A/N: I just want to thank you all for your patience. I take a long time, I know, but I've got multiple chapters in various stages of completion, and I go to each one as I figure out what the characters want me to do next. I'm pretty happy about the way each little aspect of each chapter is developing (well, except I'm not terribly thrilled with this chapter... can't win them all). So... so that's why progress is slow; I have no problem sacrificing speed for the ability to tell the story exactly as it unfolds in my heart.
Disclaimer, spoilers, and such: Still not mine... pity. Major spoilers for Breakdown. As in, we recap the whole episode here. And wow, I think we need to add a language warning! It's nothing beyond the usual words they've been known to use in the show, but it's more strongly T-rated than my usual, so there you have it.
Claudia was instantly suspicious when she heard the familiar hesitant knock on her bedroom door. She knew it had to be too good to be true, when Artie wasn't even upset enough to yell after finding out she, along with Pete and Myka, had nearly blown up the warehouse in his short absence. She knew he'd gone to hand over reports that would be taken directly to the mysterious group of regents... they'd talked briefly about it a few nights ago on their first official "Claudia-night". She also knew it wasn't usually an all-day event... he'd expected to be back around lunchtime, maybe later if he decided to have some time to himself in town. Not that Artie ever did that. "Time to himself" usually meant he was going upstairs in the warehouse to curl up with a book or spend time in quiet introspection. So Claudia knew something unusual had transpired during his time away from the warehouse, and while they'd been relieved that he didn't get mad at them for nearly blowing up half of South Dakota this afternoon, she knew it would come back to haunt them later, when Artie was feeling less overwhelmed by... well, by whatever must have happened.
So it was with not a small amount of trepidation that she answered, "Come in!" from her place on her bed, reclining among her pillows with a book she'd been wanting to read. She watched as Artie first poked his head into the room, then entered, clutching the bag of tacos that they'd brought back for him. He smiled gently as he sat down at her desk and began unwrapping a taco.
"So..." Claudia said. Quiet was not Artie's usual mode of operation, even when food was involved. And yet, there he sat, munching thoughtfully, waiting until the first of three tacos was half-finished before he spoke.
"You didn't tell me that you were on the zipline when the emergency switch got tripped," he finally said, worry evident in the funny way he stressed the word "on" in the midst of an otherwise calm sentence. He quickly took another bite of his dinner, more to prevent himself from flipping out than anything else.
"You talked to Myka," Claudia surmised, her tone utterly flat. Artie flinched almost imperceptibly. Claudia's trust was such a fragile thing; he hadn't realized that simply talking with Myka about the day would feel like a betrayal to the teen. Artie immediately resolved to ask Claudia about Claudia's day, from now on, rather than doing the "all-knowing parent, who already got the scoop from big sister" thing.
"I talked to Myka," he said, affirming Claudia's assumption. "She said the zipline crashed with you on it, the neutralizer processing center got jammed with a can of super sticky string, which then tried to kill you and Myka, and Pete nearly got killed by Sylvia Plath's typewriter in the dark vault, which you... I wish you hadn't gone through there, but I suppose it was for the best, since you only had about a minute to spare before... before everything exploded." He fell silent for a moment, munching his dinner and waiting to see if she would speak. She didn't, so he prodded gently, "It sounded pretty scary."
"I'm fine." Denial. Lovely. Artie busied himself with the second taco as he thought about where to go next.
"How did the zipline fall?" he asked, using dinner again as a way to stop his tendency to fill the air with his own thoughts, and allow her time to talk.
"I was doing the chores you left for me, and... well, I thought I fixed the auto-vac, but as soon as I went to work on the zipline, I guess it malfunctioned, because it knocked the ladder out from under me. And it was dumb, but I grabbed onto whatever I could to stop from falling off the ladder... and ended up halfway across the warehouse with no safety gear whatsoever. And then the damn auto-vac must have nailed the emergency release switch. And that was when I fell into the warehouse copy of Leena's and got trapped." Claudia paused as Artie crumpled a taco wrapper, worry rippling in his eyes.
"You fell into... are you injured?"
