Still don't own Tin Man.

Oh look, it's an update AND a decently long chapter. Venus might just switch back from a retrograde spin. If that last comment made no sense; don't worry, you are not alone in your confusion. Seriously though, I'm going to try to lessen the time between updates. Breadcrumbs in the form of reviews help; I promise they do. As always a bow of gratitude to those who have and will leave them.

Sorry for all the confusion, but the thing about time travel is that if you can understand it immediately you are not doing it right. The nest few chapters will, hopefully, clear up a lot of things.

Thanks for reading.

"DG," he said again without moving.

"Wyatt," she whispered so quietly it was impossible that he could have heard her, yet he started moving forward slowly and hesitantly. He stopped two feet in front of her and just stared. She stared back, confused, unnerved, and increasingly annoyed but at what exactly she wasn't sure.

"DG," came the trance-like utterance again.

"Did somebody shave off one too many of your IQ points while I was away," she snapped. She supposed the stress and oddness and just plain rottenness of the past week had finally broken through her patience, and she'd never had much to begin with.

His face broke into a relieved smile as he enveloped her in his arms and then let her go. Their hugs would always be awkward it seemed. "Good," he stated. She looked at him quizzically. "When that sarcasm of yours surfaces, it generally means there's a break in our troubles. Less chance of you disappearing on me." At that his face darkened. "Come on, we need to get you back to your family," he continued using the cold, distanced tone from when the had first met.

She dug in her heels when he tried to pull her up and forward. "No," she said slowly. He gave her an exasperated glare which she returned. "I'm confused. You're confused, or at least you look confused," she added when he narrowed his eyes, "and before we move, one of us needs to be less confused. Let's start with me." His jaw clenched in a clear sign of fraying patience, but he nodded. "Good, first question. How long have we known each other?"

He tried pulling her forward again, "DG, we don't have time for this."

She yanked herself free and crossed her arms. "Humor me."

His jaw twitched. "About a week," he said through gritted teeth.

"Okay," she said nodding, "and were you in a metal suit when I found you?"

"Yes," he answered, jaw still clenched.

"Because an evil witch, that I set free possessed my sister and used her to take over the O.Z., locked you up?"

"DG," he growled.

"I said humor me," she snapped. "This is important, okay."

He relaxed minutely. "Yes," he answered finally, "she sent Zero to torture me and my family and then forced me to re-watch it continuously until you let me out. Anything else you want rehashed?" he bit out, but she was already five feet away taking her rage out on the nearest tree and causing some nasty bruises to her toes.

The man actually picked her up from behind and started to haul her backwards. The nerve of him! She wasn't finished with the tree yet. She wouldn't be finished till it was in splinters and her rage and misery were whittled down to dull aches. She'd failed. She'd had her chance to stop the witch, and she'd failed. She'd come back, and nothing had changed. It had been pointless. Why the hell had she been sent back then? Was this the O.Z.'s way of mocking her? Of punishing her further for her mistake? She started cursing and kicking harder as if by sheer will she could air bicycle her way back to the tree. She needed to destroy something, but the only thing her struggle accomplished was knocking Cain off balance.

He fell backwards, and she went with him. Her elbow landed dead center in his abdomen, and she heard the painful intake of breath beneath her. Instead of crying or apologizing, she just glared. It was a glare directed at the entirety of the O.Z., and if she weren't lying trapped on her back, she'd spit at it just for emphasis.

"Princess," came Cain's voice somewhere near her ear, "would you mind explaining that." It wasn't a question or request, and he hadn't let her go yet despite the fact that his voice was still breathy from the fall and her elbow.

"I hate life," she said bitterly.

"That's always a good sentiment," he said.

She didn't want to, but she laughed. It was a good cleansing laugh, and while she didn't feel good after it, she felt better. He finally released her, and she rolled off of him and helped him to his feet. "Come on, Tin Man, let's get back to wherever you were trying to get me back to."

He wasn't moving. "You going to explain what just happened or where you've been?"

