[Fic] Deja Vu
Sep. 22nd, 2010 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kittydesadeTitle: Deja Vu
Fandom: Push/The A-Team (movie)
Characters: Cassie/Murdock
Word Count: 3,088
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Cassie runs into an old acquaintance, literally. And then some. Written becausegusthemoose is a horrible, horrible enabler.
The worst part about this, she decided, was that Watching was a passive power. The most she could do was shoot someone. Nick had helped her figure out a way to use her visions so that she got a few pieces of information from them, pieces that would help her make general decisions but nothing specific, and then winging it the rest of the way so the Watchers wouldn't find her. And they hadn't. It was the Sniffers and one Division snitch who'd sold her out this time.
Cassie had, at least, gotten the language right on the signs behind her. She thought. It was German and French, which meant that she was now tear-assing her way through Vienna trying to get to somewhere safe without making any decisions on where that was and dammit, this shit was hard!
She had to leave a message for Nick so he'd know she was okay at some point. But she had no idea how she was going to do that, so that was all right to think about. Maybe.
She didn't trust, well, okay, she didn't trust most kinds of people with powers, because you never knew who was working for Division and most kinds of powers could hurt you. A Stitch could heal you, yeah, but she could also tear you apart. A Shifter could make you think the ground was solid when it wasn't, and Movers and Bleeders and Pushers.
Yeah. The less said about Pushers, the better.
Cassie ducked down an alley for a second and bent over, wheezing. Her side was burning like someone had stabbed her there, her shins were screaming from pounding the pavement, and every breath burned. She hated living her life on the run, and doing it literally was just pushing it past the bounds of her patience. And even so, she couldn't stay here for very long. She needed to get moving. She needed to keep running until the people following her had gotten so confused they abandoned the search at least for a day, maybe two. And then when that happened...
No, no planning. Planning without planning. Like a koan.
"An ice cream koan," Cassie muttered.
She checked her shoes, her bag, made sure all the laces and straps were tight and started running again. Fast-walking, really, to catch her breath. The principle was the same, moving too quickly to really have more than a vague idea of where she was going, just in case they were after her in ways less personal and up front. Not really looking where she was going except to not run into people, and even that didn't work so well.
Especially not when she crashed face-first into a worn leather jacket, arms pinwheeling around her. Both of their arms pinwheeling, and colliding. Until his arms trapped her there and she started freaking out and shrieking, only to hear a familiar voice.
"Hey, hey, hey whoa, whoa there, hang on..."
Cassie blinked, tried to tilt her head back far enough to see. "Murdock?"
Murdock blinked. "Figment?" He'd taken to calling her figment because he wasn't sure if she was real or not, on account of what she could do. It had helped that she and the others had taken off before they'd gotten him into trouble with Division.
"What are you doing..." Then she shook her head. "Never mind. It's great to see you again, but I gotta run..."
"Whoa, ho, hold on there, kid," he grabbed her by the arm, half tugging her back and stepping forward to walk with her. She smiled a little; the last time he'd called her kid she'd been a lot smaller. "You in trouble or something?"
She sighed, rolling her eyes. "When am I not in trouble. Yeah, I'm being followed, and I need to get out of sight and, you know, public, before..."
But the next jump had taken them into an alley. A blind alley. "Before...?"
"Shit," Cassie pushed her fingers through her hair. "Okay, we need to get out of here, before..."
Before, before everything. Before she turned around, now holding his hand, and saw the Movers and maybe a Bleeder or two in front of the alley entrance. Before something bad happened. She'd seen the future, she hadn't seen any dead bodies, or at least, not any that were her or Murdock, so she knew she got out of this. She even knew she got out of it not captured by Division. But she didn't know about Murdock. The damn lunatic always was a wild card.
Right now he was a wild card who was either hiding behind her or hovering behind her protectively, she wasn't sure which and it wasn't really the venue to ask. She waited, and watched.
Eventually, one of the Movers twitched.
The Bleeders were the last resort, she realized, as she pulled the gun and fired, blasting out one of the Movers' kneecaps. Behind her she felt Murdock jump, scramble either for cover or a weapon, she didn't turn around to see.
