"Bloody hell Loker!"

Cal's voice echoed in his office as he pulled back from the papers he'd been reading, almost as if he had been hit by its content. He recovered quickly though, reaching forward to get a pen and post it from his desk with the intention to leave a message on the folder's cover. Then he changed his mind, dropping pen and paper to grab a black marker and write 'What are you waiting for?' in big obnoxious letters all over the folder.

Grinning to himself, satisfied with the balance of encouragement and hindrance he had once again achieved with his younger employee, Cal leaned back on the chair and checked the time on his watch. Past 9pm, he had spent more than one hour reading Loker's research and he had to admit it had been worthy. But that had also been the last thing on his list for the day, if he was to make and keep lists of things to do that was, and he was ready to go home.

With a huff he stood up and grabbed his jacket, then picked up the folder and headed out of his office, as usual enjoying the silence of the empty space after everybody else had gone home. He glanced at Gillian's office down the corridor, the lights were out and he wasn't surprised. Unlike him, she wasn't a total workaholic - not yet - and by then was more likely at home, enjoying a relaxing evening. He smiled at the thought, it really made him happy, then turned around and headed to the lab to leave Loker's research.

Cal punched in the numbers on the keypad to open the door and walked over to Loker's desk, dropping the folder on the flat surface with a satisfying loud noise. He took a moment to imagine the young man's confused face at his message the day after, making a mental note to try and be there for the reveal, but before he could walk out of the room he caught a movement with the corner of his eyes.

Curious more than anything else, Cal turned around and only then saw Gillian sitting in one of the chairs inside the cube, her bag and coat on the table and the door open. She seemed comfortable, totally in her element, looking at him with a hint of a smile while absently holding a book in her hand.

"I thought you'd gone home."

"I was waiting for you, Cal."

He took a couple of steps closer, tilting his head slightly to study her better. She looked fine, relaxed, and almost amused. All of which was intriguing and a tad concerning for him at the same time.

"How'd you know I'd come around?"

"I saw Loker's study on chimpanzees on your desk today. I figured with Emily away for a few days you'd give it a go, anything to have a good excuse not to go home early."

Cal grinned, not minding the fact that she would know him so well. Yeah, he certainly wasn't in a hurry to find himself alone at home that evening, or any of the following ones for that mattered. Then he took another couple of steps, catching something a little off in the way she looked. On a hunch he looked at the dashboard and realised she was on blind mode, that the blank walls of the cube were up and that she couldn't see him.

"What's going on in there, love?" He asked then, only partially hiding his sudden concern.

"I've been thinking."

"About?"

Cal was glad she couldn't see him. It was giving him an opportunity to study her face and try to decipher what he saw, and she couldn't see the way he was walking around the cube. She'd probably protested about him trying to read her and more likely thought he looked like a predator circling the prey before launching a lethal attack.

"This place, the cube."

"What about it?"

"It's - No, Cal." She must have heard his voice coming closer from the open door and her words stopped him on track. "Wait."

"Foster-"

"Just a minute, ok?"

She smiled, just about enough to convince him. Cal hesitated, really considered the option of ignoring her request but decided against it. There was a lot going on that he couldn't understand but for once waiting for things to play out might have been a better approach.

"So." He folded his arms to his chest and leaned his back on the outside of the cube. "About this place?"

On the inside, Foster smiled gratefully before resuming with her words.

"Earlier today, when we were interrogating Wallace about the missing woman, it just occurred to me the power that this place holds. Lots of people we bring here think they can take it, being interrogated by someone who is not even with the police. But they all fold eventually, even hardened criminals." She leaned back on the chair and gazed at the space around her. "Magic happens here, we see the lies and we uncover the truth. No matter what."

Cal wanted to say something, maybe a silly joke to ease the tension. However, when he looked at her, seemingly so relaxed and serene, he realised he was the only tensed one in that situation and that Gillian might have not appreciated his attempt at levity. Even ruling out that option, for his own sake Cal felt the need to let her know how he was feeling about all that.

