A/N: Thanks again for the reviews. Sorry for the wait, and keep up with telling me what you think. It's helping :) A little more action (if you can call it that) in this chapter. Hope it's a nice change of pace from the last few chapters. Don't worry, if this one isn't enough for you action-nuts out there, wait until the next chapter *knowing grin*
Mina Harker had found a most distracting way to spend her time... and it was her usual sort of diversion. Chemicals. Being a chemist after all, there was always something new she could try with them -within safe parameters of course- and something new to discover.
She had a few assorted books lying open around her, and vials and test tubes scattered in an organised fashion across the desk, amidst beakers and a Bunsen burner.
Her glasses were perched on her nose, and her blue eyes never left the test tube she was tinkering with, even as the sound of footfalls could be heard just inside her door.
"Can I help you, Special Agent Sawyer?" she asked in a kind, yet aloof tone of voice, her heightened senses alerting her to the company.
She heard his reply when it finally came, and he sounded a little put-down, "I just wanted to come see what you were doing. I haven't seen you around the ship in the last couple days, and I wondered if everything was okay."
"Yes, Mr Sawyer," she informed him coldly, placing down the tubes, and lifting a beaker carefully with her feminine hand, "everything is fine."
Mina heard him approach, but noticed he stayed at a wary distance. He seemed a little on his guard around chemicals. "Are you sure? Ever since Anise-"
Mina let her sigh come forth louder and sounding more impatient than it should have, and he stopped his sentence at once... if only for a moment; "That's it, isn't it?"
Her concentration faltering rapidly, she placed down the beaker and turned in her chair to face the young man. His handsome face was pensive and perhaps a little offended.
Oh for goodness' sake, Mina thought hurriedly, it's not as if I don't trust him.
Tom eyed her curiously, furrowing his brow. "What is it about her?"
Mina rolled her eyes discreetly. "You are jumping to conclusions. I never said it was her. Am I not entitled to a little privacy every now and then like everyone else on this vessel?"
Tom shook his head, hands in his pockets, his braces hanging -as ever- unused down the sides and back of his trousers. "It's more than that. You've been a little testy ever since she came on the scene."
"Testy, Mr Sawyer?"
The expression that came over his face showed his annoyance with her sudden use of 'Mr Sawyer'. She shrugged this off completely, and awaited his reply, which wasn't long in coming; "Yeah. You've been short-tempered and even cruel."
"Cruel?"
"Yeah... Skinner outside the Nautilus in Paris." Tom's voice was rising ever so slightly. "What was all that about? You know how he is."
"Yes, I do, and quite frankly, I am growing sick of it," Mina retorted briskly, turning her attention back on her work. He was becoming quite distracting in himself. "As I'm sure others are as well."
"I couldn't give a damn," Tom said to her, just as icily. He was growing quite heated in the way he was acting towards her now. "It's not his fault."
She stood and whirled on him then, whipping off and disregarding her spectacles. "Oh, but it is, and you know that as well as I do. He stole that formula, and used it on himself, and it serves him right he can't turn back!"
Tom eyed her perhaps with a little caution now. She was far from short, and was even an inch or two taller than he was himself. The hands stayed in the pockets though, as if he were afraid to remove them. "That's no need to lay into him every time he jokes about it. Maybe it helps him deal with the fact that he's stuck."
Mina laughed, quite without humour. "Oh, I see. So he deserves no blame for his condition?"
"I never said that."
"It certainly sounded like it, Mr Sawyer."
"Stop calling me that!"
His sudden yell startled Mina slightly, and the two locked gazes firmly. Perhaps she should calm down, she realised, and took in a deep breath. After all, he was right about Skinner. "Tom-"
"No, you know what?" Tom interrupted, his hands leaving their pockets. He pointed a finger at her accusingly then, as he persisted, "I've had enough of you looking on everyone as something bad. What was it you thought about me when we first met?"
She did not respond. She remembered... it hadn't been very positive.
"Some silly, young, hot-headed American 'boy' who was gonna get himself killed, isn't that right?" Tom said to her in a low voice. He was closer to her now, and she could almost smell the anger coming off of him. Why was he so upset? "Well I guess I'm a classic example of how wrong you can be, Mrs Harker." Her name was spoken with slight mocking that she did not like. Nevertheless, she stayed quiet.
Tom seemed to need to vent his anger somehow, and she just happened to be his target. She far from liked it, but if it would calm him down... perhaps she was willing to sacrifice a little of her pride. As long as he didn't say anything too harsh.
"Wanna know what I thought of you?"
Oh dear, she thought. This wasn't a good idea. She was far from calm herself.
Tom even had a little of his cocky all-American smile back on his face now as he answered the question without her acknowledgement, "When I first saw you, sure, I thought you were just some beautiful European girl I could look at when I thought you wouldn't notice. That didn't last long though... remember that guy in Gray's library?"
Quite vividly, she replied in her mind. She simply stared unwaveringly as he spoke.
