He came back a few hours later, looking tired but pleased. "Shit day. Let's make it better."

Lorna looked up from the sofa, where she'd been eating an apple and watching a nature documentary. A grin spread across her face. "Oh, hell yeah. Roll my wheelchair over here, will you?"

He snorted, walking over to grab it from the corner and bringing it over. "Here. C'mon, wheels."

"Alright, don't go overboard," she snorted, transferring herself into the wheelchair, then pointing forward. "Onward! To crush our mutual foe!"

He laughed, grabbing the handles and pushing her out of the flat and into the lift. "Where will he be, do you think?"

"I don't know, how badly did you stab him? If he's like he was when he came to see me, probably still in the infirmary. He might need physical therapy," she said cheerfully, drumming her fingers on the arms of the chair. It was fun to be rolled around.

"Right you are," he said, smirking and pressing the button for the appropriate floor. "I'll let you do the talking."

She snickered. "That will be the most effective. At least until the end."

"Until the end?" he asked, pushing her out of the lift as it opened and heading into the infirmary.

"Closing remarks and such. The last word, etcetera," she hummed, sitting back. She had no idea where Vince's room was, but she was sure Sebastian knew.

He had no idea either, but a glance at the patient manifest on the head nurse's desk solved that problem. It did raise a security question he'd need to address later, however. He headed down the hall, stopping in front of room 126 and looking down at her. "Ready?"

"Oh, you bet I am," she said, voice sinister, and she put her ring hand very prominently on the arm of the chair. "Let's do it."

He nodded, not bothering to knock, just opening the door and pushing in.

Armetti was lying in bed, reading, and looked up, surprised, when they entered. "Lorna," he said, setting the book aside quickly. "...Moran... Lorna, it's good to see you."

"Hey, Vince," Lorna smiled, not even bothering to hide her glee. She didn't care anymore. Not after what he had done to Sebastian. "Just wanted to bring you some news. Care to guess?"

He shrunk slightly under her leer, swallowing a little before he straightened again. "I think it'd be better if you just told me."

Lorna's grin grew a little wider. Oh, he was so cowed in front of her. She held up her ring hand. "Sebastian and I are getting married. You're the second to know. Don't you feel special?"

Vince flinched like she'd punched him, and paled. There were two beats of silence, then he took a breath, closing his eyes. His hand opened and closed, and then he opened his eyes again. "Congratulations," he said, his voice shaking and cracking slightly.

His anguish was almost as good as she'd imagined. Sweet revenge. But she wasn't done. "Vincent," she said, the glee gone from her voice, leaving it sharp. "I want to make it clear to you that I am not a captive, understand? I am not abused, I am not neglected, and I am capable of making my own fucking choices. I left you, Vince. How long has it been? Seven, eight years? I'm not coming back. And for the love of god, give the man I have chosen the respect he's earned. Or you'll get more than a permanent limp."

He looked away sharply as her voice changed, eyes red and glassy and staring at a point on the wall with a fierce expression. His muscles were tensed so hard he was trembling, finger tapping, clearly struggling to control himself. He nodded jerkily when she finished. "Of course," he said hoarsely, still not looking at her. "As long as you're happy."

"I am," she said brightly, voice back to normal, reaching behind her to briefly find Sebastian's hand on the handle of the wheelchair. "Incredibly so. Well, that about wraps up what I needed to say."

Armetti still didn't look over, and Sebastian smirked, toothy and cold as he opened the door and turned to go. "Thanks for keeping her warm for me, Vince." Then he pushed Lorna out, closing the door behind them. From the room there came the sound of shattering glass. He laughed as he headed for the lift. "I'd say that went well."

"I think that will haunt him for a long time," she agreed, smirking. "I wonder if he'll let it affect his work. Hard to predict, with Vince."

"Mmm... I don't know. You know him far better than I do." He hit the button to call the elevator, leaning against the wall and smirking. "I feel a bit more vindicated."