Claudia shook her head in reply. "Coolest bruise ever, but that's about it. The roofing kind of ripped my jeans a little." Artie waited, but again she fell silent, forcing him to pry. He was starting to get the impression that she liked it, just a little bit, when he showed enough interest to ask questions and prod.
"So... sticky string?" he asked.
"Yeah, the zipline must have knocked it over... it broke just about everything underneath it for at least a quarter mile. The artifacts are all dormant, but I'm going to be cleaning that mess up for weeks. My best guess is a can of the string fell through a vent into the gooery."
"I guess we need to put some chicken wire or something over the vents so things can't fall through," Artie said thoughtfully, getting a snort of laughter out of Claudia.
"And by that, you mean I need to put something over the vents. Already on my to-do list."
"Yeah, so is fixing that light switch, by the way, young lady," Artie said, now that she'd reminded him of things she needed to fix.
"Already done, cranky. Couldn't have people grabbing live wires... besides, it was kind of throwing sparks all over the place. Blew a fuse and everything. I managed to short it out pretty good." Artie chuckled at that, choosing to ignore the "cranky" jab.
"You know, that is, more or less, what was supposed to happen. When Myka kicked the keypad, she was counting on it shorting out, and the door freaking out. Pete's lucky it didn't lock the door, which is what is supposed to happen in that situation, as a failsafe."
"We're all lucky that didn't happen, since Pete saved our asses in the gooery... but I still want to learn how to do stuff like that without breaking bones," Claudia said, then flinched slightly, realizing that she might have let the cat out of the bag until she saw the look of remembrance on Artie's face. Nope, no luck, Myka had already informed him. Claudia began whining before Artie could even make the demand she knew was coming.
"Oh yeah, your toe... let me see it." Artie said. He completely ignored the whining and pointed at her sock-covered right foot, guessing that she'd used her dominant leg for her attempt at being a badass. Accepting defeat, his companion peeled the sock off, frowning a little as it stirred up fresh pain. Artie leaned over to get a good look before pronouncing his opinion. "Might be broken, but it doesn't look like it needs medical attention. Take it easy, and if it's not improving after a couple days, you tell me, do you understand me, young lady?"
"Yeah, no problem," Claudia replied, nodding with wide-eyed seriousness. Artie softened his expression once he was certain he'd gotten the point across.
"So... nearly getting eaten in the... the gooery, I like that word. Myka said you seemed a little shaken up." Actually she said Claudia had collapsed into Pete's hug and stayed there for quite some time, but Artie figured it was best to paraphrase that one. He expected Claudia to shrug it off, and she did so without a trace of hesitation, without even breaking eye contact. Damn, this child was good at lying about her heart, and it nearly broke his to think of how she must have learned that coping habit. Finished with his dinner, Artie got up from the desk and made his way to the bed, sitting to face her.
"You don't have to be all big and bad for me, you know," he said gently.
"I'm not," came her peevish retort. Not acting all big and bad, he wondered? Or not doing it for his benefit? He knew the first was a load of crap, but the second... he decided to go with that interpretation, see how it played.
Artie took a calming breath as he thought for a moment. He knew it was just a lot of leftover stress that she needed help coping with, but it seemed like Claudia was trying to push all his buttons at once tonight. "Let me try that again," he said. "A lot of times in this job, and even life in general, we have to put on a confident face and just forge ahead. If we were to allow uncertainty to affect us, well, it wouldn't be good. But when it's just you and me, I want you to be honest, kiddo." Artie let that hang in the air for a moment. "Myka said you seemed shaken up," he said again, now that he'd established some sort of expectations for how Claudia should respond. He watched carefully as she first weighed the risk of being that vulnerable. She must have deemed him worth the risk, he realized as her expression changed, evidence of the thoughts and feelings that flooded her memory, and her eyes filled with the fear of a person who's just realized how close she'd been to death.