A weapon, as it turned out, because the next thing she knew after trying to get aim on the second Mover's leg the third one's fingers exploded. Then his hand. Then...
She should have taken out the Bleeders first.
Cassie had a split second's warning to drop her gun and practically jump on Murdock's head, somehow managing not to get shot, before they started. It hurt. It hurt so much, like her skull was vibrating, and she only knew Murdock was screaming because she felt the vibrations in his chest. Somehow she hung on while he stood up, awkward and shaky, her hands clapped over his ears. Much more of that and she was going to pass out. Please, let her not pass out.
Silence. So profound after that assault that she wasn't sure she was hearing it, all she heard was buzzing and Murdock pulling his hands off her ears, then saying something. Then, running in circles. She tipped over sideways and watched his legs come in and out of the frame before the wet, warm blood started coating the insides of her fingers. It didn't matter, she supposed, if they were safe or not. She knew she wasn't going to die or be captured. Probably, now, neither was he. She could black out in peace.
When she woke up she was on a bed, in a hotel room. Cheap hotel room. Water was running in the bathroom and her face was wet.
Bit by bit, she deduced what had happened. Her face still hurt and her ears were ringing, so he hadn't taken her to a Stitch. Of course he hadn't, stupid, he didn't know any Stitches. But her face was clean, that was the dampness, and when she turned her head to the left (which thankfully was unaccompanied by pain) she saw a wet washcloth still stained with pink dripping onto the floor. The handle of the phone wasn't wet, though, so if he'd called anyone it had been before he'd cleaned her off. So he probably hadn't.
Her bag was in the corner, too. Thank you, Murdock. She looked around for him, daring to sit up a little, but he wasn't in the room itself.
The water was running in the bathroom and the door was closed. Maybe he was in the shower, maybe something else. Right now it seemed like a better idea to hold still and wait for him to come out than to go, well, anywhere.
But as her hearing started to come back and the minutes slid by, he didn't come out. And Cassie started to wonder. Was he sick in there? Was he d-- No, don't think that, Cassie. Was he hurt, still hurt from the Bleeders, had she not gotten to him in time? Was he all right? Of course he wasn't all right, he was Murdock, and he'd been thrown into a pretty hellish situation just by running into her in the street, that wasn't right. She should have stayed away from him, she thought.
She pulled out her sketchbook and gave him another ten minutes. There was some stuff she'd wanted to get down anyway, from memory. And some stuff that, well, um. When she thought about it, it kind of solidified, and then when she didn't it faded away, and she wasn't sure she wanted to draw that. Any of that. It made her smile, but it also made her uncomfortable. As if she was forcing something by putting it down on paper.
Cassie put aside her sketchbook and pens and looked up, and it had been twenty minutes. "Shit." Her voice sounded strange in her ears, far away and hard to hear. Everything else seemed to be coming in clear though. Well, clear ish. Fucking Bleeders. "Hey, Murdock, you okay in there?"
He didn't say anything, but after a minute or two something thumped on the door, like he'd thrown something at it or kicked it.
"I don't speak thud, sorry." More silence. And more water running. He was going to use up all the hot water in the building if someone didn't stop him, and it was hot water. She could see the steam coming from under the door.
Hell with it. "You better be decent in there, 'cause I'm coming in." But she took her time going from the bed to the bathroom door and opening it. And then staggering back because a cloud of steam hit her in the face. "Christ, are you trying to boil yourself in..."
Except, Murdock wasn't in the shower. Or even undressed at all. He was still in the same clothes he'd picked her up in, t-shirt that said something about zombies and ragged-looking cargo pants, loose flannel shirt over that that had seen better days and was now drenched. Even his hair was still pretty well matted and down, just wet. Soaked with steam. He was perched on the closed toilet and staring at nothing.
Cassie sighed, reached in and turned the water off so she could see more than a foot in front of her and so it wasn't so damn hot in here. "Hey."