"Yeah? How so?" she chuckled, looking over at him. He looked pleased. She hoped that this might have done him some good.

He glanced over at her, raising an eyebrow. "His leg was not enough payment for my goddamned trigger finger. He destroyed part of my life. The fucker deserved to take the same in kind." He smiled. He felt good. The cold satisfaction of power. The elevator dinged and opened, and he pushed her out into the hall toward her room. "Sometime when Jim is far away on a business trip, we should fuck in the lift."

She gave a surprised laugh. "I'm not arguing, but what made you come up with that idea?"

He shrugged, still grinning. "Sometimes I'm just inspired." He let her key into the flat, and pushed her through the door.

"You're a ridiculous mastermind," she shook her head, smirking. It was always surprising how easily they returned to normal, to happy. It seemed too fast, for people like them, but damn if she was arguing. "Let's finish off that rum cake."

He rolled his eyes, but headed for the kitchen. "Do you think Vince stocked you with ice cream somewhere?"

"Probably. Betting it's my favorite, too," she chuckled, wheeling herself over the sofa and moving onto it, stretching out.

He paused at the kitchen door, cocking his head slightly as he considered her. "What is your favorite flavor?"

"Mint. Preferably with chocolate," she replied, then raised her eyebrows a little. "What's yours?"

He considered her further, vaguely annoyed that Vince evidently knew that and he didn't, before heading for the refrigerator. "Vanilla. But not the shitty mass-manufactured crap. Really good properly-hand-made vanilla."

"Have you ever made your own ice cream? That seems like something you've done," she said, acting like she hadn't noticed a shift in his mood. What was that about?

"I haven't, no," he called through, pulling open the door and- to his sudden petty pleasure- finding cookie-dough ice cream rather than the expected mint. He worked the satisfied smirk back down and found an ice cream scoop, heading back in. "No mint."

"Ugh, what? Unbelievable," she muttered. "Cookie dough is fine, I guess."

"You're so spoiled," he muttered with a snort, dividing the remaining cake onto plates and, after a moment's thought, heading to the kitchen to heat it up in the microwave.

She made an indignant sounding squawk. "Hey, I'm not spoiled!" She protested.

"No?" he asked, putting the cake in the microwave and then walking over to lean against the door frame. He gave her an amused smirk. "You just harrumphed the fact that your luxury flat was stocked with the wrong sort of ice cream. Remind me how that's not spoiled, again?"

"Shut up! If you had someone mooning after you like that you'd expect a certain level of quality to make up for it, too," she complained, sticking her tongue out at him.

He laughed, heading back to grab their cake as the timer beeped, and walking back in a moment later, armed with the plates. He set one in front of her and sat down, reaching for the ice cream tub and prising it open. "Does that mean I get all the ice cream? Or are you going to allow inferior quality mooning on your cake?"

"What am I, some kind of wealthy maniac who can just turn down food?" She scoffed, waving her hand to beckon him closer with the food.

He shook his head, smirking, and doled out a large scoop of ice cream before shoving her plate her way. "Spoiled," he muttered under his breath, still grinning.

"Shut up, rich boy," she scoffed, taking her plate and making another face at him.

It was his turn to scoff. "Please. You make almost as much as I do," he snorted, rolling his eyes and taking a bite of cake.

"Do I?" She shook her head, shrugging a little and taking a forkful of cake. "I don't know, I never spend money."

He gave her a long-suffering look, and then returned to eating his cake in silence.

She muttered something under her breath about that being 'excessive' but let the silence stand otherwise, polishing off her cake and then turning her attention to the bowl of cookie-dough ice cream.

He put his own ice cream on top of the warm cake, letting it melt over the hot food and eating it that way. He polished the dessert off quickly and set the bowl down, leaning back with a contented sigh, watching the room absently. He wasn't foolish enough to close his eyes quite yet. They were technically in Armetti's turf. He had people loyal to him. And they had just royally pissed the man off. Best to remain alert.

