14. Dance
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It ended up taking more like a few weeks for them to get their collective act together and drag themselves away from various design ideas and their inexpert infighting about particle physics (none of them really knew what they were talking about in that field, so everyone ended up yelling). Jane was also nursing a new nuance in her theory about the formation of naturally occurring wormholes and gravitation between celestial bodies, which had engaged Erik's enthusiasm and had caused Luke to scoff openly at them both. He'd said they were barking up entirely the wrong tree- that Jane ought to realise that by now- and drawn something incomprehensible on the whiteboard with what looked like a Celtic knot beside it. Seeing their blank faces, he'd written 'exotic matter' in scare quotes and walked away in a dismissive huff. Unsurprisingly, no sudden light of understanding had dawned from this performance.
The day they managed to leave, which happened to be the morning after Halloween, Jane called ahead to warn Darcy they were on their way and received a mumbled lecture to the effect that Darcy would be unable to involve herself in anything unless they stayed in the city for a few days. She was, in her own words, 'decimated' by her recreational activities the night before. Jane made an executive decision to put up Team Science in a hotel on SHIELD's dime instead of trying to get Highlands University to extend the questionable hospitality of its spare dorms.
Erik found the three hour car ride borderline excruciating, mostly because Jane and Luke had taken up recreational bickering in order to keep their enormous brains occupied during the trip.
"No, seriously, try it. Your mouth will love you forever."
Luke curled his lip as if she were shoving garbage in his face instead of a hot dog. "I would sooner starve. In what possible semantic accident could a term like 'street meat' come to refer to anything one would wish to put in one's mouth?"
Jane took a huge bite and visibly relished every chew. She swallowed and grinned good-naturedly. "I guess it isn't the most appetising image ever, and yet it works so well. That's how you coin a phrase. Darcy would say this hot dog is 'the shit' and you'd think she'd be agreeing with you, but just the opposite. She appreciates fine cuisine and colourful metaphor."
"How tragic you are in my company and not hers. It must be so odious."
"So very." Jane nudged him gently with her elbow, her petite silhouette practically disappearing into his as she pretended to dig him in the ribs and he caught her lightly around the shoulders, immobilising her against his side. Luke cracked a tiny, uncertain smile as she giggled and pushed away from him with a hand on his chest.
"If you two would be so kind," Erik groused, hauling himself up into the driver's seat. He and Jane were taking turns manning the wheel, but it had been a long time since he'd driven regularly and he was already tired of it halfway into his shift. Their constant chattering was not helping. He saw where this was all headed.
Jane was riding shotgun, spreading out the remains of her lunch on her lap and fiddling with all the air vents so they weren't aimed directly at her. She had some notes laid out beside her on the seat and, between the generous cabin of the van and her narrow bottom, there was plenty of extra room for sketches and calculations. Erik knew it was only a matter of time before she dripped mustard on something important and squawked for a paper towel, but he held his tongue. There was no point whatsoever trying to stop it, she'd wave away any and all worries until the thing came to pass. She was always so confident her luck would hold.
Luke was folded uncomfortably on the jump seat in the back, forced to lean forward and hunch so he could see them. Erik felt his pain, having been relegated to sit there on almost every previous occasion he'd ridden in this blasted research tank. It was borderline impossible to feel like part of the conversation from back there, but Jane was babbling to him over her shoulder and completely ignoring Erik anyway, so he could hardly feel left out even if there were a snowball's chance in Hell he ever would. Luke had not struck Erik as the biggest social butterfly. The kid did have a quick tongue, he'd give him that; Erik had nearly bust something laughing at his deadpan 'joy' upon being told he'd be in the back the whole way.
"We have the potential energy now, as soon as we have enough antimatter and we finish building the containment-converter thing- like, we are there," Jane summed up, ever-so-subtly changing the subject back to work. She'd said as much several times over the last month, but she never sounded any less awed by it. "The next thing is really the exotic matter to hold the bridge open. Negative gravity. It's theoretical that it exists, but obviously something like it does because the bridge we saw was stable and huge. Supposedly, armies could be moved with it." Jane tended to look up when she was thinking, her eyes travelling over the ceiling of the van like there was some incredibly interesting series of equations written up there. She scrunched her face up as she finished, some thought half-formed, then turned to Luke expectantly. Like she just knew he'd guess what she was thinking.
