Hi! I have a solid second part in mind for this if you guys would like a continuation. Please let me know what you think of it, I haven't written a lot about Happy and I don't think she's ever talked as much as she does in this story haha. Thanks for reading!

"He said what?"

Toby cleared his throat and shrugged. "Exactly what I expected. Our relationship will jeopardize the team, it's statistically unlikely to work out, we're being selfish by pursuing it instead of staying friends, etc."

"That little…" Happy grumbled before glancing up at the shrink. "You're not…?"

"Not a chance," he insisted with a smile, reaching over to the mechanic and linking his fingers with hers. Toby felt her body relax as she let out a barely perceptible sigh of relief. "We've come way too far to give up just because Walter is jealous."

Happy frowned, and Toby realized that he found the expression quite adorable when it wasn't directed at him. "You think this is about jealousy?"

He squeezed her hand. "I do. We both know how long he's been obsessed with Paige, but he can't stop getting in his own way. He's jealous that you and I have found a way to make things work…or that we're trying to, at least."

"Hm." Happy fell silent, furrowing her brow as she lost herself in thought. Toby inched closer to her and placed his other hand over hers, rubbing circles over her knuckles until she spoke again. "What if…"

"Yeah?"

"Maybe we could…I don't know…" She scrunched her face. "Move things along for him, somehow?"

"You mean, break the standoff between him and Paige?" She nodded, and Toby broke into a wide grin. "And we could get him off our backs. Happy, you're a genius."

"Well, duh." The tiny mechanic leaned over, bumping her shoulder against the psychologist's. "Meddling is a dangerous game, Doc. Are you sure we should do this?"

"I don't have a better idea."

Happy let out a prolonged sigh and hopped off the desk. "I'll get Paige. Tell the boss to meet us upstairs in ten."


"Hello, Paige," Toby said cheerfully as the liaison reached the top of the stairs and stepped into the loft. Her eyes darted between him and the woman next to him as she took a hesitant step forward.

"This feels like a trap," Paige announced suspiciously.

"You're paranoid," he commented, pointing his finger in her direction. "Have you ever seen anyone about that?"

She rolled her eyes, taking another step and crossing her arms in front of her chest. "What do you want? If it's about the trampoline, I already told you that you'll have to pay for it yourself."

"I did, and it's coming in six days. Although I still maintain that—." Happy cleared her throat, causing Toby to snap back to attention. "Not what we brought you here for. Actually…" Paige narrowed her eyes as Toby practically sang the word. "We wanted to check in with you. See how things were going."

Paige stared blankly at the couple before shaking her head. Whatever their game was, she'd learned not to waste time trying to figure it out. "I'm fine. Thank you for your concern, I guess."

"It's just that, um…" Happy started, glancing at Toby for confirmation and receiving an encouraging nod. "This whole Walter dating thing is pretty crazy, and if I was you, I wouldn't be okay with it."

Her slightly widened eyes were the only indication that she was affected by Happy's words. Toby noticed the way she subconsciously leaned away from them; a sure signal of discomfort, but that was a good sign if they were going to break through her denial. "Walter is an adult. However he chooses to work on his social skills is his decision," she said evenly. "It really doesn't concern me."

"Sure it does," Toby argued, and Happy nodded helpfully. "In all the years I've known him, I have never seen Walter act around anyone the way he acts around you. And it's pretty clear that you're in just as deep as he is."

The mechanic ignored Paige's warning glare and added, "We saw you two at Christmas. Whatever 'agreement' you guys had before clearly wasn't holding up."

"It doesn't seem like you're fighting," the psychologist continued, barreling full steam ahead now. "And you can't really be okay with this. So why haven't you told him?"

Paige pressed her lips together, the dark flash in her eyes betraying her growing frustration. "Why are you pushing this?" she asked through gritted teeth.

Toby motioned for Happy to take the lead. "We think you guys should be together," the mechanic stated clearly, stretching herself up to her full height even though it was still a good head shorter than Paige—especially Paige in heels. "Maybe if you told Walter how you felt, he'll realize that he doesn't need to meet these other women…"

The liaison's fingers curled under as she clenched her fists, an action that didn't go unnoticed by the geniuses. "You're both crazy, and I'm leaving."