She looked over at him after she finished off the rest of her food. "Whatcha thinking about?"

He glanced over at her after a moment, and shrugged. "Whether to expect mutiny from Armetti."

She nodded a little, considering. Normally she would have assuaged his fears, but the truth was that that was when Vince had clung to the hope that maybe one day they could be together again, and now that hope was crushed. And Vince, when he didn't have anything to lose, was notoriously unstable. "Best to keep our eyes open, I think."

He nodded in agreement, pulling his phone out and shooting a quick text off to apprise Jim of the situation. He doubted the boss would be particularly pleased that they had infuriated Armetti at the moment, from a purely convenience standpoint, but it was revenge for his finger, and that was all he cared about.

She was silent for a moment, then she swore quietly under her breath. "Fuck," she muttered, looking disappointed. "We totally missed out on the opportunity to thank him for his involvement in this. Damn. That would have been hilarious."

He looked up from his phone, and raised an eyebrow. "How do you mean?"

"Can you imagine if we told him the idea for marriage would never have come up if I hadn't come up with an idea for revenge? This is all because of him. Without his influence this might have never happened," she chuckled, rubbing her eyes.

A small smile cracked his expression at that. "If he tries to talk to you about it, you should tell him that," he suggested, eyes full of dark amusement.

She snickered, nodding. "Oh, I will. I don't know if he'll be able to speak to me for years, though."

He shrugged. "Might take one last chance to try to convince you. Who knows, though. I don't really care."

"What, you're not going to fight for the right to my hand?" she teased, smirking at him. "I mean, it's not like you asked my father for it..."

He smirked back, then, pupils widening suddenly at the memory of hot blood, a heart pounding in his bare hand. "What do you think the ritual sacrifice was for? I wasn't asking to borrow his car keys."

"Please, I barely had anything to do with it. You killed him because he disrespected you," she scoffed, rolling her eyes. The memory of Sebastian hulking over Carl's limp form, dripping with blood, his eyes feral, though, was doing something to her. "And you were pent up because you didn't get to fuck me."

He was quiet for a moment, then shrugged. "I killed him because I didn't like the way he talked about you, to me. So it had a bit to do about you." He smirked again. "But yes. He mostly just annoyed me. Besides. You would have been insulted if I asked him. Or, if you wouldn't have been, I would have been for you."

She laughed. "Yeah, that's valid. Maybe I would have made you ask my mother, as a joke, but otherwise, I'd be a little offended with the idea of a man giving me away. I'm only Jim's property."

"Oh, good, glad we've made that progressive step," he snorted. He glanced at her then, hesitant. Her mentioning her mother had brought up an off sort of sick feeling in his stomach. He shook it off and grinned. "Still. Your old man went out in style."

"That's for fucking sure. Though he's joined a long list of my family members who have gone out spectacularly," she smirked. "Eric didn't listen to me and got shot by his sister, my mother got taken out by Jim Moriarty, my step-father swam with the fishes... Who knows what happened to my grandparents."

The knot in his gut twisted a bit tighter, and he decided he was done with this subject, standing and starting to clear their plates, heading for the kitchen.

That hadn't been the reaction she'd been expecting. When did he not laugh at death and destruction? She watched him go, brows furrowed a little.

He washed the dishes quietly, scrabbling around for a new topic, because he could feel her eyes staring holes in the back of his head. "So should I wear a tux at this thing?"

She debated the pros and cons of pursuing a topic he was obviously hoping she would let go, but he didn't usually change topics so awkwardly, so it was obviously affecting him somehow. "What's up, Sebastian?"

"A tux," he repeated, deciding to misunderstand her. "When we get married. Rip away bow tie, of course. I don't know, though. What are you going to wear?"

She sighed, rubbing her thumb along a seam in the sofa cushions. "You're avoiding talking about it, and you're doing it badly. That means you're uncomfortable. What's wrong?"