He flinched when she touched his shoulder. Slapped her hand away when she did it again. And then she realized that what he'd just seen, everything he'd just seen, not just the parts where they'd almost died but that people had visibly, tangibly done things that were supposed to be impossible, that was stuck in his mind now. And his mind was already shaky at best. Maybe now it was like reality melting at the edges.
It didn't explain the hot water steam shower, but it was a start.
"Hey," she said again, quieter and more subdued this time. "Hey, it's okay. It's just me. You know, Cassie, right? The kid?" Not that she was a kid anymore. She hadn't been for a while, but she was almost nineteen now, and her body finally was starting to match. "It's okay. Look, the steam's disappearing, we're both all right, both ... here." And his team would be here whenever they got there, if he'd gotten ahold of them.
"You sure?" he warbled. "Maybe you're just a figment of my imagination. 'cause, people don't do that. People, they don't, don't do what you do. And that..."
He was starting to gesticulate a bit, now. When he almost hit her with a flying elbow she scooted around behind him, hunkered down till her chin was on his shoulder and slid her arms around his, holding them gently to his body.
"Hey. I'm not a figment. Figments don't give hugs. And..." She pressed her cheek to his, hugging him a little closer. "People do. Sometimes. You felt it. You saw it. This time, what you saw was true."
He didn't move for a little while. She had the feeling she knew that expression, wide-eyed and slack-jawed and half-terrified, though she'd never worn it herself. Not that particular one anyway. Her terror was more the sort that came with knowing exactly what they could do to you and that it was real. She tightened her arms a little around him, squeezed her hands gently over his forearms.
"Hey. It's okay. You're gonna be okay."
"No'mnot," he mumbled, but he didn't fight her anymore. At least not physically. He didn't relax or breathe easier or say anything, though.
"Come on," she sighed, loosening her grip and shifting around to stand in front of him. "Let's get you out of this room..." Cassie started to ask why in hell he'd decided he was going to not take a hot shower with his clothes on and then remembered who she was talking to and changed her mind. "And out of those wet clothes before you get everything soaked."
This whole plan had sounded a lot better in the bathroom and a lot more dodgy when they were in the tiny bedroom and she realized she was taking his t-shirt off.
She stripped down to her jeans and underwear, herself, because after that steam bath her shirt was soaked. Murdock she made strip down to his boxers and then had to let him go because if she stripped him down anymore she was going to die from embarrassment. Or he would. Or both. As she'd been undressing him, her hands inevitably over his body, she'd remembered how she'd been attracted to him in the first place. Not the why but the how.
After getting him undressed she threw on her jacket and went to ask for extra towels. They weren't soaked from the steam, but they were definitely drippy.
He was looking through her book when she got back with the towels. Murdock looked up at her and she looked down at his hands, moving over the last few drawn-on pages, and she felt her cheeks go pink. Stupid pale coloring.
"This what you see?" he asked. She couldn't tell if he was laughing at her or not.
"I d--" Cassie took a breath and made herself just walk forward as though nothing was wrong. "I guess." No, you idiot, you don't guess. "It's a potential future. It came up earlier."
He looked back down at the book, flipped through the last couple of images. "You knew we weren't gonna die... 'cause you saw this?"
And now Cassie felt uncomfortable for a whole other reason. She hadn't seen that then, she'd seen that a couple minutes ago, maybe five, ten. She'd never explained to him exactly how their powers worked, how most Watchers couldn't see more than maybe an hour into the future at most. And that was most of what she got, unless she worked for it. But telling him she hadn't known, that would undermine his confidence in her careless, this-happens-every-day attitude that she was working hard to maintain.
"Yeah," she lied after a second. "Might not be accurate, but it at least... it's a good chance we'd live through anything before we got to, uh. That point." Okay, now she was blushing. That point here used could mean anything from them kissing, shirtless, on a chair, to them what looked like having sex. In that bed. Which she actually had seen.
Okay, she did like him, but there was something a little weird about just hopping into bed with him like this, and from the details in her vision it wasn't that far off.
"You okay?"
His shoulders knotted; she could see it even from where she was. One hand came up to his head, which he shook in a negatory.