"I was quite surprised, I'll give you that," Tom continued. "I'd never quite seen anything like it. I joked about it at the time, but you scared me."
Mina averted her gaze now, not quite so confident anymore. She despised discussing this topic.
"Don't get me wrong, I'm not exactly squeamish, but seeing you... 'devour' that man didn't exactly fill me with a sense of joy and content."
Mina's eyes snapped back to meet his. He did not flinch beneath her gaze now. Perhaps he felt braver for having confronted her. "Devour?" she muttered to him, "Is that what you call it?"
Tom took in a breath noticeably, and squared his shoulders.
Oh how very American of you, her thoughts rambled, but she dismissed them.
"Devour..." she laughed quietly to herself, "well, that's a new term for what I do." Her voice came out with more confidence and volume when she next spoke, "What I do, which I might add is completely my own business and far from yours, is anything but a hobby. Occasionally, I require it simply to survive, and if you could get your narrow mind around that for just a moment, perhaps you would not be so judging."
He had offended her now, and she was shocked and upset despite her outer shielding of confidence and nonchalance. Inside she was reeling from his verbal attack.
"You forget," she said to him in a low voice, "that you joined this 'freak show' quite of your own accord."
Tom glared. It looked as though she had struck a blow on him now. "I wanted to help," he retaliated, some of his bravado gone now.
Despite her subconscious telling her to do otherwise, she said, "And what a grand job you did, Thomas... why, we simply couldn't have done it without you."
Tom's face fell for only a moment, before it hardened once again, his jaw clenched with what could have possibly been anger. "Well it's nice to know what you really think of me."
Mina wanted to apologise immediately, but her pride held it back, kept her silent. She raised an eyebrow at him.
He thrust his hands back into his pockets again, quite forcefully this time, as though he wanted nothing more to smash her beakers and equipment but was restraining himself. She was glad... she would have been quite annoyed had he given in to the urge.
"A pleasure as always, Mrs Harker," he mumbled to her, and departed at once, almost colliding with Dr Jekyll upon doing so.
Mina let out a long, quiet breath of exhalation, and touched her fingers to her temples. She was suddenly getting a headache. She closed her eyes.
"Is everything all right?" Jekyll asked of her.
Her eyes opened and met his face, and she shook her head. "It's fine."
Jekyll glanced the way Tom had clearly taken, and added, "But I heard a commotion from down the corridor, thought I'd come and see if everything was okay. What happened?"
"Young Sawyer and I had a minor disagreement, that is all," Mina informed the gentle doctor, whom she wanted to leave more than anything, but didn't quite want to order away.
"A minor disagreement that has him filled with more anger than I've seen in him?" Jekyll inquired at a push. "And yourself I might add."
Mina looked to him. "Doctor, it was nothing. We had an exchange of opinions, nothing more."
Jekyll looked as though he was going to add something further, but then seemed to decide against it. He nodded with a small smile as usual, and removed his pocket watch, eyeing it.
"Well, I really must be shooting off," he said quietly, "but I just thought I should tell you that New York has appeared on the horizon."
Mina nodded and offered him a wan smile. "Thank you, Doctor."
Jekyll nodded, and disappeared from view.
With a deep regretful sigh at all the words she had said to Tom; Mina went back to her chemicals.
Anise jumped quite violently in surprise when the door slammed, and she whirled at once, dropping the book she had been perusing. Her heart raced for a while before she realised it was only Tom. He looked troubled, angry... even upset.
Picking up the book she had dropped and closing it, she replaced it on the desk, and walked over to him as he paced slowly. "Is everything all right?"
"It's fine," Tom replied shortly.
Anise frowned. "Is it the woman? Did she say something about... about me?"
"Not exactly." Tom sat heavily on his bed, and lay back on it with very little care what he landed on. There was nothing but a few papers and a white shirt. He ignored this. "Not about you anyway."
Anise stood over him with concern and curiousity she could not deny. "About you?" She was surprised. Everyone here appeared to co-exist quite effortlessly... or so it had seemed. This suggested otherwise.
"Don't worry about it," Tom mumbled, and sat up, his hair a mess, once again. She stroked some of it from his eyes, forcing him to look up at her, and he smiled. "I'm not."
She crouched down, and looked him squarely in the face. "Liar."
Tom rolled his eyes. "Why should I care what she thinks of me? I don't... really."
Anise knew this to be far from the truth, but let it drop nevertheless. If he wanted to talk about it, she would listen. Clearly, this was not the time, and she did not want to push him.
At that moment, there was a knock on the door. It opened immediately afterwards seemingly on its own, and a dismembered voice said, "Nearly there. Just thought you'd like to know, Sawyer."
"Thanks, Skinner."
The invisible man in the doorway chuckled, and added, "Welcome home."
Then he was gone, as the door closed behind him. Tom stood, and retrieved his jacket from the coat rack. Anise followed suit. He slipped his on, as did she, and led the way out of the room, retrieving his Winchester rifle on the way.
Anise smiled as they went. She was quite eager to see America with Tom all of a sudden.