He cleaned the spotless ice cream bowl for a few more moments, then shrugged. "Your mother. It shouldn't bother me. It does."

That surprised her a little. She didn't even think he'd ever really thought about it within the last three years. "It wasn't you. You didn't do it yourself. It's alright."

That was bullshit, and he hoped that she knew that. He wasn't planning on bringing it up, but the feeling in his gut wasn't going away, and now he was pissed. "I fucking set you up, Harrison. Say it's fine if you like, but don't say it wasn't me. Jim could have killed you for that stunt."

She let out a long breath. "I know what you did. I made my peace with it, a long time ago. I said we could start over, and I meant it. Maybe if you'd pulled the trigger personally I would have more of a problem with it - my memory is too good - but you didn't. So I'm over it. I appreciate that you care, though."

"I don't... care," he muttered, a tad sullenly, as he finally set the bowl aside to dry. But he did, which irked him. He decided he was going to have to live with the tight gut feeling. He closed his eyes, taking a slow breath and shaking himself a little. He opened his eyes and turned around. "So. Tux, no tux?"

"That depends, I think. How functionalist are we going?" She asked easily, always good at pretending things hadn't happened. "I mean, should I wear, like, a wedding dress?"

He raised an eyebrow skeptically, walking back over. "Do you want to wear a wedding dress?"

"I don't know," she shrugged, "Do you want to wear a tux?"

He shrugged. "I don't really care. You're the fashion expert here, not me," he pointed out. He examined the bandage on his hand. It had gotten wet while he was washing dishes, and he sighed, starting to unwind the gauze.

"I might be a fashion expert, but it's not about fashion, it's about what we want to do for our wedding," she chuckled, then waved him over. "C'mere, let me do that."

He hesitated a beat, then walked over and sat next to her. She hadn't seen the injury yet, and he wasn't exactly eager, but it had to happen at some point. "Well, then, if we're talking preferences, you know mine."

"No, not really," she pointed out, gently taking his hand and beginning to unwrap it the rest of the way. "I only know you don't want to do anything big."

He smirked. "I meant as far as clothes are concerned. Red. Lot of it." He shrugged. "I'm most comfortable in my uniform, but that seems a bit... underwhelming for a wedding. I don't know. What are you expecting here?"

"I don't have expectations about a lot of things, Seb, not with you," she chuckled, getting down to the brace and setting the gauze aside. The wound was ugly, but she'd seen worse. She'd seen plenty of reattached hands and fingers, working with Armetti in their younger days. It broke her heart that this had happened to him, but it didn't affect her expression other than a tightening around her eyes. "You've a long history of being unpredictable. It's nice, for someone who's good at predicting people. Destabilizing, at first, but then it's a pleasant break. Look, you show up in decent slacks and some sort of dress jacket that doesn't look like it was coughed up out of the 80's, I'll be happy. If you're really worried about it, make Jim dress you. I bet he'd find that hilarious, despite it giving him a chance to flex that fashion diva beneath his carefully calculated exterior."

"I think I'll pass on that, thanks," he said with a snort, trying to smirk a little but failing. His eyes were on his finger. He took a slow breath, then stood. "I'm going to go get this bandaged again," he muttered. He didn't like the thing exposed. Despite his determination that once it was healed it wouldn't affect him, it put him on edge.

"Bring me the gauze if you want, I'm not doing anything else," she shrugged, letting his hand go. Her eyes were on him, but she kept emotion out of them. RE: The concern.

He nodded just a little, heading for the bathroom where he'd stocked his bandages. He considered ignoring her suggestion, but to be honest it was still hard, slow work to bandage with his left hand, and after a moment he headed back out, handing her the box and sitting, expressionless and quiet.

She opened the box, got out the roll of gauze and the pair of scissors, and began wrapping up his injury. "They did a good job with this," she said, taking a moment to consider the finger before she returned to wrapping it, hiding it from their gazes. "I've seen jobs a lot worse. Nice to know we have some talented surgeons."