Cassie gave up, gave in, one of those, came up to him and crouched down by the chair he'd sprawled over, taking his hands. "It gets better. Or maybe better isn't the right word, but it gets easier. This..." Might have been a moment of insight for her. "This is real. This, right here, you and me. This is real. And what I can do? That's real, too. Your brain's not melting from the Bleeders... that's what we call them."
"That's what you call them?" he asked, at almost the same time.
"Yeah, Bleeders. 'cause of the ..." One hand freed itself to indicate dripping down from her ears. "The others were Movers. Telekinetics. No one really knows why we exist, but we do. Stitches can heal you or take you apart, I guess the science type term would be biokinetics. Biokinesis. My friend Dani's a Pusher, she..." Shit. That was not a good thing to tell Murdock right now. "... is kinda dating a secret agent, like you. Military guy." Cassie smiled, hoping he didn't notice the total lack of smoothness in the transition there.
Murdock just grinned. "But, see, there's a problem with that. 'cause there ain't no one like me."
"That's certainly true," she grinned. Reached up and brushed a little of the damp hair out of his face. He always had looked really scraggly. Like a drowned puppy resurrected slightly off and staggering.
He ruffled her hair and then stopped at that, one hand in her hair and sort of down by her cheek, blue and green strands curling over his wrist. "Is this, uh. The part where I'm supposed to kiss you?"
That had been made up. That had totally been made up, she'd made that up because she was remembering how she'd had a crush on him once about a billion years ago and she had never meant for him to see that and why was she even talking? "You can if you want."
Had she really said that?
Was he really thinking about it?
He was a lot warmer when he wasn't dripping wet.
He also slept on his back, which was a little weird. Not so bad, because she was still pretty small and skinny and fit neatly into the crook of his arm, which was tight around her shoulders. Just in case she decided to disappear after all that, or maybe in case someone tried to disappear her.
Well, she wasn't going anywhere, anyway. "You might as well go to sleep," she told his collarbone. "If I get a sense of we're in danger, I'll let you know."
"You mean that?" His voice came down through her hair and her Bleeder-tortured ears, but it still came through clear. Shaky accent and slight warble and all. "You promise?"
She kissed the hollow of his shoulder just by his throat. "I promise."
Fandom: Push/The A-Team (movie)
Characters: Cassie/Murdock
Word Count: 3,088
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Cassie runs into an old acquaintance, literally. And then some. Written because
gusthemoose is a horrible, horrible enabler.The worst part about this, she decided, was that Watching was a passive power. The most she could do was shoot someone. Nick had helped her figure out a way to use her visions so that she got a few pieces of information from them, pieces that would help her make general decisions but nothing specific, and then winging it the rest of the way so the Watchers wouldn't find her. And they hadn't. It was the Sniffers and one Division snitch who'd sold her out this time.
Cassie had, at least, gotten the language right on the signs behind her. She thought. It was German and French, which meant that she was now tear-assing her way through Vienna trying to get to somewhere safe without making any decisions on where that was and dammit, this shit was hard!
She had to leave a message for Nick so he'd know she was okay at some point. But she had no idea how she was going to do that, so that was all right to think about. Maybe.
She didn't trust, well, okay, she didn't trust most kinds of people with powers, because you never knew who was working for Division and most kinds of powers could hurt you. A Stitch could heal you, yeah, but she could also tear you apart. A Shifter could make you think the ground was solid when it wasn't, and Movers and Bleeders and Pushers.
Yeah. The less said about Pushers, the better.
Cassie ducked down an alley for a second and bent over, wheezing. Her side was burning like someone had stabbed her there, her shins were screaming from pounding the pavement, and every breath burned. She hated living her life on the run, and doing it literally was just pushing it past the bounds of her patience. And even so, she couldn't stay here for very long. She needed to get moving. She needed to keep running until the people following her had gotten so confused they abandoned the search at least for a day, maybe two. And then when that happened...
No, no planning. Planning without planning. Like a koan.
"An ice cream koan," Cassie muttered.
She checked her shoes, her bag, made sure all the laces and straps were tight and started running again. Fast-walking, really, to catch her breath. The principle was the same, moving too quickly to really have more than a vague idea of where she was going, just in case they were after her in ways less personal and up front. Not really looking where she was going except to not run into people, and even that didn't work so well.
