around."
The old man whistles between his teeth. "That's a nice piece of equipment," he replies, nodding at the watch. "Sure, yer welcome to come on in the truck if y'kin fit that head of yours in. I'll drop you at Bob's."
Megamind climbs gratefully into the truck. "Name's Pavel," he says.
"Just toss the rifle in the back, 't isn't loaded. Folks call me Ginger."
How apt. "Can't imagine why," he says dryly, and Ginger chuckles.
"You walk up here as the crow flies?"
"More or less."
"Drunk crow, then. Y'know there's a trail?" He turns the key in the ignition, and the engine turns over unhappily. "C'mon, old gel, c'mon, m'lady." Sputter. Wheeze. "C'mon, you sonuva two-dollar whore!"
The old truck rumbles reluctantly to life. Megamind eyes the gear shift warily-it's little more than a rusty stick duct-taped to the control rod.
"Just got to know how to talk to her," Ginger says happily, patting the dashboard with a fond smile.
"Heh heh heh," says Megamind, searching in vain for a seat belt. He finds a length of rough rope instead. "Uh…"
"Oh, just tie that to the other one down left. Couple of half-hitches and then take the extra over to the s-hook on yer right. Or don't. Ain't more'n a couple miles down the road."
Megamind grapples first with these strange instructions and then with the two ropes, finally opting to just hold onto them for dear life. "Are there headlights?" he ventures to ask. He can see perfectly well in the grey half-light, but humans…
"Busted 'em out in oh three, but don't worry." Ginger sends him a comforting grin as he puts the car in gear. "I know these switchbacks like the back of m'hand."
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
Roxanne has the door open when Megamind finally stumbles onto the porch. "Where have you been? Why weren't you answering your phone? It's been hours! I've been worried sick!"
"Sorry, sorry!" He stamps and kicks against the stoop, knocking the snow off onto the mat before coming inside. "I tried to call you, but Ginger's cabin doesn't get cell phone reception."
"And just who," she says flatly, "is Ginger?"
"This old trapper up yonder-ffff, just up the road a ways. Bleah." He works his mouth a little, massages his cheeks. He's going to be picking that accent out of his teeth for at least an hour.
Roxanne stares at him. "What is wrong with your voice? You sound like something out of the Beverly Hillbillies."
"I know," he says carefully. "My Uncle Bill was backcountry, he always said that his kind of people trusts other backcountry folk more readily than outsiders, and language is always the first barrier. I hiked up Sun Peak, met this guy at the top-he freaked out, of course. Apparently he never believed his cousin's stories about space aliens. Here, take this. You will not believe the night I've had." He hands her a warm canvas bag. "Don't let that tip over."
Roxanne takes it, unsure whether to ask about the bag or the comment about space aliens. "He saw you?"
"I wasn't exactly expecting to see anybody at the top of a scenic overlook in Colorado in the middle of December." He rolls his eyes, shrugging out of his coat and hanging it in the wardrobe. It's caked with snow; he leaves the doors open so it can dry. "It's okay, though, apparently his 'Cousin Jim' out in New Mexico has been abducted five or six times. He thought I was hilarious. Took about ten polaroids with me. He promised he wouldn't send them to his cousin until at least February."
"Change your disguise, you still look like you're about to go trekking through the Himalayas."
He switches to a blue shirt and iron-grey jeans. "Better?"
"Much." She holds up the bag. "What is this?"
He grins at her. "That, dear lady, is food. It looks like roadkill but it's really good, trust me."
"What a ringing endorsement. What happened to finding dinner?"
"I found it," he says, weaving a little and leaning heavily on the arm of the couch. "That's it right there. Look, don't worry about Ginger, I explained things to him and when he finally stopped laughing he swore-on what I'm pretty sure was a copy of Poor Richard's Almanac, but I'm not entirely certain-he swore he wouldn't tell a soul about me."
"And you believed him?"
"Well, we sealed the deal with some kind of liquor, and according to Uncle Bill that's a solid pact. No idea what was in it, it tasted like death on a shin-gule." He stifles a hiccup. "Judging by the way I'm reacting, I think it may have been corn. What is it with you people and corn? I don't get it."
She shakes her head and goes over to the little table, unwrapping the furs as she goes. Inside is a hot tin pail. "I thought you couldn't drink?"
"I can't. I'm going to be very sick in a moment, that's why there's so much stew." She turns and stares at him, and he offers her a wan smile from where he's still bracing himself against the sofa. He really doesn't look good. "I'll be hungry all over again."
Oddly enough, he doesn't sound bothered about this at all. Roxanne blinks at him, uncertain. "You want me to wait for you?"
He shrugs. "If you aren't too hungry, that would be nice." Then he frowns. "Please excuse me. Bathroom."