"You're starting to worry me here, love." He said in the most sincere voice he had ever used. "Can I come in?"

"Not yet."

It was a stern but very polite reply, trademark Gillian Foster really. Through the glass of the walls Call kept staring at her, thinking it wasn't even about reading her anymore but only about to make sure she was ok.

"We hold that power, when we are in here. We created it when we designed the cube. But we never thought about if and how we would respond to that power."

Cal was at loss for words. In a few minutes he had gone from surprised to intrigued, then confused and slightly concerned, only to end up in a whole new square occupied by sheer panic. The fact that she still looked peaceful and in control of herself did not help, as he struggled even more to reconcile her words and the unclear meaning of them with that unbothered expression on her face.

"You can come in now."

He let out a long and loud sigh of relief at the long awaited invitation and tried to collect himself before stepping in. Whatever she was up to she didn't seem to have a problem with it, and Cal didn't want to get in what she had marked as her territory looking like he wasn't up to it.

Uncharacteristically careful and slow, Cal stepped inside the cube and stood on the door for a moment, hands in his pockets. He knew, he felt he must have looked like a scolded child but couldn't help it, and just waited for a sign from Foster. She smiled at his shyness and waved him in, pointing at the chair in front of her.

"You don't have to worry about anything, Cal," she pointed out then, and he smirked.

"You're giving me a lot of reasons to, Gill."

Calmly - seductively, even? - she closed the book and joined her hands on the table, the steady and serene look on her face never budging. But for a moment, too brief to be entirely reliable, Cal caught something that offered him the first hint since that strange conversation had started.

"That's why you're in here?" Scratch that, he thought, waving his hand briefly as if to erase the question. "That's why we are here."

It was all there, in the change of pronoun and the switch from question to statement. And in the determination flashing from her eyes in response.

"This is a place of truth." Gillian stated again, then looked right at him in a way he didn' think she was capable of. "I think it's about time we test it ourselves."

Cal understood, it was near impossible not to. It was everywhere, in her words to begin with but mostly importantly in her face, body language, in that sudden and somewhat unexpected confidence she was screaming at him through her eyes. It was all there for him to see, to soak in it with no fear of misunderstanding or misreading, and yet he couldn't believe it. He could have touched it, had it been some kind of physical representation, as close as she was to him.

"Truth or dare?"

He knew he sounded like a bloody idiot, but he was still trying to regain his footing.

"Only truth, Cal."

She clearly wasn't going to let that one go.

Cal gulped down, nervous, but also somewhat looking forward to it. Someone else at his place might have felt himself stripped of his masculinity, forced to chase after her making such a bold move. However, the truth was he couldn't give a toss about that and instead only hoped he was up for it.

"Ok." He leaned forward and focused his attention on her, his energy entirely dedicated to matching her gaze. "Go on then."

"Alec." Big value item, right off the gate. "Did you like him?"

"Can't say that I did love."

"Ever? Not even before the divorce?"

"Same answer I am afraid. Marked him down as a tosser the first time and never changed my mind."

There was no hint of regret in his voice, nor his face. Gillian knew she had started with some sort of an easy one, Cal's dislike for Alec wasn't exactly breaking news, but she was glad he was taking that seriously and not holding back.

"Why?"

"Well, first impressions have a lot to do with it." Cal leaned back and slouched on the chair. he was a man of many talents but sitting up straight was not one of them. "I could tell he didn't like me either the first time we met but I understood that, right? Hardly anybody does the first time they meet me and after all I was the one irresponsibly dragging you away from a nice safe job at the Pentagon. All that hostility, I expected it, I could manage. Then, remember that time we went out for dinner?" She did, until her divorce the three of them had been to dinner a number of times but she knew exactly which one he was talking about. "He kept going on and on about how he was the one who had found you that job, it was the only thing he seemed to know about it, the plonker."

"It was," she conceded. "Besides asking how my day had gone he never showed too much interest."

"See? Plonker." He grinned, then his smile softened. "I would have listened to you talking about your work for hours."