Especially not when she crashed face-first into a worn leather jacket, arms pinwheeling around her. Both of their arms pinwheeling, and colliding. Until his arms trapped her there and she started freaking out and shrieking, only to hear a familiar voice.
"Hey, hey, hey whoa, whoa there, hang on..."
Cassie blinked, tried to tilt her head back far enough to see. "Murdock?"
Murdock blinked. "Figment?" He'd taken to calling her figment because he wasn't sure if she was real or not, on account of what she could do. It had helped that she and the others had taken off before they'd gotten him into trouble with Division.
"What are you doing..." Then she shook her head. "Never mind. It's great to see you again, but I gotta run..."
"Whoa, ho, hold on there, kid," he grabbed her by the arm, half tugging her back and stepping forward to walk with her. She smiled a little; the last time he'd called her kid she'd been a lot smaller. "You in trouble or something?"
She sighed, rolling her eyes. "When am I not in trouble. Yeah, I'm being followed, and I need to get out of sight and, you know, public, before..."
But the next jump had taken them into an alley. A blind alley. "Before...?"
"Shit," Cassie pushed her fingers through her hair. "Okay, we need to get out of here, before..."
Before, before everything. Before she turned around, now holding his hand, and saw the Movers and maybe a Bleeder or two in front of the alley entrance. Before something bad happened. She'd seen the future, she hadn't seen any dead bodies, or at least, not any that were her or Murdock, so she knew she got out of this. She even knew she got out of it not captured by Division. But she didn't know about Murdock. The damn lunatic always was a wild card.
Right now he was a wild card who was either hiding behind her or hovering behind her protectively, she wasn't sure which and it wasn't really the venue to ask. She waited, and watched.
Eventually, one of the Movers twitched.
The Bleeders were the last resort, she realized, as she pulled the gun and fired, blasting out one of the Movers' kneecaps. Behind her she felt Murdock jump, scramble either for cover or a weapon, she didn't turn around to see.
A weapon, as it turned out, because the next thing she knew after trying to get aim on the second Mover's leg the third one's fingers exploded. Then his hand. Then...
She should have taken out the Bleeders first.
Cassie had a split second's warning to drop her gun and practically jump on Murdock's head, somehow managing not to get shot, before they started. It hurt. It hurt so much, like her skull was vibrating, and she only knew Murdock was screaming because she felt the vibrations in his chest. Somehow she hung on while he stood up, awkward and shaky, her hands clapped over his ears. Much more of that and she was going to pass out. Please, let her not pass out.
Silence. So profound after that assault that she wasn't sure she was hearing it, all she heard was buzzing and Murdock pulling his hands off her ears, then saying something. Then, running in circles. She tipped over sideways and watched his legs come in and out of the frame before the wet, warm blood started coating the insides of her fingers. It didn't matter, she supposed, if they were safe or not. She knew she wasn't going to die or be captured. Probably, now, neither was he. She could black out in peace.
When she woke up she was on a bed, in a hotel room. Cheap hotel room. Water was running in the bathroom and her face was wet.
Bit by bit, she deduced what had happened. Her face still hurt and her ears were ringing, so he hadn't taken her to a Stitch. Of course he hadn't, stupid, he didn't know any Stitches. But her face was clean, that was the dampness, and when she turned her head to the left (which thankfully was unaccompanied by pain) she saw a wet washcloth still stained with pink dripping onto the floor. The handle of the phone wasn't wet, though, so if he'd called anyone it had been before he'd cleaned her off. So he probably hadn't.
Her bag was in the corner, too. Thank you, Murdock. She looked around for him, daring to sit up a little, but he wasn't in the room itself.
The water was running in the bathroom and the door was closed. Maybe he was in the shower, maybe something else. Right now it seemed like a better idea to hold still and wait for him to come out than to go, well, anywhere.
