8. Rip

.

It wasn't so much the hangover- which could have been a lot worse: she recalled a celebration dinner back at Culver Uni that had involved such an extremity of vodka that blinking had become a Herculean labour alike to being an arthritic contortionist, this was a mild ache and a slightly upset stomach, this she could handle- as the total agony of embarrassment, that had her pinned under the bedclothes in a state of humiliated lethargy.

Talk about a clever idea. She was supposed to be smart. She should have thought through the contingencies, realised she had no idea of Luke's alcohol tolerance, realised she could end up making a complete idiot of herself in public, realised she could say something super majorly inappropriate. Which she kind of had. Sort of. She wasn't sure how inappropriate her many blunt pronouncements really were; she hadn't been getting out a lot lately. But anyway, as usual, the burning need for answers had overridden the common sense which told her she was acting like a teenage busybody.

She didn't even have anything to show for it, Luke's purpose and motivations were as elusive as ever. The only thing she had learned about him was that he maybe, apparently had no idea that he was gorgeous. Jane still found this extremely difficult to accept.

She was still staring at the ceiling in abject regret when the soft knock came. It made her sit straight up and stare around the fridge at what she could see of the door. Erik would never be up yet, Darcy was miles away, and the odd time strangers came around they always went over to the lab. It being an actual building.

Which meant Luke was trying to ruin her life on purpose. What had she done to deserve that? Did he still think she'd been making fun of him? Could he really be that tragically misguided?

Jane finger-combed her hair into a slightly less horrific tangle and smoothed her oversize t-shirt and flannel comfy pants. She was not in a fit state to face the possible repercussions of her rampant idiocy the night before at all. Damnit. It wasn't like she usually dressed up to a standard significantly higher than what she had on, but she would prefer to assemble some dignity and at least not be wearing something she'd slept in. Well, Mr. Fashion out there would just have to cope. Not that he really seemed cognisant of fashion, per se; it was more that he was seemingly unaware that there were clothing options other than bespoke tailored finery. His suits were sharp enough to cut, but he had no obvious understanding of the limitations of their appropriateness. Focus, Jane. Rein in your brain, Jane. This, this right here, is how you get yourself into Situations.

Luke had somehow discovered sunglasses. In his new jeans and a button down layered over a t-shirt, he looked a bit like any given grad student. Almost normal. Then he tried to smile in greeting, the corner of his mouth twitching uncertainly upward but not quite making it, and met her eyes over the rim of the glasses with a strangely searching look. The possibility of normality was dispelled. Him being from Africa was really not fully covering his atmosphere of singularity for her at this point.

"I've brought..." he began, holding up a bag, at the same time that she said, "I'm sorry."

He pursed his lips, sucking his cheeks against his teeth and studying her with a kind of edgy reluctance before finally asking, "For what are you sorry, Jane?"

Folding the hem of her t-shirt between her fingers, she hid behind a curtain of her hair and tried not to blush. "For, you know, anything I might have said or done last night that was too much. I don't remember offending you horribly, but I was a bit less observant than usual, so you know."

"You did spend some time praising my appearance," he said in a tone of forced lightness, as if he were trying to find that funny because somehow he thought that he should.

"Oh God." How could he be so... so. She nervously scratched her forehead, checking out his expression surreptitiously and finding it a crude facsimile of dismissive ease. She lost herself momentarily in the breathtakingly awkward realisation that he was not just nice to look at sort of abstractly as he had been before, like a painting one would hang on the wall, but that at some point over the last three weeks, she'd become actually attracted to him and overindulgence had floated this unwanted knowledge to the surface of her brain. This made it worse that she clearly had to say something if she wanted to not be the jerk here.

"You were intoxicated," Luke was excusing distantly, misinterpreting her embarrassment, "I quite understand."

"You do, huh?" This was like peeling off a band aid. "What you do you understand?"

Struck speechless, he stared at her like she'd said something rude.

Winning gold in the awkward conversation Olympics again this year, Jane. Someone had to put this maniac right and it might as well be her. She couldn't bear to be pussyfooting around this much psychological chaos when there were space-time anomalies to study. "That wasn't the beer talking, you know- well, it was in the sense that I probably wouldn't have been quite that, um, direct, but not in the, um, not... I mean, I meant it. It's true. And I kind of think you don't understand that."

One hundred percent of his intimidatingly astute concentration was on her, those cool blue eyes searching her face with disquieting seriousness. He was definitely trying to catch her at something.

"I see," he said at last. He totally didn't, but she was so done talking about this.

"What's in the bag?" she asked, bubbly with relief that she had done her duty as a decent person and tried to get through to him- not once but twice- and that they were still talking amicably in spite of his strange, unpredictable reactions to her efforts to be nice to him. She knew one thing about him for sure, she supposed: he could not take a compliment.

He looked at it, then glanced warily back at her before he decided to let it all go. "Some components, requiring only assembly and a few added touches. If I might have access to your supplies and the tools in the lab- and your superior experience in 'kludging', as you say- I believe I can begin to deliver on some of what I've promised."