He shrugged. "Jim wouldn't have hired anyone but the best." He watched her bandage his hand with deft motions, and nodded his thanks when she was done.

She cut the gauze and then taped it into place, then patted his wrist. "All done. I should probably change the bandage on my chest tonight. It's been a bit."

He nodded. "I can help there, if you want. Don't know how much better or worse that would be. Up to you." He sat back.

"I'll let you know when I have to. The nurses were changing it while I was in the infirmary, so I've never had to do it before. Not sure how it will go."

He nodded a little. "How are you feeling, in general?" he asked, kicking his shoes off and sitting cross-legged on the couch.

She shrugged a bit. "Well, the being in and out of surgery and losing consciousness all the time helped me... not get over the heroin, but it gave me more time in between me and the last dose. Trying to forget it, one day at a time. Physically, I ache a little less all over, which is nice. My chest still hurts, though. Probably them breaking my ribs open."

"Yeah, that might have something to do with it," he agreed with a small smirk. He reached out to tug her gently in the direction of his lap, leaving the impetus on her.

That was a signal she almost never passed up, so she followed his momentum and transplanted herself into his lap. "I feel kind of like I survived an autopsy."

"Much better than the alternative, trust me," he said softly. "No more almost dying. You do it far too fucking often. I blame this grey hair on you."

She chuckled tiredly. "Sorry, my bad. Look, most of the time it's not on purpose."

He raised an eyebrow. "And when exactly has it been on purpose?" he prodded, just for the fuck of it. She was warm against his chest.

She shrugged. "Not on purpose, maybe, but as a direct result of my actions. The overdose, for instance. Not my goal, but I made it happen."

He grunted in response. That was both their faults, he felt, but he didn't feel like bringing that up.

She fell silent. She didn't need to remind him of all the times she'd almost kicked the bucket. He had lived through them enough times.

He tried to just relax, to not care, like he had years ago. But any time he let his mind wander, it returned to the network. "I think we can get the network back within two months, if we play it right."

She was quiet for a moment, considering. "How do you figure?"

He reached his good hand up, playing absently with the ends if her hair. "If I start now, start working my way into her security system... we can plant people. Adler, possibly. A few others. Grifters. They can start feeling out the situation. Eventually someone can let me in, and I'll deal with Ines. Once she's gone, loyalties should snap back to Jim."

"Do they even have a clue what happened to us, at this point?" She sighed, rubbing her eyes, before letting them close again, enjoying his touch. She liked the absentminded touches a lot.

He shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't risked accessing the database yet," he said quietly. "I won't until I run things by Jim."

She nodded. That was always the first step to anything like that. "I'm sure he's eager to get his network back."

"That, I have little doubt of," he said with a nod. "Especially after so long in the infirmary. I'm surprised he hasn't killed anyone yet."

She rolled her eyes a little. "Maybe he feels like you've done enough of it for him."

He snorted. "I haven't killed that many people." Well. It really depended on your frame of reference.

"Uh huh," she said, chuckling. "I heard the nurses talking amongst themselves when they thought I was out. Did you take away their morgue?"

He drummed his fingers. "Technically it's my morgue," he muttered petulantly after a moment.

"No it's not, it's Jim's morgue," she snorted, completely amused that he had literally commandeered the entire fucking morgue. Her serial killer fiancé.

"I'm in charge right now. It's my morgue." He grinned a little. "You should come see. I got a fresh one down there a couple days ago... I only have a few drawers left."

"What do you even do in there? I thought your interest was in warm bodies, not cold ones," she raised her eyebrows a little, even though he couldn't see her. It occurred to her again just how slim it had been, the time he'd almost slit her throat. Just another one of the many casualties caused by Sebastian Moran. And now she was going to marry him. Life was fucking strange.

He shrugged. "They start warm. It's more... artistic than I usually go." There were bodies he couldn't show her. Ones covered in his words. He didn't think she'd care, but he did. He didn't want her seeing that he still... wanted them. On others, however, he had enjoyed himself, just relaxed, no words, just designs.