But as her hearing started to come back and the minutes slid by, he didn't come out. And Cassie started to wonder. Was he sick in there? Was he d-- No, don't think that, Cassie. Was he hurt, still hurt from the Bleeders, had she not gotten to him in time? Was he all right? Of course he wasn't all right, he was Murdock, and he'd been thrown into a pretty hellish situation just by running into her in the street, that wasn't right. She should have stayed away from him, she thought.
She pulled out her sketchbook and gave him another ten minutes. There was some stuff she'd wanted to get down anyway, from memory. And some stuff that, well, um. When she thought about it, it kind of solidified, and then when she didn't it faded away, and she wasn't sure she wanted to draw that. Any of that. It made her smile, but it also made her uncomfortable. As if she was forcing something by putting it down on paper.
Cassie put aside her sketchbook and pens and looked up, and it had been twenty minutes. "Shit." Her voice sounded strange in her ears, far away and hard to hear. Everything else seemed to be coming in clear though. Well, clear ish. Fucking Bleeders. "Hey, Murdock, you okay in there?"
He didn't say anything, but after a minute or two something thumped on the door, like he'd thrown something at it or kicked it.
"I don't speak thud, sorry." More silence. And more water running. He was going to use up all the hot water in the building if someone didn't stop him, and it was hot water. She could see the steam coming from under the door.
Hell with it. "You better be decent in there, 'cause I'm coming in." But she took her time going from the bed to the bathroom door and opening it. And then staggering back because a cloud of steam hit her in the face. "Christ, are you trying to boil yourself in..."
Except, Murdock wasn't in the shower. Or even undressed at all. He was still in the same clothes he'd picked her up in, t-shirt that said something about zombies and ragged-looking cargo pants, loose flannel shirt over that that had seen better days and was now drenched. Even his hair was still pretty well matted and down, just wet. Soaked with steam. He was perched on the closed toilet and staring at nothing.
Cassie sighed, reached in and turned the water off so she could see more than a foot in front of her and so it wasn't so damn hot in here. "Hey."
He flinched when she touched his shoulder. Slapped her hand away when she did it again. And then she realized that what he'd just seen, everything he'd just seen, not just the parts where they'd almost died but that people had visibly, tangibly done things that were supposed to be impossible, that was stuck in his mind now. And his mind was already shaky at best. Maybe now it was like reality melting at the edges.
It didn't explain the hot water steam shower, but it was a start.
"Hey," she said again, quieter and more subdued this time. "Hey, it's okay. It's just me. You know, Cassie, right? The kid?" Not that she was a kid anymore. She hadn't been for a while, but she was almost nineteen now, and her body finally was starting to match. "It's okay. Look, the steam's disappearing, we're both all right, both ... here." And his team would be here whenever they got there, if he'd gotten ahold of them.
"You sure?" he warbled. "Maybe you're just a figment of my imagination. 'cause, people don't do that. People, they don't, don't do what you do. And that..."
He was starting to gesticulate a bit, now. When he almost hit her with a flying elbow she scooted around behind him, hunkered down till her chin was on his shoulder and slid her arms around his, holding them gently to his body.
"Hey. I'm not a figment. Figments don't give hugs. And..." She pressed her cheek to his, hugging him a little closer. "People do. Sometimes. You felt it. You saw it. This time, what you saw was true."
He didn't move for a little while. She had the feeling she knew that expression, wide-eyed and slack-jawed and half-terrified, though she'd never worn it herself. Not that particular one anyway. Her terror was more the sort that came with knowing exactly what they could do to you and that it was real. She tightened her arms a little around him, squeezed her hands gently over his forearms.
"Hey. It's okay. You're gonna be okay."
"No'mnot," he mumbled, but he didn't fight her anymore. At least not physically. He didn't relax or breathe easier or say anything, though.
"Come on," she sighed, loosening her grip and shifting around to stand in front of him. "Let's get you out of this room..." Cassie started to ask why in hell he'd decided he was going to not take a hot shower with his clothes on and then remembered who she was talking to and changed her mind. "And out of those wet clothes before you get everything soaked."
This whole plan had sounded a lot better in the bathroom and a lot more dodgy when they were in the tiny bedroom and she realized she was taking his t-shirt off.