"I knew better than to take the gloves off when touching an artifact... I don't know why I did that," she finally said. Artie didn't know whether to yell at her or hug her, at that admission. She was right; that was so far beyond a rookie mistake, there weren't even words for how stupid a choice she'd made. But he knew that wasn't the right thing to say, so he remained silent, waiting to see what Claudia would say next. "Pete figured out how to save us... you know how a tennis ball will shatter if you dip it in liquid nitrogen and then bounce it?" Artie nodded. "Yeah... turns out sticky string will shatter too... makes sense, similar properties." Artie was going to respond, but the words died on his lips when he looked up at Claudia. Her eyes were searching his face, he realized, asking in her own way if she could really trust him. Uncomfortable as it was, he sat motionless and quiet, allowing her to study his eyes, to paw through his heart and soul. It was a question that her eyes had been asking often, lately, in these quiet moments.
"What?" Artie finally asked, wondering if he'd passed her inspection. Claudia took several deep breaths, her hands twisting around as if they were trying to draw words from her mouth, words that were stuck just beneath the surface. He'd passed, all right, he thought as he waited for her to fight with a decade of distrusting habits. As much as Artie wanted to help, this was Claudia's battle and she needed him to simply sit and support her while she fought it. He gently took her chilled hand between his rough, warm ones. Such a connection gave her strength when she was little, he remembered. Maybe it would have the same effect now as well. He watched her take one more breath as the look in her eyes shifted from stuck to determined. The battle was won.
"The scariest part was that this time I knew you couldn't come save me," Claudia said, the words tumbling almost on top of one another as she gave up fighting a losing battle for stoic independence. She tipped toward Artie with such unexpected suddenness that his arms caught her out of sheer reflex before his brain engaged enough to gather her into the fatherly hug she sought.
"Come here, moppet," Artie muttered as he turned around to lean against the headboard, dragging her slender form along with. Perturbed eyes peered up at him from within his embrace.
"Moppet? What am I, eight?" Claudia asked, a small smile giving away the sense of amusement that hid beneath her annoyed reaction.
"No, but I remember when you were, and I could already tell that you'd grow up to be at least as much a pain in the ass as I am," Artie answered with a twinkle of mischief in his eyes.
"Did you know I'd grow up to be a warehouse agent, too?" Artie smiled at Claudia's question as he thought back to the little girl in his memory.
"I knew you had the potential, but I, I didn't... at the time I could foresee many options for your future. I knew that if you chose this one, you'd make a phenomenal agent." Artie's smile faded, his sense of empathy causing him to mirror the frown that had suddenly come across Claudia's face. "What, what's wrong?" he asked. Claudia responded by squirming and reaching into her pocket, pulling out the headlamp that Artie realized must have begun to dig into her side as she'd reclined in his protective arms. He chuckled when he saw her name in jewels on the elastic band. "You know, I'm sure I still have the original in a box somewhere, but... well I put it somewhere safe, and someday I'll remember where that safe place is," he said.
"You saved it?" Claudia asked, a confused frown creeping over her features. "Why?"
"It was probably a month after Joshua disappeared, when I found that headband... I don't even know how it ended up in my coat pocket. I just remember he'd gotten you that jewel... craft kit... thing to keep you occupied so he could work."
"Didn't work," Claudia said with a wry grin.
"Well, it occupied your hands while you tried to figure out everything... about everything he was working on. No, it didn't work," Artie conceded. The memory was so much funnier now than it had been at the time... or perhaps the passage of time made him treasure the past all the more, he wasn't sure which. "You'd worked out such a complicated set of equations to design your name, instead of just laying out the beads and seeing what it looked like. That was... that was when I knew there was something special, that you had the sort of outside-the-box approach to perfectionism that keeps warehouse agents alive. I tried to return it to you when I found it, you know... the social workers weren't terribly helpful, to say the least. So I tucked it away in the hopes that I'd have the chance to return it someday."
"I probably would have lost it in the thousand or so moves, anyway," Claudia muttered, provoking her mentor to hold her just a little closer.
"I wish I could have... well, I shouldn't let the joy of today get muddied up with yesterday's regrets."
"So, how did making me a new headband... which is very useful, by the way, I love the headlamp. But how did that help you let go of yesterday's regrets?" Claudia asked. She'd meant it to be a rather pointed question just to annoy, but realized she'd started a more emotional conversation as she watched a thoughtful look come over Artie's face.