She turned on her heel and headed for the door, but Toby blocked her exit. "Paige…"

"Enough!" she snapped, causing Toby and Happy to jump. Incurring Paige's wrath was never pleasant, but Toby had assured the mechanic that they needed to bring her genuine emotions to the surface for their plan to work. "Walter knows how I feel and has apparently decided that it's not what he needs right now. That's the end of my involvement and yours."

"So you're just going to give up on him?" Toby said to egg her on, resuming his place next to Happy. "Because I don't buy this as innocent workplace flirtation. I think that you—."

"That I what, Toby? That I love him? That's what you think, isn't it?" Paige threw up her hands. "Hell, I don't know! Maybe that's true. And guess what? It doesn't really change anything."

Toby's jaw dropped at her confession, sinking even further when he looked over her shoulder and spotted Walter, frozen on the stairs. He'd been so caught up in the game that he'd forgotten all about the purpose of their plan—and he certainly wasn't expecting an outburst like that from the liaison when he invited Walter to the loft under the guise of helping with a project. "Paige…" Toby muttered as a warning.

"No, we're going to settle this now," she barked, gripping the edge of the table so hard they thought she might break it. "I cannot force Walter to be ready for or want any kind of relationship with me, and I respect his decisions. So stay out of my business and just let it go, okay?"

Unnerved by the sudden silence, Paige followed the couple's gaze behind her and blanched when she saw the genius. Their eyes locked, but the shock on his face was too much for her and she turned her full anger back onto Happy and Toby.

"Did you get what you wanted?" she hissed, pushing herself off from the table and storming away from them. Walter murmured her name quietly when she approached the door, but the liaison held up her hand. "Don't," she said in a clipped voice as she pushed past him, and Walter did something he swore he would never do again after the night he drove off the cliff.

He let her leave.


"I'm sorry."

Walter flicked his eyes up. It was rare for Happy to offer apologies, and even rarer to hear one that didn't sound like sarcasm. He'd heard her and Toby bickering in the loft for a few minutes before the garage fell deeply, almost eerily quiet. Walter himself had retired to the dingy room in the back of the garage where they interrogated suspects or hid items of questionable legality from Cooper, depending on the situation.

"I'm sorry," she said again, sliding into the seat across the table from Walter. "We didn't mean for it to go so far. We just…honestly, it doesn't matter. It was stupid."

Walter tapped his fingers absentmindedly on the wood, soaking in each word. "Where's Toby?"

"I figured the doc would only cause more damage, so I sent him home." The mechanic offered him a sympathetic smile. "We're the only ones left. Robot to robot."

Walter rarely faced problems he felt incapable of solving, but he had the strangest sensation that all of his knowledge was useless here. There were emotions…questions…doubts coming at him from all corners, and he struggled to separate them, analyze them, control them. The genius stared at the wall in front of him for a long time before he said, "That was…unexpected."

"I certainly did not see it coming," she agreed, gazing solemnly down at her grease-stained nails. "What's going on in your brain, Walt?"

"I can't tell," he admitted, and Happy nodded in understanding. They were the most similar members of the team: arrogant, distrustful, emotionless. But there was more to them under the surface, and they could see the changes in each other, even when no one else did. "Paige was upset. Whether she was angry at you or at me, though…I don't know."

Happy shrugged. "Both, probably."

"I can't…rectify the situation if I don't know why she's upset with me," Walter mumbled before clearing his throat and adding, "This type of dissension is crippling for the team."

The mechanic smirked. His last concern right now was the team's welfare, but he couldn't admit that it killed him when he and Paige fought.

"She's embarrassed, Walter." Happy shifted in her seat. Things were about to get real between two of the most closed-off people on earth, but this was her mistake to fix. "Toby and I pushed her into admitting something that she clearly wasn't ready to tell you on her own. Our plan was only to show you that Paige wasn't happy about you dating, but…it got a little out of hand."

"My dates were not…wholly successful," he noted, creasing his eyebrow. "But they were necessary, and Paige appeared to be supportive of the experiment."

"But she wasn't," Happy explained bluntly. Paige had been too afraid to spell things out for him, so it was clearly up to the mechanic to hammer the truth into his thick skull. "I would have made Toby bleed if he went on a date with another woman, even when we weren't together. You know why? Because we were getting there, just like you and Paige were getting there, and you confused her and broke her trust by running around on her. Maybe to you it didn't mean anything, but it hurt her, and I think that deep down you knew it would and you sabotaged yourself because things were getting too intense."