She stripped down to her jeans and underwear, herself, because after that steam bath her shirt was soaked. Murdock she made strip down to his boxers and then had to let him go because if she stripped him down anymore she was going to die from embarrassment. Or he would. Or both. As she'd been undressing him, her hands inevitably over his body, she'd remembered how she'd been attracted to him in the first place. Not the why but the how.
After getting him undressed she threw on her jacket and went to ask for extra towels. They weren't soaked from the steam, but they were definitely drippy.
He was looking through her book when she got back with the towels. Murdock looked up at her and she looked down at his hands, moving over the last few drawn-on pages, and she felt her cheeks go pink. Stupid pale coloring.
"This what you see?" he asked. She couldn't tell if he was laughing at her or not.
"I d--" Cassie took a breath and made herself just walk forward as though nothing was wrong. "I guess." No, you idiot, you don't guess. "It's a potential future. It came up earlier."
He looked back down at the book, flipped through the last couple of images. "You knew we weren't gonna die... 'cause you saw this?"
And now Cassie felt uncomfortable for a whole other reason. She hadn't seen that then, she'd seen that a couple minutes ago, maybe five, ten. She'd never explained to him exactly how their powers worked, how most Watchers couldn't see more than maybe an hour into the future at most. And that was most of what she got, unless she worked for it. But telling him she hadn't known, that would undermine his confidence in her careless, this-happens-every-day attitude that she was working hard to maintain.
"Yeah," she lied after a second. "Might not be accurate, but it at least... it's a good chance we'd live through anything before we got to, uh. That point." Okay, now she was blushing. That point here used could mean anything from them kissing, shirtless, on a chair, to them what looked like having sex. In that bed. Which she actually had seen.
Okay, she did like him, but there was something a little weird about just hopping into bed with him like this, and from the details in her vision it wasn't that far off.
"You okay?"
His shoulders knotted; she could see it even from where she was. One hand came up to his head, which he shook in a negatory.
Cassie gave up, gave in, one of those, came up to him and crouched down by the chair he'd sprawled over, taking his hands. "It gets better. Or maybe better isn't the right word, but it gets easier. This..." Might have been a moment of insight for her. "This is real. This, right here, you and me. This is real. And what I can do? That's real, too. Your brain's not melting from the Bleeders... that's what we call them."
"That's what you call them?" he asked, at almost the same time.
"Yeah, Bleeders. 'cause of the ..." One hand freed itself to indicate dripping down from her ears. "The others were Movers. Telekinetics. No one really knows why we exist, but we do. Stitches can heal you or take you apart, I guess the science type term would be biokinetics. Biokinesis. My friend Dani's a Pusher, she..." Shit. That was not a good thing to tell Murdock right now. "... is kinda dating a secret agent, like you. Military guy." Cassie smiled, hoping he didn't notice the total lack of smoothness in the transition there.
Murdock just grinned. "But, see, there's a problem with that. 'cause there ain't no one like me."
"That's certainly true," she grinned. Reached up and brushed a little of the damp hair out of his face. He always had looked really scraggly. Like a drowned puppy resurrected slightly off and staggering.
He ruffled her hair and then stopped at that, one hand in her hair and sort of down by her cheek, blue and green strands curling over his wrist. "Is this, uh. The part where I'm supposed to kiss you?"
That had been made up. That had totally been made up, she'd made that up because she was remembering how she'd had a crush on him once about a billion years ago and she had never meant for him to see that and why was she even talking? "You can if you want."
Had she really said that?
Was he really thinking about it?
He was a lot warmer when he wasn't dripping wet.
He also slept on his back, which was a little weird. Not so bad, because she was still pretty small and skinny and fit neatly into the crook of his arm, which was tight around her shoulders. Just in case she decided to disappear after all that, or maybe in case someone tried to disappear her.
Well, she wasn't going anywhere, anyway. "You might as well go to sleep," she told his collarbone. "If I get a sense of we're in danger, I'll let you know."
"You mean that?" His voice came down through her hair and her Bleeder-tortured ears, but it still came through clear. Shaky accent and slight warble and all. "You promise?"
She kissed the hollow of his shoulder just by his throat. "I promise."