"What, do you heat them up in the microwave or something?" She chuckled. "Why do you keep them?"

He shrugged. "Stress relief. It's not ideal, but I don't have a steady supply of victims here and exercise wasn't cutting it. I had to conserve. I'll probably let it lapse now that things are a bit more resolved."

She nodded a little, admitting that made a lot of sense. She may enjoy this particular extracurricular activity as much as he did, but she'd been raised in a relatively normal environment, besides the drug trafficking, and she'd had a few logical considerations built into her, based off of moral teachings. Really, she'd just been taught, at the core, to ask 'why' for these sorts of things. "I'm sure the infirmary would appreciate it. Though I can't imagine they really need a morgue."

He shrugged, and grinned toothily. "They do now," he retorted. "Oh, man... if I let them go back in, I'll have to keep recordings of the security footage when they deal with the bodies..." He laughed.

She smirked. "In their defense, they do work here. I'm sure they've seen some pretty gnarly things."

He shrugged. "True. But it might be worthwhile. I got some great expressions when I field-gutted a lab tech in the infirmary commons a few weeks back."

"Well that was death in a public space," she pointed out, "They're not expecting it there. Morgues are guaranteed to be a little bit gross. If you move them somewhere else they'll get a big reaction."

His grin widened at that. "New game. Let's start hiding bodies around the facility. Somewhere they'll be found before they melt too much."

She laughed. "Jesus. Alright. You're carrying them, though. I'm not touching dead bodies I didn't create."

"Excellent," he snickered, feeling remarkably cheerful.

She shook her head with a chuckle, happy he was happy, and always willing to cause a little trouble with him.

He shifted sideways until he was laying down on the couch, with her on top of him. "I'm still technically on call, but it's a slow day."

"How much can they possibly screw up?" she muttered, relaxing into his warmth. She felt like a cat sleeping on a very big dog. She'd be pissed if he had to leave.

"Well, now that you've said that, everything," he snorted, amused. She took up so little of his body, curled up on top of him like she was. It was adorable.

"Shh, it'll be fine. We're in a bunker, for god's sake," she said, patting his chest, her eyes closed. For such a muscular man, he was oddly comfortable.

He rolled his eyes, looping his arms low around her hips, careful to avoid her chest. "You're too optimistic lately. It's frightening."

She snorted. "You came back from the dead. Tends to make a girl feel pretty optimistic, believe me."

"I suppose that's fair," he smirked. "I beat Jesus on that timeframe, too. Three days. Pff. Total bullshit. Try months, dude."

"Yeah, you're pretty spry, considering," she laughed. "And you're way more fun."

"Glad you don't think I'm a buzzkill," he snorted, smiling and pinching her arse.

She made an indignant noise, eyes opening to look up at him in exasperation. "What was that for?"

He grinned cockily at her. "What, we get engaged and suddenly I can't pinch your arse? Talk about things getting stale."

She scoffed, rolling her eyes. "Please, the quality of sex has never declined in all this time, legally tying the knot won't have any adverse effect whatsoever."

"Right," he agreed, and pinched her arse again, with little force this time.

She dug her nails into his side for a moment in recompense, then relaxed again, eyes falling shut. The warm happiness that had been coming and going since the proposal was back in her chest again, and she wondered how long it would last. Would this feeling ever fade, with them?

He rolled his eyes as she half-clawed him, chuckling, and then shifted a bit, getting more comfortable. His eyes drifted shut as he relaxed. He was... content.

She fell asleep without really meaning to, just too warm and comfortable and safe to put off any lingering feelings of weariness from a simple activity, like putting on clothes.

He let her sleep, tracing patterns on her back, feeling her breath, and mostly just enjoying her presence.

I believe in possibility
I believe someone's watching over me
And finally, I have found a way to be
Happy, happy

- MARINA - Happy (Acoustic) -