As he reels away, Roxanne falls backwards onto the sofa, bemused. She had woken up just as the sun was setting, fully three hours after she'd gone to sleep, and tried to call Megamind with no answer. Worried, she had tried again, only to have it go straight to voicemail. And now he's back, with mysterious supper from a mysterious trapper named Ginger, cheerfully getting sick in the toilet.
He's back about ten minutes later, still looking slightly green around the gills but bright-eyed and chipper regardless.
"Feeling better?" she asks, and he nods.
"Much better," he replies, "but hungry again."
"You're a lunatic," she tells him, but finds bowls and a mason jar of utensils in the small cupboard above the table.
"I'm the lunatic you're looking for," he quips, and she's glad her back is turned so he can't see her trying to quash her goofy smile-she's determined to remain irritated with him at the very least. She had been really worried.
"So, let me get this straight. You hiked up that mountain across the valley, met a mountain man, went home with this mountain man, had dinner with him, and then he drove you here?"
"Well, his daughter married Bob and Lucy's son, so he knows the area. I asked him for a lift here, but halfway home he said my stomach sounded like a sow bear and offered to feed me so it'd quit growling at him. I wanted to know if he knew a good place to eat around here, but he said he could do better than any, and I quote, 'highfalutin classed-up watering hole.'"
Roxanne snorts, bites back a laugh, but her lips are twitching when she brings the bowls to the table and she suspects it's a lost cause. Staying upset at Megamind is impossible, honestly.
"So yes," he continues, "we went back to his cabin and had a lovely supper during which I ignored my astonishing lack of alcohol tolerance and he told a number of lewd jokes which I am now doing my level best to forget."
Truth be told, she's still inclined to be worried about him. But he looks and sounds all right now and he knows his body's abilities better than she does; despite his penchant for hiding his injuries, if has an appetite, he probably really is fine.
Besides, maybe she's hungrier than she had thought she was, but whatever's in the pail is so absolutely delicious it's distracting. "What is in this?"
"Raccoon, mostly. There's some deer, some bear, pheasant, turkey. The really dark pieces are skunk."
She chokes.
"Well, think about it," Megamind says reasonably, chewing with obvious relish, "what does a skunk run from?"
She swallows. "Nothing?"
"Exactly!" He beams at her. "They just waddle around getting fat. Butcher them right, and they're about the tenderest meat you'll ever find."
"I'm not sure that's a word."
"Most tender. Whatever. Ginger said tenderest." He shrugs, and they eat in companionable silence for a while.
As they're finishing up, he says, "It's good stuff, whatever's in it. I did ask him what seasonings he used."
She fights back a grin. "And he said?"
Megamind clears his throat. "'Couple o' splashes of pepper, a whole heap of salt, couple cans o' baked beans, few splashes of wor-chester-shire sauce, stewed t'maters, some Idaho Reds, and about a half a can of mustard.'"
Roxanne, who had completely lost it at the literal pronunciation of Worcestershire, is nearly crying by the end of this gleeful recitation.
"I wish you'd been there," Megamind tells her, grinning. "You'd have liked him."
"I'm sure I would have," she sighs, wiping her eyes.
"You'd have made it at least twenty-three percent more hilarious, that's for sure. Oh, question-is Wayne particularly good at Scrabble?"
She snorts. "He's a Scrabble beast. He learns words specifically so that he can use them in-game."
He leans his chin on his hand. "Is that why your vocabulary is so broad?"
"Well, that and my continued association with you." She grins. "It's hilarious, it really is. He has absolutely zero tactical knowledge-forget chess, he loses at checkers every single time we play-and yet, somehow, he looks at a pile of useless Qs and Js and does he think, oh, my hand is crap? No. No, he plays freaking equijacent." She gives him the c'mon really look that always makes him want to laugh. "Equijacent? I didn't even know that was a word!" Then she cocks her head. "Why?"
"Heard from Minion earlier, he was in a mood. Apparently our large friend stuck 'xebec' on a triple word score."
Her lips twitch. "Those ships have lost me so many points. Oh, and never ever let him talk you into playing Monopoly, because he will win-I'm still trying to figure out how he cheats. What are we going to do about the dishes?"
"Give them to me," he tells her. "I've watched Minion do the washing up enough times, I know how to do it. And then I don't know about you, but I'm going to bed."
"Bed sounds good," Roxanne says. "You want me to set your PJs out for you?"
"Thank you, that would be nice."
By the time he's done giving the dishes a cursory scrubbing the bathroom sink, Roxanne is already in bed. He gets into his pajamas as quietly as he can, but as he's crawling under the covers Roxanne says, "How's your arm?"
He blinks. He honestly hasn't thought about it at all. "It hurts a little, I guess," he says. "Why?"
"You should probably put an actual bandage on it," she tells him. "I know you said it's okay, but it is a big cut."
"Tomorrow," he promises. "I'll do it tomorrow."