Gillian smiled back, appreciating the honesty but also thinking he might have been pushing it a bit too much even. So, she thought, that might be a good time to test exactly how committed he was.

"When I told you we were separating, I called you out on you following Alec." Cal bit at his bottom lip, not exactly ashamed but obviously not entirely proud of that either. "You said it wasn't really about protecting me, but something like that."

Cal's whole body tensed for a moment and he angled his neck to give her a better look. It wasn't about reading her, Gillian was making no effort whatsoever to hide and whatever doubt he might have had about it had been just squashed by the straightforward implication of her words. It was a dangerous game she was playing, but it was obvious to him that she was well aware of that. Except, as the conversation progressed it was becoming clear that it wasn't at all a game for her. He did fear a little where that might go, but when Gillian caught that fear and raised an eyebrow to him Cal decided he wasn't going to be the one chickening out.

"What was that then?" She asked again.

"What I said? That was a very lame attempt at letting you know I had been desperately waiting for him to screw it all up for good." Incredibly, she nodded knowingly. "I had spent months watching you trying to make it work for the both of you, pretending you didn't see, burying deep how much you were hurting." He wanted to take her hands, it seemed appropriate, but he didn't know if it was part of whatever rule she had established. Instead he leaned forward, his palms spread open on the table close to hers to let her know that option was available. "It was quite possibly the worst time and way to let you know that with Alec out of the picture I was ready to cross that bloody line."

That was one big leap he had just taken, and judging by her face he had just landed on his feet with a nice score. Even more, she moved one hand and rested on top of his, leaning forward a little to whisper.

"You really didn't try hard enough."

His breath got caught in his throat at those words, combined with that sultry look in her eyes which was also filled with some kind of regret. Was she really saying she had wanted him to make a pass at her? It couldn't be possible, Cal didn't want it to be. On the one hand, to know that she had wanted him to act on his feelings was a welcome revelation, it erased years of doubts and misreads… However, on the other hand it did also mean that he had wasted years not doing anything concrete about it because he thought he didn't have a chance.

"Don't dwell on the past, Cal." Foster admonished him gently, squeezing his hand. "Your turn."

"Not fair love, you had plenty of time to think about this."

"This is not one to overthink, Cal."

That sounded like a warning, but also like an odd reassurance. Did she mean he didn't have to worry about the journey, because eventually they both knew where that was going to end? Cal was beyond frustrated; the more she opened up, the more directly and bluntly she told him whatever was going through her mind, whatever had been going through her mind in the past, the less he understood his part in all of that.

"That night you got drunk with Torres, when I came back from the mine case." It was the first thing that had come to his mind, and he took no small pleasure in seeing that Gillian had not seen that one coming. Funny enough, neither had he. "What was that all about?"

"It didn't come from a bad place, if that's what you worry about."

"Elaborate?"

"It always feels good to help you out. You think you don't need help most of the time, that your problems are for you to solve and deal with no matter what." Gillian lowered her eyes for a moment, gathering some courage before looking back at him. "I know one of the reasons why you hide things from me is that you want to protect me, I know that you feel like what happens to you affects me too and every time I get to help you I am showing you that I can take it, that I will because it's you. And that I don't care, about any of that."

"Did you-"

"Ah, my turn."

"Now c'mon Gill," he mumbled frustrated. "This game of yours seems a little lopsided."

"It's not a game Cal, not to me." As if it hadn't been clear enough already. "Did you want to kiss me, that night?"

Now what? Cal gulped down nervously, still unable to fully understand what was going on. He did see what she wanted, but he couldn't quite grasp why, why like that just out of the blue. There had been no warnings, no signs that he could have seen, just…just Gillian in the cube one night, apparently determined to break a vicious cycle they had mutually observed for years.

"Yes."

His reply was sincere, the truth nothing but the truth. Foster smiled, her eyes sparkling with satisfaction and victory. Then she moved, stood up for a moment and moved her chair closer to his, leaning forward.

"Why didn't you?"

"Didn't feel right, darling."

"You are that much of a gentleman?"

