(Untitled)

[cutting_edgex23]

X slips in through the front door, laptop in hand. After a brief stop at Bar to check for messages and to place an order for dinner, she settles down at a corner table.

After eating, she cracks open the laptop and gets to work.

Blueprints are not confusing, except when they contain multiple contradictions within one document.

Hmm.

Comments

[master_wayne]

Bruce spots her, watches a moment and smiles to himself at the look of confusion.

And then flops down unceremoniously next to her.

'Hi.'

[cutting_edgex23]

She looks up and over at him with no visible surprise.

Scent is a fine thing.

"Hello."

Beat.

"Bruce."

[master_wayne]

For a mad moment, he wonders what she'd do if he kissed her on the cheek.

Stab him, possibly. Probably.

The moment passes.

'What're you doing? And...how are you?'

[cutting_edgex23]

Startled looks and some questions are not outside the realm of possibility.

But as the moment has passed --

"I am working. A little. I do not know if it will become a mission."

But knowing the plans for where certain members of HAMMER spend their time is probably not unwise.

"You are okay, too?"

[master_wayne]

He does tend to overthink things, at times.

'Yeah, I'm good. Thanks.'

He has an apple and takes a bite out of it. He looks happy today. This is possibly entirely down to seeing her.

'How will you know if it does become a mission?'

[cutting_edgex23]

"Someone will tell me," X says, after a moment of thought.

She isn't quite smiling, but she's not carrying a lot of tension in her shoulders, either.

"Or I will see a very good opportunity for infiltration."

Beat.

"The situation is unstable."

[master_wayne]

'Why, what's happening?'

He looks at the screen. It...doesn't mean much, beyond being blueprints.

'Or is it classified?

...you want an apple? I have another.'

[cutting_edgex23]

X blinks at him, head tilting very slightly.

Then she holds out her hand.

"An apple would be okay. Thank you."

And while that happens --

"Someone is in charge of superhuman oversight who should not be. He hates us. And he wants to be President. It is problematic."

[master_wayne]

An apple is placed in her hand.

It's shiny.

'...yeah, I can see how that would be a problem for you. Why does he hate you all, though?'

[cutting_edgex23]

"I do not know."

X looks a little dubious.

"I think he is insane."

Or so the documentation suggests.

She takes a bite of the apple, chewing carefully before swallowing.

"You have known people like that?"

[master_wayne]

He thinks about it.

'Insane, bigoted people who want to be President? I don't think so. Apart from everyone who wants to be President is probably a bit deranged.'

He stretches, runs a hand through his hair, eats his apple.

'I knew a guy who was...a bit out there. When I was away. But he taught me a lot.'

[cutting_edgex23]

"It is probably better not to know people like that," X says, after a few moments of consideration.

She takes another bite of the apple.

"He taught you things you wanted to know?"

Someone you learn things you did not want to know.

Even if they are useful lessons.

[master_wayne]

'Yeah, he did. In more ways than he meant to, I think.'

He draws a foot up on to the chair, rests his chin on his knee.

'It was a good test, in the end. He wanted me to kill someone, an eye for an eye. I said no.'

He shrugs like it was no big thing when really, he'd learned that killing someone isn't justice. It's just murder. And he learned that he wasn't like that.

'If I didn't know him, I would always have wondered. But faced with the choice...'

Another shrug and he finishes the apple.

[cutting_edgex23]

"I knew," X says, quiet and precise.

"When we met."

The day he wanted to shoot Joe Chill.

Beat.

"It would have hurt you."

X reaches out her free hand and rests it on his wrist.

Just for a second.

"But it is good you know, now, too."

[master_wayne]

He watches her, watches the hand on his wrist. And his eyes flick up to her face when she takes it away.

And then he lowers his leg, leans in and kisses her on the cheek.

'Thank you.'

[cutting_edgex23]

X's eyes go wide, but she neither stabs him nor flinches away.

It is less strange than being kissed by Castiel. Or Helium.

(If she scents the air it is only to be 100% sure that Bruce is not on drugs.)

"I -- "

She studies Bruce for a long, long moment.

"You are welcome."

Beat.

"It is the truth."