She looked down, "I had an adventure. It didn't turn out the way I'd hoped. Now I'm back." With that, she started moving, and he fell into step with her, gun ready and scanning the woods for trouble. As they walked back to the camp, she asked, "Where are we?"

"A resistance camp about a day's walk south of the tower. Jeb and I have been meeting with resistance leaders. It needed to be done, and I . . . needed to get away from the tower."

"Too many bad memories?" she asked.

"Yeah, among other things," he paused and looked at her, "after I almost . . . after you disappeared . . . I don't like being useless."

She nodded her head and turned away, "I know the feeling." They walked on.

"Where were you?" he asked after a minute of silence.

"Don't ask me just now. I'll need to kick something again, and," she smiled faintly, "you're the only thing in reach."

He nodded and answered her with his own ghost of a smile.

The camp was small, perhaps thirty men in total. As she walked up with Cain, they stared at her with unchecked awe which slowly gave way to the annoying reverence they'd shown her the night of the witch's fall as she got further into the camp. She vaguely recognized most of them.

"Where's Jeb?" she asked scanning faces. He'd said they'd gone out together, hadn't he?

"At a camp a lot like this one north of the tower," Cain answered leading her onwards. "The Zipperhead thought we'd get more done with two groups."

"I'm sorry," she mumbled.

He stopped and turned, "Why?"

"You just found your son, and you've already been split up again," she said.

"And that's your fault how?"

"Because –," she started when he cut her off.

"Never mind Princess, I can see where this is going, so let's just stop before we start arguing over who's guilty of what. Alright?" She nodded her head, and they moved on.

They entered a tent near the center of the camp, and he sat them both down on two makeshift chairs that were inside. "You ready to tell me where you were yet?" he asked. She shook her head. He frowned.

"Who's in charge now?" she asked after a moment of uneasy silence.

"Mostly Glitch and occasionally Ahamo."

"Not my mother?" she asked confused.

"She hasn't left Azkadellia's side since your sister woke up." He answered her questions quickly and simply; she would have to work for elaboration.

"Az and my mother, they tried to bring me back?"

"Yeah," he murmured.

"Cain," she growled impatiently.

He shrugged, "When your sister woke up and learned what had happened, she attempted to get you back with the queen's help."

"I remember," she said. "You were there."

"Yeah," he said again, "it didn't work. Your sister's been shut in her study with the mut and the queen ever since, and the zipperhead took charge."

"Is that when he sent you out, you and Jeb?" she asked carefully.

"They talked me into it. I needed to get out," she ignored the sinking sensation that statement caused. "I wanted to go after Zero, but Glitch started in on my duty and my traitor son joined him. It was his revenge for me talking him out of doing the same thing a minute earlier." He almost laughed at that. Almost, but the half smile fell into a glare.

Not knowing how else to respond, she just asked another question. "Have there been any more voodoo instances?"

He locked eyes with her, and she had to resist the urge to fidget. "Not since you disappeared."

She stared at her legs when he continued to look at her. Was he trying to interrogate her? Was he angry? She couldn't tell, and her nerves were too fried to find out. Just keep asking question, she told herself. Questions made her seem calm and reasonable. Calm and reasonable was good. Much better than panic or depression. "Any news about Zero?"

"No," she could still feel his eyes on her. Definitely interrogation mode.

"I'm sorry, Cain," she said to her knees.

"I wish you'd stop saying that Princess," he sighed, and when he next spoke, his voice was quieter. He'd turned his head. "You don't need to be, and for as much as you apologize, the practice doesn't suit you."

"What do you mean?" she asked lifting her head to look at him.

"You . . . do. You were doing from the first moment I saw you, and you haven't stopped since. Anything you do wrong, you move to fix before anyone has the chance to reprimand you. It's slightly annoying actually."

She blushed at the perhaps-compliment but continued to argue, "I screwed up your life."

"Kid," he said exasperated, "Ahamo and Glitch might claim to have had peach sweet lives before the witch, but the rest of the O.Z. didn't. I had plenty of sorrow in my life before that tin suit."