Jane blinked in shock. "You've got the components of a particle accelerator in that bag?"

"I believe so." He seemed a trifle smug, amused and gratified by her more-than-half-disbelieving, helpless awe.

"If not the money and fame, what do you want out of this project?" Clearly, if he wasn't totally bonkers, it was true that he did not need her help or her research to acquire money and fame. Which did rather put to bed the scientific espionage theory, though she could no longer make herself consider him being a SHIELD plant even as a mental safety net to keep her on her toes.

He sighed, probably having thought they were finished rehashing last night's conversation. "Jane, I can't tell you that, and it is not because I am attempting to spy on you. No one has hired me and you have nothing I wish to steal. I will entrust you, one last time, with the perfectly unvarnished truth and I will implore you to at length believe it as you have refused to do up until now: the honest answer is that I must do something, and this is the only thing that there is on this planet which can possibly engage my interest."

She narrowed her eyes at him, feeling a mixture of guilt and suspicion and knowing it was all over her face.

"I jest not." He sliced the air between them with his hand. "I want to help you, Jane, I don't know what- if anything- I expect from the end result, but I do want to help you for its own sake. For your own sake. There is no ulterior motive except to enjoy the pursuit and like-minded company."

"Why do you want to?"

"You deserve to succeed. You're closer than anyone else. I have no reason to do it alone." His robotic shrug told her- as he carefully hadn't admitted with words- that he believed he was absolutely capable of doing it alone and, at the rate he was going, she found it increasingly difficult to doubt him. Even sober, she was starting to think he might actually be able to bend the parameters of the impossible. He always had this air like he was waiting to see if she would give up and ask him to solve everything with a snap of his fingers. Like that was an option.

I have no reason to do it alone, she thought. Translation: I could do it alone but what would be the point? Leaving aside whether he could or not for a second, she didn't like the picture he was painting. "Is your foster mother still living?"

He recoiled from the blunt question with a shocked intake of breath that was almost a hiss and sneered nastily at her. "Does your foster father frequently fall drunk and leave you to walk to the edge of the desert alone at night?"

Well, she had wondered what the breaking point would be between his prickliness and her diarrhoea of the mouth. "All right, I think you're pretty clearly super lonely and I've been taking advantage of that to satisfy my curiosity: that's probably wrong, but I'm well into adulthood and Erik doesn't need to hold my hand every second so I'll thank you not to go around casting judgement."

"It's not a question of adulthood, it's a question of vulnerability to attack and suitability of companion, but obviously you were perfectly capable and in no need of assistance last night. Why, I hardly had to carry you home, surely no harm would have befallen you. Surely had I been any of those things he so fears I may be, I would have been in no position to take advantage of your suggestive state." His icy sarcasm and the way he used the contrasting velvety smoothness of his voice like a subtle blade flayed her of defences and hit unerringly home. "I'll thank you not to speculate on my emotions or you will find my previous generosity towards your impertinence for the sake of our work runs out extremely quickly."

At an impasse in the wake of his cutting but infuriatingly accurate tirade, they stood in tense silence. Jane felt like a tumble weed should roll through any time now. She didn't want to apologise again because she didn't really feel like she'd done anything wrong, and she was losing patience for the lingering rigid formality of his conversation, but she knew they'd both die here if she waited for him to make the first move toward reconciliation. She saved her immovable stubbornness for science and other battles worth winning. It was better, in relationships, to be the peacemaker.

"You can turn my personal questions back on me, you know. You don't have to be constantly drowning in politeness and always accommodating until you can't take it any more."

Luke scoffed in disbelief. "What makes you imagine I could possibly be interested in the insignificant details of your life as you are so relentlessly, inexplicably interested in mine?"

She wanted to laugh at his obvious dissembling, but contained herself to a wry grin. "You're just as curious as I am, Luke, not least about a kindred spirit. Don't pretend like you're not. I've met you."

For a second, several reactions warred on his face and there was some anger in there that she worried could be explosive. Finally, he looked surprised and almost pleased. "Indeed, perhaps you are right."

"Usually am." Jane congratulated herself on her ability to deflate his posturing so easily. He always seemed to expect her to fly into a rage and present a great big target for him, but she'd spent far too much time learning to be all right with herself to rise to such transparent bait.

"And you would consider us to be of a kindred spirit?"

"It seems like a good way of putting it. You've got to be the only person I've ever met who thinks quantum entanglement could be better explicated in verse than in math. I don't really get what you mean in that case, but I saw your eyes getting all shiny and I know exactly what you were feeling. I haven't had many friends who really got it, not even in the field. This is my life, I couldn't love it more, pretty much nothing is more important- I don't know if you're in that place about astrophysics in particular, but I think you definitely are about gaining new understandings of the universe."

He smiled at her and it had a kind of warmth to it she had never seen from him before, cautious and nearly shy. "Would you ever consider me a friend, Jane?"

She smiled back, feeling touched by the tentativeness of his tone in spite of everything. "Sure."

"But not now, because you don't trust me, do you?"