In Jane's defence, it seemed he did. He smirked at her like the spider to the fly, a wicked glint of self-satisfied recognition in his eyes. "Exotic matter is nothing, inaptly named: it is as common as dust. You should be wondering how to connect departure point and destination, Dr. Foster."
She shook her head at him, as if he were just an incorrigible child hiding a secret stockpile of candy and not a shifty adult claiming arcane knowledge of the composition of the universe.
"And this is where the realness of consciousness and Uncertainty collide and make magic, is it?" Jane was amused but also enthralled, her honey brown eyes gleaming like gold with excitement. She had that 'I want the cookie and I have a plan to make it mine' look which had never preceded anything good in Erik's experience.
"The exact place, Jane," Luke said, equally thrilled and leaning close to her. "And two points in space-time are momentarily one."
They were all going mental. Erik gripped the steering wheel and tried not to grind his teeth.
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"Where do you go to shop for controlled industrial substances?"
"Anywhere you want when Nick Fury vouches for you."
"I begin to understand why you were both so certain I must work for this organisation."
"It's kinda the safer assumption. They're pretty thorough."
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Jane left Erik at a not-too-fancy restaurant to secure a table, then drove a few blocks to venture into the University's campus bar and retrieve her wayward intern. Darcy was sufficiently recovered to be out again only two days after her decimation. The bar was in full swing with an After-Halloween costume party, advertised on the posters that covered every available wall as a pre-emptive consolation to prevent post-holiday blues. Jane thought that would logically lead to an infinite recursion of holiday and post-holiday parties, but that was probably the idea. She couldn't say she understood the appeal of the event herself, the deafening thumping of electronic music, flashing lights, and the sweaty press of bodies was already making her claustrophobic. The one thing she'd never liked about any club or concert or dance she'd ever been to, no matter what kind, was how staggeringly loud it always was. She was hoping to still be able to hear when she turned forty.
Luke, who was probably not someone she should have brought with her into this situation now that she thought about it, was at least easily visible in the throng and unlikely to get lost. She'd sent him to one side of the room while she searched the other, Darcy having said something about meeting her at the edge. The edge of what had been unspecified, but she hoped it meant near a wall where the crowd was thinner.
Just as she was quietly beginning to panic, utterly surrounded and being constantly jostled, a hand seized her arm and yanked her around into a small circle of people. Darcy's pink streaks glowed under the black lights that lined the bar and her teeth looked preternaturally white against her dark lipstick as she smiled. "Hey, boss!" she shouted over the music, hugging Jane briefly and pushing her glasses back up her nose as she pulled away.
Jane was opening her mouth to suggest they get out of the noise when Luke suddenly materialised in her line of sight, cutting easily through the fray towards them. He tried to stop just behind Darcy, but the press of people herded him in so close that he brushed against her and Jane managed to interject, "Darcy, you remember Luke," just as Darcy turned around to investigate and ended up nose to chest with him.
"Oh shit," she said, surprised, stepping back so she could see his face and give him a little wave. "I mean, hi! Sorry! I forgot you were like eight feet tall."
"Miss Lewis," Luke acknowledged, his distantly polite tone strained by the need to shout. "Jane, I will sample every kind of meat vended on every street corner of this city if we leave immediately."
Jane hid a smile. "You don't like dubstep, huh?"
"If that is what this sound is called, then no, I do not."
"What's wrong with it?" Darcy wanted to know, clearly amused.
"It is entirely loathsome, Miss Lewis. I apologise if I have insulted you personally by saying so."
Darcy shook her head. "Nah, it's got a beat. That's all I'm looking for." She grinned again.
Jane grabbed Luke's hand as he made a beeline for the exit and reached back for Darcy's as well so she wouldn't lose either of them. Their short human chain threaded through dancers and minglers to the door, people getting out of Luke's way sometimes without even looking at him. Darcy pulled away as they gained the street, rushing over to kick the van's tires. Jane had abandoned it right in front of the entrance, just in case she needed an ironclad excuse to get out of the party the very instant she found Darcy.