"I am not that much of a bastard." He could tell she could see it was the truth, so he decided to double down. "I didn't want it to be like that."

"Me neither." She leaned in even closer, gently resting one hand on his cheek. "Thank you."

Cal closed his eyes and leaned into the touch, a sigh of relief leaving his mouth much to her amusement. They stayed like that for a while, silence filling the cube as they both thought about that strange and powerful experience they were going through. There were about a million things they could have asked each other still, taking advantage of the mutual agreement they had somehow reached on being fully honest and transparent for more likely the first time in their lives. However, all that they had said to each other until then, all that they had let show…what else really was left to say?

When Gillian removed her hand from his face Cal had to fight the urge to seize it and put it back there, terrified for a brief moment that might mean she wasn't going to go any further. If that was the case, he wasn't going to let it happen. She had started it, God knows for what reason, she had insisted on truth and honesty and she had been the one blasting open a door he'd never thought about even pushing slightly ajar. God forbid he'd let her back out of it when-

"You know the line-" Gillian started talking again but immediately stopped, shyly biting at her bottom lip. "The bloody line?"

"Gill, if you bring that up now I-"

"I always thought about that line as something to observe, a separation device." She could see that he was fuming, the very mention of the dreaded line in that moment making his blood boil. "But recently I started to see it differently, not as something between us but something we've been walking on, like a tight rope. We kept balancing on it, not going anywhere, careful, not taking the chance to move ahead to avoid the risk of falling off."

Cal took a long look at her, trying to make sure the whole 'nothing but truth' rule still applied. Then he realised that wasn't the right approach, that he was so used to reading people's faces that he wasn't actually listening to her words. He played them again in his head, he was blessed - and cursed - with a good memory like that. He went through them over and over again like a broken record until there was no mistake, no possible way he could have misinterpreted the meaning of that conversation.

Cal inched closer, like he had done a million times with her. Sometimes she stood still, a defiant smile on her smile, knowing he was all bark and no bite. Sometimes, more than he cared to remember, she would step back or lift her hands up to restore the distance between them. But that night she stayed still, welcoming his outrageous proximity with a smile and not budging a bit. It wasn't the teasing smile she gave him sometimes; it was the bright smile of a woman who was happy to have him close. Then she did the thing, the one thing he had seen many times and had always decided to ignore, thinking it was too good to be true, that knowing what it meant Gillian was probably just messing with him for the sake of it.

She looked down at his lips, her eyes lingering there for a very specific reason, then she looked back up with the light in her eyes even brighter. And Cal decided to go with it, because if he was wrong on what he was picking up then he might as well shut the whole place down and find another job.

"If I fall," he whispered then, his lips brushing hers, "will you catch me?."

He barely had the time to finish the question that Gillian's lips responded. Stealing the initiative from him she leaned in, turning his teasing gesture into a decisive action. The moment their mouths touched properly and their tongues met an explosion of awareness ran through them, feeling just how right it was as well as long overdue.

Their first kiss wasn't how Gillian had imagined. All the intensity she had seen for years in his eyes, the raw passion for pretty much anything he cared about, the undeniable, almost animalistic pull he has had on her since the first day they met… All the time she had let her mind wonder how it would have felt, wishful thinking mostly, she had imagined all of those strong emotions flowing through the kiss like a wild river having been released by a dam.

Their first kiss was nothing like that. It had nothing reckless and uncontrolled, no regret nor desperation for the long wait. It was the opposite of it all, and it was so much better than anything she could have ever imagined.

It was slow, sweet, delicate… Most people would have never associated those words with Cal Lightman, but he was putting that and so much more into that kiss. Wanting even more, Gillian wrapped her arms around his neck, holding onto his shoulders while he cupped the back of her head with one hand. Cal knew she wasn't going anywhere, but he just wanted to prolong the moment for as long as possible and make sure she knew they had passed the point of no return.

And the wide, satisfied smiles on their faces when they broke apart, short of breath, red-faced and a bit sweaty, was the only confirmation they really needed.


This looked different in my head, I hope I did it justice!