Walter blinked, his face devoid of expression, but she knew she'd hit a nerve. Happy and Toby were the poster children for self-sabotage; they could spot it a mile away in anyone except themselves.

She allowed him a moment to process her accusation, and when it appeared that the initial shock had faded, she clasped her hands and leaned forward. "Would it be the worst thing if Paige did love you?"

"No," he mumbled instinctively before straightening up and running his rough hands through his hair. "Yes. We agreed to stay friends for the sake of the team—."

"Cut the team crap, Walter," Happy demanded, narrowing her eyes at him. "We survived your blood feud with Cabe and the tornado of unmitigated crazy that was Mark Collins. There's literally no fight you and Paige could have that would ruin the team after all that."

Walter appeared to soften for a second, but his defenses reappeared as quickly as they had slipped. "Fine. But Ralph—."

"Stop, Walt, you're exhausting." She waved her hands in front of her. "You care about the effect it would have on other people, I get that. But you're convinced that you'll mess up and lose Paige, and you'd rather stay in limbo your entire life than have her slip through your fingers. That's why you went on those dates. You wanted to prove what you've always believed: that sooner or later, you're going to ruin everything."

The genius scratched the side of his face, avoiding her expectant gaze. "It's too big of a risk."

"You've taken bigger."

"Risk is relative," he explained after a long pause. "If I disarm a bomb or save a hostage, the greater good is served, even if I don't make it out. But if I take a personal risk and fail…what's the point then?"

"The point is that you live, Walt. Life is scary. Deal with it."

She was pushing him to his limits, and she could start to see the strain. Happy was hardly in comfortable territory herself—Toby knew better than to pressure her into emotional discussions like this—but if it would make her life easier in the long run, she was willing to soldier through it.

"I don't think I could say it back to her," Walter admitted, running his hands over his legs as if he wasn't quite sure what else to do with them. "That is, if she meant it, which I'm not convinced that she did. I've tried to…learn, but it's still a foreign concept."

Finally, they were getting somewhere. Happy, feeling a bit restless in her seat, untangled her legs from around the table and stood up, leaning her back against the wall. "Oh, she meant it. And you don't need to understand it. The rest of us do."

"Your logic is confusing."

"Shut up and listen, Walt." Happy pressed further into the cold brick and crossed her feet. Part of her regretted sending the shrink away; confrontations like this were what he lived for, but she'd spent enough time around him to pick up a trick or two. "I can't tell you how you feel, but I can tell you how you act. And if the lengths to which you'll go for Paige and the things you do to make her happy are any indication of how you feel, then it's a pretty safe bet that you love her."

Happy smiled inwardly, imagining the prideful expression the psychologist would have if he could hear her. It was fully possible that he did; the two of them had planted listening devices all over the garage, mostly out of boredom.

"Do you love Toby?"

She made a strangled choking sound, covering it with an exaggerated cough. It was a fair question, she guessed, but that didn't mean she'd been prepared for it. None of your business, she thought, but there was no one else around, and if she was serious about helping Walter, she was going to have to commit sometime.

"I will go full 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' on you if you repeat this." The genius stared at her with no hint of recognition, and Happy rolled her eyes. "Seriously? It's in the title. Massacre. Chainsaw. Please don't make me explain my threats to you."

Walter nodded.

"Honestly, I don't know," she conceded after she'd collected her thoughts. "I suspect that I will one day, if I'm not there already."

"I thought you said that you knew?"

The mechanic shrugged, pushing her hands deeper into the pockets of her gray hoodie. "It's a hard thing to accept when you've spent your whole life fighting against it." She bit her lip, cracking a smile at the sudden realization of how far cold, mechanical Happy had fallen. "The doc makes me crazy, but I'd be lying if I said he doesn't make life easier. I can't imagine dealing with…all the crap we deal with, next to anyone but him. You know what the funniest thing is?"

The genius didn't respond, but she sensed his undivided attention.

"I don't think he cares if I say it back. Ever. I mean, I'm sure he'd appreciate hearing it, but…" Happy shot him a pointed look, lifting her eyebrow challengingly. "Maybe the word is not the most important thing, Walter. Maybe people like us are just meant to show it."