"Man, this thing! I had nightmares about dying in this thing and never being found. Mummified with all your computers and stuff as my tomb treasures. You've scarred my psyche, Jane." She started to walk around it and glanced back at them. "Where are we going? Can I drive?"
Luke's fingers squeezed hers and Jane took that as him registering his protest. She barely kept her laugher in, both because he seemed nervous of Darcy and because he was afraid of the wrong driver. If anyone was a danger behind that wheel, it was Jane. "I think it'd be better if I did, actually." What he didn't know probably wouldn't hurt him.
"Spoilsport," Darcy complained, levelling a mischievous gaze at Luke. "Does she let you drive it?"
He looked at Jane and then back at Darcy. "Me?"
"Usually she fobs it off on anyone who gets close enough to be construed as willing. It's boring having to watch the road and stuff, you know. Jane's brain-the-size-of-a-planet gets restless." Darcy flipped the hood up on her sweater and hugged herself, going for her cute and innocent look. It worked only on people who didn't know her. Jane's stomach filled with dread. "That's how come she keeps-"
"Anyway," Jane interrupted, tugging Luke's hand, "Erik's waiting."
"What was she going to say?" he leaned down to ask to her as they moved toward the van, and her face flamed.
"Nothing, she's just bugging me. Come on."
Darcy started whistling.
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Darcy sipped her wine and settled back into the pillow lounge she'd made, mad pleased with herself. "Some day I'll just live in a hotel. Never clean up after myself, room service, queen beds for everyone, and more pillows than you could ever use. It's definitely the way to live."
Jane smiled a little, looking down as she poured herself another glass. Darcy wondered if Jane knew it was exactly the right angle for her, her incredibly thick eyelashes fanning just so and her sweet, heart-shaped face looking especially soft and pretty. So much havoc could be wreaked with these gifts, and Jane just wasn't at all interested in wreaking it. She always refused to be Darcy's wingman, even when Darcy promised to love her and make her coffee forever. A waste was what it was.
"Do you think you could convince SHIELD it's totally necessary that I stay here while I'm in school? Like, tell them I'm doing vital... something or other for your research? I will so pay you back when I'm President."
"I think they might catch on after the first month or so. Sorry, Madame President." Jane settled on the other bed. "I thought you liked dorms."
"I do, but there's no hot tub and I have to wash my own sheets."
"We've all got our burdens to bear." Jane took a drink, but she was staring out the window with that dreamy look that meant she was thinking of something else. Inevitably, it was probably something sciencey and beyond the ken of mere interns.
"So, you can't stop bantering back and forth, and you finish each other's science sentences," Darcy observed nonchalantly, as if it weren't a complete non sequitur, hoping Jane would bite and come back down to Earth where she would be ripe for teasing and torture. She liked to keep the boss reminded that she wasn't immune to life's little trivialities.
"I don't know what that's supposed to imply, but if you're asking if the project is going well, then the project is going incredibly, unbelievably well." Jane rolled over and propped up the stem of her wineglass between the folds of the duvet. Darcy saw that ending in tears, but it was a hotel. Hotels were for living dangerously. With red wine and white fabric. Although if there were a time for living without red wine, Darcy didn't want to know about it.
"Right, so you're not touching more and more and he totally doesn't obviously relax when you talk to him. I see that."
"I think you're just desperate to pair me up." Jane pointed accusingly, her usually wide-open expression giving way to narrow-eyed distrust.
Well, hook line and sinker, Darcy congratulated herself.
"The moment he showed up on the scene, you were already planning our wedding, just because," Jane complained.
That wasn't technically a completely inaccurate summary, if Darcy was being honest, though she had been mostly kidding at the time. Still. "But you don't think of him that way."
"No."
"Which is why we've been talking about this for like two entire minutes, and I've never once mentioned any names, yet you still instantly knew exactly who I meant. Because he is not on your mind at all."
Jane threw her head back and tossed an arm across her eyes with a prodigious sigh. "Come on, Darcy. Please."
"I know," Darcy said and smiled evilly into her wineglass, "I'm not being fair. It's all that sexy, sexy smarts that you're really after. Jane the science monk."