"Like what?" she asked without thinking. "Sorry, I didn't mean –"

He raised a hand to stop her. "We're beyond social do's and don'ts Princess. Adora," he paused for a moment, "Adora's second pregnancy was a miscarriage. It hit us both pretty hard and made us realize Jeb was even grander than we thought before. Shame," he looked down at his hands which clenched a little. "I even had a name picked out for her."

"Really?" she scooted closer to him but stayed out of touching range. Finding Adora's grave after he'd been led to believe she was alive had reopened the wound for him if indeed it had ever really been closed, but for some reason the idea of Cain being the father of a little girl was utterly fascinating.

"Yeah. I knew a woman once; she was the strangest person I'd ever met. It was like she was totally unafraid of everything and totally unaware that some things were impossible." A small smile crept to his lips, "Well, until you ran into my life with a stick." DG narrowed her eyes at him. He was interrupting a deeply emotional moment to mock her. Cain continued after a moment, "She was the only girl I ever met who could take down Zero, and she even tried to order the mystic man around." She stared at him wide-eyed. There was no way he was describing her. His smile faded, "Being around her was the only time I questioned whether I was really in love with Adora."

It was a good thing he wasn't looking at her because her mouth wouldn't close. "What," she stopped and started again, "what happened to her?"

His hands clenched again, "I treated her badly and never got the chance to apologize. Doesn't matter though. Adora was the one for me, and my friend beat me to using the name anyway."

His friend? "Your friend."

"Yeah," again a small smile appeared, "he and the mystic man championed the resistance. There were times I thought they knew the witch was going to come to power before even she did."

She couldn't help herself, "What was his name?"

"Rhys Gatwick," he said and turned to her, "You would have liked him. He was a lot like you except with more sense and great deal more style."

"Hey," she said swatting at him even as she thought, you WOULD have liked him. Would have, not will. She waited a moment, "You said he had a family? What happened to him, to them?"

Cain considered his hands again, "Just a daughter. When the witch found out about him, he died trying to get her to safety. From what I heard later it didn't matter. The witch killed her too."

She hung her head. Rhys and the mystic man had known the witch was coming. She'd told them, and by telling them, she'd practically forced the resistance on them. He'd named his daughter for her, well sort of. How did that make her feel? It was like there was a hole in her stomach, toasty warm at the edges but cold and empty in the middle. Oh Rhys, I'm so sorry.

"You okay DG?" he asked. She lifted her head and nodded.

"So," she cleared her throat, "this daughter of his must have been something to be named after that woman."

He snorted, "Yeah, Gail was something, alright, although what that something was I'll never know." He stopped abruptly at the end of the sentence. She could see the gears kicking in motion. "Gail," he said and repeated louder, "Gail. Gail Theodora. DG!" he half growled as she moved to sink away. Crap, crap, crap. This was so not good.

He grabbed her arm and made sure she stayed put. "The first time I saw you, I thought I'd seen a ghost, but I couldn't figure of who. It was you." The intensity of his stare was scaring her.

"Cain, I'm sorry," she pleaded.

"I told you to stop," he growled, "enough apologies. That's where you were. Damn it, what were you doing there?"

Her own temper was sparking. Why was he so angry? "I told you there, and here, and I'm telling you now. I DON'T KNOW!"

"You were going to try to stop yourself from releasing the witch?!" he asked accusingly.

"Yes!" she shouted back.

"And what would that have done to you?!" he was shouting now too.

"It doesn't matter!"

"It matters to me!" he countered, and half a second later the import of his words hit both of them. They sat there staring at one another, still as statues and barely breathing. Then very, very slowly he leaned forward and cupped her cheek with his hand. Her breathing grew heavier, but she couldn't stop looking at him. He had the most incredible eyes; they were like a clear sky reflected in a glacier pool. Icy and intense yet irresistable. He leaned still further forward and placed a chaste kiss on her lips.