Good Idea, Seven

Lux placed the last of the food on the table. With a huff, she combed back her hair and appraised the feast she had created. It was… a lot; however, it would save them time. They're barely out of trouble. V had not recovered yet; Ray and Rika still controlled the messenger; on top of that Mint Eye continued to hunt them. Lux bit her lip as guilt stirred her chest. Perhaps this was excessive. They didn't have much time; what small amount they had shouldn't be spent liberally to time-consuming things like eating and sleeping.

She understood that. She understood all of that, but…

If they all kept going like this exhaustion would kill them before Mint Eye ever could.

Especially Seven.

He had not stopped working ever since they arrived in the hideout. He had not slept and ate properly—and no, honey-butter-flavoured potato chips and 23-flavoured sodas did not count. With Vanderwood's arrival she thought his workload would halve at least… but it seemed to have doubled or tripled. How was that even possible? Now, even he had to work extensively alongside Seven. At least the man knew when to take breaks, but it's nowhere near enough.

As admirable and… terrifying the agents were on their laser focus, she couldn't have three incapacitated men under her care because two of them actively decided to neglect their health. Her lips tightened determinedly. Their hope in escaping this mostly unscathed lied in their full strength to fight. Something innocuous like eating would consume time, but this was what Seven needed—what they all needed.

Sighing, she exited the kitchen.

"Seven…"

Damn. More ports to open this time. The amount of systems he could employ to overload the hacker's servers were running out. It would only be a matter of time until he failed. Only a matter of time until the RFA fell because of his inadequacies. Still, he was not one to surrender. Until his complete and utter defeat the fight was not truly over. Besides, he had been strangely blessed. Since early morning the hacker's attack patterns had changed. It was more aggressive, brute, but not as meticulous. Yesterday, the hacker crashed every system, deleted every log, and reclosed every open port, slowing Seven's progress to a crawl. Today… today the hacker did not bother with such precautions. While he was running out of resources, he hadn't had to use more for the past few hours. If he was lucky and the hacker remained sloppy, he might make it.

He might.

"Seven!"

"What!?" he snapped, turning to glare at the source of the disturbance. Lux's surprised expression mellowed him instantly. He smiled sheepishly at her. Damn it, she didn't deserve to receive the brunt of his frustrations. "Lux! I am so sorry. I was just concentrating on the hacker."

"It's okay." Lux smiled kindly at him. "Lunch is ready—or brunch, you know."

"Aw, thank you! You go ahead." He didn't have time to eat. "Take V as well, he needs to eat."

"So do you."

He felt around for the open packet of Honey Buddha Chip and brandished it at her. "I got all the food I need right here."

"That's not proper food, Seven—"

"Ow, my heart!"

"—you need to eat something better."

"Seriously, Lux, I'm fine!" He said, dropping the bag. He wished she'd leave it. Right now, he's under the most important time crunch of his life. He couldn't waste any time. Soon enough the hacker would leave a loophole; he couldn't be absent when that happened.

"Come on, it won't take long—"

"Lux, I am so close to restoring the messenger," he asserted. Their situation was precarious, did she not sense that? Right outside their hideout was a pseudo-religious cult hell bent on forcing their inductions via drugs; Vanderwood had successfully detoxed V, but he still needed to be taken to the hospital; and as if that weren't enough, he's fighting against a hacker who's succeeding in tearing them apart. Seven needed all the time he could get to restore the messenger so he could get her and V out of trouble. He could not waste it on something stupid like eating. "So close. I don't have time for anything except this, understand? I'm sorry, but just… go ahead, please."

Lux didn't answer. She must be shocked. Of course she would be—he was a jerk to her, a monster. V would be disappointed in him. After everything Lux had endured she didn't deserve the cruelty of his true nature. Hell, after everything she had done until now… it was ungrateful of him to snap at her like that. She had been so strong, so calm, and so patient; she bore the bleak side-effects of V's illness and the manipulations hurled at her by Rika and the hacker. She seemed to have nerves of steel, but Seven knew that this ordeal must be chipping away at her—she was only human after all. He shouldn't have added to her stress, but the quicker he finished this the quicker she'd be safe. He'd apologise properly for what he had done later, but for now…

"Luciel Choi…"

It was his name wrapped in a familiar voice, but not at the same time. it actually made him pause and look. Lux still stood at the end of the couch. She had one hand planted on her hip; the other held the taser he had given her aloft. She was smiling at him—that happy, kind, and sometimes humorous smile that she had been wearing ever since they officially met. However, now it contained a dark kind of determination. It was steely, in a way, and contained an unforgiving force. Seven didn't understand it... but he did understand the chill that just went down his spine.

"If you don't eat right now I will not hesitate to poke you with this." Her smile widened as the taser crackled menacingly. "Okay?"

Her voice was so kind. So deadly kind. "Uh…"

"Hmm?"

"I, ahem, need to keep working."

"That's no problem!" she chuckled, waving the very active taser around. "Keep working and I'll feed you."

"H-hey, that's dangerous—!"

She looked at the taser and stopped with a giggle. "Whoops! Come on, let's go."

Thank God. Seven sighed. "Lux, I really need to work—"

Crackle. "You need to eat."

"Okay, I'll eat!" he scrambled to his feet when she approached him. He shielded his laptop with his body, holding out a hand to ward her off. Being electrocuted by an irate woman was not something he wanted to experience, thank you very much. "I'll eat. So put that away, okay?"

"Good." She pocketed the taser and walked out of the living room.

Seven stood, shell-shocked. Though she had left his guards were still on high alert. After a few seconds, though, the shock began to wear off and his gaze went to the laptop. That sense of urgency returned once more. Already, he was lowering himself on the couch—

"Don't you dare sit down again, Seven!"

Another chill raced down his spine at Lux's voice. He shot back to his feet. Did Lux somehow gain a superpower? Sighing in defeat, he trudged out of the living room and into the hallway. Slowly, he walked towards the kitchen. "Never again—"

"Good idea, isn't it, giving the lady my taser."

Seven scowled. He looked over his shoulder at Vanderwood, who was leaning against the wall of the hallway. He seemed to be eavesdropping. "Shut up, Madam—"

"Come join us, Vanderwood!" Lux's voice rang.

Seven smirked. Vanderwood flinched. "I'm fine—" his response stopped when Lux popped back into the hallway with that deadly, kind smile on her face. He held up his hands. "I'll go."

Smile widening, she left. Seven shot his colleague a smug grin and received a cold scowl in return. Reluctantly, the world's best hacker and the world's deadliest spy walked to the kitchen to eat some lunch—all with the beckoning of an inconsequential and diminutive woman equipped with a high-powered taser.

Notes:

1. That taser's finally been put to good use. Maybe. I based this on one of the chats (I'm sorry I can't remember which) wherein you can choose the option to tell V to return inside the hideout or else MC would fetch him and Seven commented that MC was scary. Now in my head MC is just this really kind person, but she turns real dark when people continue to neglect themselves.

2. I wanted to bring in some of Seven's true self in this one. The one that's not happy all the time. He didn't seemed too pleased after discovering that Vanderwood messed with his phone. I interpreted that as at that point he was frustrated and he wanted to finish the fight with the hacker as soon as possible.

3. I made Vanderwood a spy... seems to be one of the things that made sense. In my head it was like a James Bond/Q scenario wherein Seven was Q and Vanderwood was James Bond, only it's got that Mystic Messenger twist.

4. I once played a game called Hacknet. It was basically my reference when I described that hacking scene with Seven. I'm not a genius, I know jack about hacking.

That's it! Thank you so much for reading, I hoped you enjoyed. As always, feedback is appreciated.