She threw a pillow. "Don't do that! Don't make me into some killjoy stick-in-the-mud. I had a long-term boyfriend when I first came out here and we broke up. I'm allowed to need some time A, and B, as hard as it is for people to believe for whatever reason, I hate casual dating and trolling and all that. I'm not against having a relationship, I just haven't got the patience to go out looking or go through all the crap you have to go through to actually get to know someone when you're both aware you're supposed to be moving towards some kind of decision about Your Lives Together. I'd rather focus on my own life and my research and let it happen if it happens. If it doesn't, so what! Anyway, I am not some cold fish. I am completely not denying that Luke is extremely attractive and I'm so not pretending that I haven't noticed. I have definitely noticed."
"Not just his brain?" she teased, not letting it go because it was way too funny when Jane got all outraged.
"Oh my God, you haven't seen him in a t-shirt with his hair messed up. You don't even know."
It was nice to know that even Jane could still take a second to be totally shallow and ridiculous. Darcy hadn't seen her giggle over anything since Thor had kissed her hand like some kind of courtly knight and it just wasn't right. She understood devotion and passionate dedication to a goal, but you always need some goofiness in your life- not even man-related goofiness: any kind at all. It was only practical, otherwise you end up with crazy eyes and an intern who has no business working for you as your only companion.
"But you like him," Darcy found herself repeating, because it genuinely struck her as something notable. Jane was so focussed, her curiosity about people tended to burn out when she got what she wanted from them, but it went beyond the intrigue with this guy. It wasn't just calamity-of-curiosity Jane talking. It wasn't just Jane's general amiability with pretty much anyone who didn't antagonise her, either. "I mean, really like him. Kidding aside, you were like... protective of him. At dinner. Is this a rebound thing?"
"Rebound? What, from Thor? Darcy, he was pretty memorable, but I barely knew him. No." Jane's eyes glazed over as she thought about it. There were clearly a lot of feelings tied up in the whole shebang. Darcy figured the feelings were about what Thor represented as much as about him as a (hunky) person, that was always her personal theory about why Jane found it so hard to get over. "But I guess I do feel a bit protective of Luke. He's so... I don't know. Lost."
"And the unspeakable brilliance and towering hotness are just extra."
"He'd still be interesting without either. He's proud and he's demanding, but he's also weirdly sweet and kind of shy. Sometimes he can be playful, but it's like there's this shadow hanging over him. I want to know what happened to him- something obviously happened to him. I want to figure him out, and I think he... needs that. From someone. For someone to try."
Darcy wasn't one for projects like that. She didn't have a lot of patience for people who were difficult, usually she was instantly connected and total bosom companions with someone or it wasn't going to happen at all. Jane was one of the few exceptions, in that it hadn't seemed like they would get along the best for a while there, but Jane was pretty endearing when you got used to her. "It sounds like that could take some time."
"I am okay with that," Jane said breezily, clearly not realising how it came off.
"You sure you're not going stir crazy out there by yourself all the time? I worry about you, you know. I feel like Erik is going to call me sometime and be like, 'Jane keeled over after trying to live on instant coffee and hot pockets for too long and she was eaten by giant desert rats. Unpack your suitcase, you're never touring the Milky Way'."
Jane merely raised her eyebrows. "I'm not lonely. Why does everyone think I'm just so lonely?"
Darcy pushed a hank of hair behind her ear and adjusted her glasses. "I probably shouldn't say this, but Jane, you have no friends. We're not the two most compatible people ever, but I know you more than a bit and you're actually super cool and you're independent but you're not really a loner. I guess I just want to make sure you're okay with how it is." Especially so that if you do get with this guy, or don't, it'll be for the right reasons. I am looking out for your absent-minded genius ass. Least I can do.
"That's very sweet, Darcy." She smiled that glamorous smile she had, all teeth and sparkle, to show she wasn't offended. "I'm fine with my choices. It's hard sometimes, but it's worth it."
"Did you, like, just have this same conversation? Or do you rehearse?"
Jane laughed, shaking her head. "People have been asking. I didn't realise my lack of interest in Puente Antiguo's thriving social scene was going to be such a point of concern."
Darcy threw the pillow back at her.