"Leena threw a box of my old storage on my reading sofa upstairs in the warehouse, so I had to clean that up before I could sit down and read... which was probably her intent, but... well, anyway." Artie groused, getting a chuckle out of his young companion. "Among the books and photos, I found that silly craft kit your brother had given you... don't ask me how I ended up with that, either. I guess it was mixed into some things that belonged... belonged in the warehouse. I found it to be strangely cathartic, a way of remembering the little girl who I, I wish I could have protected and taken care of then, but who I'm so fortunate to get a second chance with. Second chances are really more rare than we would like to think." Artie finally fell silent, lost in his memory for a few moments until Claudia shifted against him, drawing him back to the present.
He watched as her fingers traced over the delicate design of her own name, nodding gently. He understood her unspoken words. Artie's foray into crafting had been a little silly, sure, but it was also sweet, a reminder of their shared history. But now that she knew the story behind it, the kitschy, little-girl decoration had suddenly become a highly-prized tangible reminder of the relationship that had once been lost but that Artie was working so diligently to regrow, like a plant coming back to life after a hard winter. It was hard evidence, she realized as she ran her fingers over his handiwork, that she was indeed wanted and treasured even on the days when she didn't feel particularly valuable or worthwhile... days like today, when her trust wavered and her footing faltered.
"It's okay if it's hard to trust you, right?" Claudia asked suddenly, unexpectedly. Artie blinked, slightly hurt by the question before he remembered that trust is not instant, especially for somebody who'd been through as much as she had been in her young life. He took a breath as he reminded himself that he should count it a win that she had given him a second chance at all, though he had a sneaking suspicion that it was mostly because she didn't have enough sense of self-worth to envision herself anywhere else, and the artifacts were intriguing enough for her to tolerate him.
"I know trusting me is hard," Artie answered. "I know that one minute you may feel very... very secure and safe, and the next, it feels like you're in mortal danger. I plan to keep – I'm going to keep fighting to earn your trust. For one thing, I'll come to you to find out about your day, and not take my information from Myka, or Pete, or anybody else."
"Not a big deal," Claudia said, even though Artie could see the flicker of uncertainty in her eyes. "It wasn't a very rational reaction."
"It is a big deal, not because feeling betrayed is necessarily logical in that situation, but because now I, I know it shakes your sense of trust. I'm sorry you got hurt, however unintentional it was on my part. Now that I realize that, I'm going to make a point not to do it again. I should... I should really talk to you anyway, let you tell your story for yourself."
Claudia nodded her acceptance of his apology, not really sure how to deal with it. She wasn't accustomed to people apologizing... wasn't used to people who thought she deserved to be treated with kindness. Artie's habit of treating her with boundless, if awkward and unconventional, love was entirely foreign to her, and she had no idea how to accept it most of the time.
Artie smiled warmly down at the teen still resting against him like a little girl. He was surprised that she hadn't yet moved, or for that matter, surprised that she'd let him take care of her in her moment of insecurity in the first place. He'd known that this life would present challenge unlike anything she'd ever experienced before, but he'd kind of expected it to be more of an intellectual challenge for the young genius, rather than the emotional challenge that had presented itself for both of them instead. Not that he minded, but this was entirely not what he'd had in mind on that fateful day when he'd asked her to make this place her home, in his usual backward manner.
"So tell me how you finally escaped the warehouse copy of Leena's," Artie asked, delighting in the easy, relaxed smile that spread across Claudia's face as she sat up and turned to face him to tell the tale of how she, Pete, and Myka had combined the best of each of their talents to figure out how to manipulate the artifact and escape just in time to save the warehouse.
I'd love to hear what y'all think about this one, because I really have about zero confidence about the characterization... and even less confidence about the next chapter which is getting totally, completely out of hand and it's only... bah, one-third done, maybe? And with a critically ill family member... yeah, sorry, it's just going to take time. I'm glad some of you think it's worth the wait, though! It means a lot to me, really.