She rolls over and raises herself up onto one elbow. "I worry about you, you know. You've always downplayed your injuries."
It's difficult to tell in the darkness because he can't see her face, but she sounds honestly troubled. He cocks his head. "Does it bother you?"
"Of course it bothers me," she replies, and now she just sounds incredulous-amazed that he would think it wouldn't bother her. Megamind is quiet for a long moment. When he doesn't say anything, she sighs. "Do you remember the time Wayne threw you through that steel door?"
"No. I remember the time Metro Man threw me through a steel door." She rolls her eyes, but he insists, "It's an important distinction!"
"Okay, okay. Anyway. He threw you hard enough to break it down and you didn't get up. And then it was months since I'd heard from you, and I wasn't used to that. So I went to the prison and asked around, and do you know what I did when someone finally told me that the only time you wouldn't get up was if you were seriously injured? I cried."
Megamind sits up and stares at her. "But that was years ago," he says, astonished. "That was ages before we started doing this."
"That was the first time I ever watched you get hurt," she informs him coolly.
"That explains why you were so smiley when you woke up the next time!" he exclaims. "I never knew!"
Roxanne sits up now, too. "That would be why," she agrees. "I was so relieved you were okay. It's a good thing you tied me down, or I might have hugged you. To be fair," she adds, "I would have done the same thing if Wayne had been the one who got hurt, but if you think this whole 'me caring what happens to you' thing is new, you're wrong. Just so you know."
She lies back down, pulling him with her, but he's the one who rolls her over and covers her mouth with his and kisses her deeply, slipping his tongue between her lips to tease her. It's a sign of how very far they've come, that he's able to just kiss her like that without warning.
He breaks the kiss and lifts his head a little, but keeps her face cupped in his hands. "Thank you," he whispers. "That means more to me than you know."
She half-smiles and strokes her thumb over his goatee. "That's why I told you."
He smiles down at her, and she thinks, Oh, to hell with sleep, and tilts his head to the side with her thumb and cranes her neck upwards to press her mouth to his throat. That's as far as she goes, though; she isn't sure if he's tired.
He exhales, then kisses her again, more forcefully this time, and she has her answer. Sleep will be a long time coming to both of them, but only the bed is complaining.
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
In the middle of the night, Megamind's eyes fly open and he inhales sharply-then he blinks. "Why," he croaks, then swallows, "why are you up?"
Roxanne straightens but doesn't let go of his arm. He's curled on his side, facing the room, and she had been standing in front of him and shaking him. "Because you usually lash out when I startle you awake."
He blinks again. "Really?"
"You kick. Really hard, actually." She stares down at him apologetically, hugging herself and shivering a little. She isn't wearing much. He blinks and focuses; she isn't wearing anything. "I wasn't going to tell you, since you can't help it, but…"
He shudders and slowly sits up. "This wasn't that kind of dream, I think."
"By which you mean you remember this one?" She starts to hug herself-it's cold-only to find that he's reached out with one of his lightning-fast movements and caught her hands.
"Partly, yes. Please get back in bed. Now."
She resists the urge to tell him not to boss her and starts to walk back around the end of the bed, but he doesn't let go of her hands. "Megamind, I have to-" But something in his expression stops her, something hunted or haunted or somewhere in between. His brows are lowered but his eyes are wide. He tugs a little on her hands, and she isn't sure why but she doesn't put her foot down and make him let go; instead she crawls awkwardly onto the bed and across his legs still holding on. "What's wrong?" she asks, wriggling back down under the covers.
"It caught me again."
"What?"
"The thing that's always chasing me," he snaps. "It caught me again. Like last time. Usually I wake up in time, usually I don't wake you up."
She frowns. "But not this time."
"No." He's quiet for a long minute, trying to figure out how to explain, trying to decide if he even wants to. The dreams don't scare him-the shadow in them does. And only because he can't fight it, and because he knows what will happen if it catches him. He knows where it will send him.
Roxanne sounds hesitant. "Have you tried facing it?"
"Yes." It comes out sullen. "That just makes it worse."
"Do you know what it is?"
"I have a pretty good idea." He decides, on second thought, that he'd rather not talk about it. Even though that's probably the point. The shadow, whatever it is, seems intent on throwing him back into all the places he refuses to think about-usually it's space. Usually he's stuck in a bubble, rolling through utter emptiness.
But not this time. This time, it was the bathroom in his high school, that day. That day with the pen and the why not? It's almost, almost worse than space. In space he's lonely and grieving, but that day, he had known with all certainty that it was never going to stop; it was going to go on and on and on…
He shuts his eyes, squeezes them closed. No. We're not going there. When she kisses him he jerks away with an animal snarl from deep in his chest that startles them both.
He stares at her, aware that he's shaking, wanting to apologize, wanting very badly to be normal and functional and not afraid of the dark things in his mind but completely unable to speak.