"I think there's a lot you're not telling me. Some of it maybe stuff I actually should know, not just stuff I'd like to know." Hesitating, she felt compelled to be honest even if it was foolhardy. "But I do trust your intellectual integrity, I trust your curiosity. I believe that no one sent you here."

Luke nodded, thoughtful. "Shall we proceed to the laboratory?"

She coloured slightly. "Um, I'll just... if you could give me a second, I'll get dressed."

"Oh." He looked appalled. "Are you not...? Yes, I will wait over... Excuse me."

.,.,.,.,.,.,.

She finally heard her cellphone vibrating while she was buttoning up the plaid shirt with the two holes in it she had promised herself she would stop wearing. It turned out Erik had called three times already, having woken and suddenly remembered that he'd abandoned her at the bar, off her face and with the disturbingly sober nefarious element.

Jane rolled her eyes at his mothering and threw the phone on the bed. Thinking about how low her supply of various electronic and other bits of junk was getting, she reconsidered and gathered phone, wallet, keys, and her notebook into a big shoulder bag. An adventure was in order and now she had someone besides Darcy (who usually made it worth it to struggle by herself) to carry crap.

The thing Luke had in his bag was in several pieces, none of which were recognisable as part of anything she had ever seen. Smooth and angular, the components appeared to be some kind of bronze-coloured metal with smaller inner workings in shades of gold and Luke's weird handwriting scratched all over it in labels that she didn't understand. He explained that the material allowed the scale, but he couldn't tell her how in a way that she could follow. There were properties, he said, that allowed a small layer she could see inside of the cylinder to act the same way as fleets of superconducting magnets. It was sounding more like poetry than physics again and listening to him try to make it sound plausible while withholding her own judgement was just giving her a headache. She, in turn, tried to explain why size was always such a problem using the example of the Large Hadron Collider, but succeeded only in making that crease of annoyance appear between his eyebrows.

Her breathless, nauseated hope-terror-burning desire for his device to be real, for him not be crazy, for it all to work- and his frustration with their mutual incomprehension- made it impossible to stay calm and collected. Jane decided they would go to her favourite junk dealer, get distracted enough to breathe for a bit, and play with their toys after. There were other materials they would need before he could put the thing together, anyway, and they might as well be ready to see the madness through to the end. She told him they were going and didn't wait for any argument, heading out of the lab into the driveway. Luke eyed her van with tremendous distrust and she had a passing fancy that he could sense what had happened to her last stray involving it before she told him, amused, that they could walk if he preferred.

She enjoyed walking through Puente Antiguo, anyway. The town's atmosphere was an odd one for New Mexico and it certainly didn't look typical to the rest of the State, but the elaborate faux-quaintness was sort of endearing. Someday she would have to ask a local to explain how the broad, pastel façades and nostalgic store fronts had become the dominant aesthetic of an entire high street; she suspected an ambitious council meeting and the words 'tourist industry' were probably involved.

Luke walked quietly beside her, looking mildly predatory even at a stroll. Unsmiling, eyes forward, and always moving with palpable purpose in his every step, he managed to seem both extremely out of place and to convey an air that he was blessing the dirtbowl with his presence without even doing anything. Truly, he was giftedly remarkable. Even if he hadn't been, there weren't a lot of tall, dark strangers in Puente Antiguo and Jane herself was only just becoming commonplace enough to escape being viewed as entertainment. Passers-by were sneaking glances at him, did flamboyantly obvious double takes, or straight up stared. Mostly the women were the ones staring, but not all of them appreciatively.

He gave no sign that he noticed the curious and suspicious scrutiny of the townspeople, but Jane was somehow certain that he did. She found herself, now, painfully conscious that his discomforts were in no small part due to an all-encompassing insecurity with every aspect of himself, not arrogance alone or his more simple awkwardness. He was a fish out of water in more ways than just being a stranger in a strange land.

They passed Annie's Diner and its perpetual plywood front, not quite covering the devastation underneath, and Luke stared at it a moment too long, his eyes slightly rounder than usual.

"We had, uh, a tornado," she offered, following his gaze. Technically, that was true. Thor had caused one somehow with his super-hammer. That wasn't what had created this particular damage- she thought it might have been the third time the big scary robot thing had thrown the beardy guy off its back and he went careening through the store fronts- but it wasn't actually a lie.

"The others have been repaired," Luke observed in a near-whisper.

"The owners didn't have insurance, there was only so much time and money around to help out with all the damage, you know. There's a couple places still digging themselves out of the hole."

"I see."

He strode on and she had to jog slightly to catch up. "Not how they do it round your place?"

"The village is the village. It would be the responsibility of everyone, not least the king, to... heal a disaster."

His tone closed the subject and she wondered why he'd gone so white. Maybe a natural disaster had killed his birth mother, the father he had yet to mention. Maybe it was something else entirely. She felt like she was falling into a black hole with this man, either she was about to be spaghettified or she was going to discover the next plane of existence. Either he was crazy or they were about to change the world.

She should probably be afraid, but she wasn't.