Then her head tilts and her eyebrows pull together, and she says, "Hey. Hey, now. Come here," and she gently extricates one hand from his and puts it behind his head, scooting closer to him and pulling him towards her on the pillow-and that's no small feat; his head is heavy-and pressing her forehead against his. "I should have expected this would happen," she whispers, and he hisses a sigh. "This whole trip is going to be very hard. On both of us, but you especially. You're the one who stands to potentially lose the most."
She pauses for a minute, but he still doesn't respond. He really hadn't wanted to wake her up. He has been dealing with this quietly on his own without any problems-she can tell him as many times as she wants not to worry about asking for help, but sometimes he just wants to be able to not ask for help. This must be what she had meant when she'd told him she hates feeling like she needs to be rescued all the time. It makes him feel weak and stupid and needy, and he hates it.
When it becomes clear that he's not going to say anything, she continues, "And I mean, sure I'm here and sure you know I'm not planning on going anywhere, but that's on the surface." She flops her arm around his back and scoots closer still, so that they're lying front-to-front. "Maybe I'm just better at hiding it than you are," she muses. "But when I tell you that I'm amazed every time I look at you and think, oh wow, I'm dating this amazing wonderful man and we communicate and argue and laugh all the time and I'm living with him and he isn't grossed out when I forget to take my hair off the wall in the shower," she smiles in the dark, "I mean I'm seriously amazed. I told you before, I had decided to be content with being on my own."
He nods.
"And it was fun and all-I never had to worry about letting somebody else know where I was-but every now and again, something would happen and I'd wish I had someone to tell about it." She hooks a leg over his waist, not trying to be sexy, just pulling him a little bit closer. "Or I'd have a terrible day at the office and come home and just sit and be sad because I couldn't vent at anybody.
"And I know that's not anything like what you went through," she adds quickly, "I know that's kittens and rainbow sparkles compared to all the utter crap you've had to deal with. But just because I was content before we started dating doesn't mean I was happy."
They've ended up with her wrapped around him, and her body heat is incredible. Usually, he'd wriggle away a little; he doesn't like being so warm and sometimes she's a little bit too much for him, but right now all he wants to be is closer. Her heat and just the smell of her-it's overwhelming, she is so incredibly close and just so there and it's wonderful. He hums at her. That's the one thing he's never been able to understand about humans: they are all so warm. How they manage to burn so much energy and put out so much heat is totally beyond him.
"So, what I mean is-I know. Kind of. I kind of know what it means to tell yourself to make do with what you've got, and I know what it is to be content with that. But I also know what it means to be content with being alone."
"Not alone," he protests. "You had Jo and Hal. And Wayne. And other friends, surely."
She chuckles. "And you had Minion." Her arms around him tighten ever so slightly. "We both know it's not the same."
He shuts his eyes. "I suppose not. I was doing a lot better for a while there, I really was." His mouth twists. "I really didn't want to wake you up."
"You don't have to be embarrassed-"
"Of course I have to be embarrassed!" he exclaims. "I'm having all kinds of nightmares because I'm afraid to be lonely? How sad is that?"
"Honey, from what you remember and what I can tell of the way your mind works, you belong to a social species. You're not designed for isolation any more than I am." She shrugs. "I think it's totally reasonable for your subconscious to be running in circles going oh no we're gonna crash! Aaagh!"
He grins. "'Aaagh'?"
"That's what I said. Aaagh." She yawns and lets go of him, nudges at his shoulder. "Roll over. I wanna be big spoon."
He rolls his eyes but does as she asks, smiling when she hums appreciatively and presses close along his back. It's not a perfect fit-their heights are similar but his torso is very long, so she loses contact with him just below her hips and has to settle for tangling her feet in his spindly legs. Still, her head fits pretty well into the curve of his neck under his skull and he's finally grown used to her breathing on him. She yawns again, hugely. "So don't be silly, 'kay? Don't worry 'bout waking me up. I know. Still dream about falling sometimes, makes me all panicky and weird. Less now, though."
There's a pause.
"Hey. Roxanne?"
"Hmm."
"How did you get rid of the falling dreams?"
She sighs a puff of warm air against his neck that makes him entirely too comfortable. "Didn't get rid of them. Just don't get them so much these days. They suck. Can't fight 'em. Stupid."
He rolls his eyes in the dark. He's gotten his four hours of sleep; he's not going back to dreamland anytime soon, but lying still and cuddling is something he's okay with. "Okay, but how did you make them go away?"
She's almost asleep now, he can tell. "Well that one's easy," she says, snuggling her nose into his shoulder as though it were the most natural thing in the world to do, "I met you."
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She only wakes up once after that, and that's because there's a draft on her skin-and Megamind's hands are on her hips, and his mouth is-his mouth is-
Definitely not complaining.
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