Hello, darlings!

I really like how this chapter turned out. It took me a lot of time, but I'm very happy with the finished product. I hope you all like it as much as I do! Please leave me some lovely reviews and let me know how you feel about everything that happens. Kevin shows up. Bones and Addy come to a head. Is their confrontation believable? Do you think Addy went too far or Bones wasn't understanding enough of how she felt? Let me know, your reviews really help me flesh out these characters better and make the story worth writing.

Kisses!

MD

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek or any part of the franchise. I gain nothing from writing this other than creative satisfaction.

Soon after landing on Tarsus IV, Addy's life soon settled into something she could only call… well, she didn't know what to call it, to be honest. Certainly not easy, like she'd expected. Henry and Lillith kept her too busy with chores and helping out on their farm for it to be easy. She was up before the sun, already feeding the livestock, watering Lillith's herb garden, collecting eggs, replacing old water for the animals and helping with breakfast. And that was just the start of her day. Her life was far from easy.

But it was the closest thing to happy she'd felt since she first learned how to read and discovered her father's library. Her skin was slowly browning in the constant sunlight, and her hair gradually lightening. The rays from this sun were weaker than earth, this star was older, but the planet was just inside the habitable zone, making the temperature warmer. It saved Addy from needing sunblock, though, which was a plus since her skin was so sensitive to sunlight. Her aunt kept saying that would change as she got older, but for now, the sun was her enemy. And the food was basic, meaning that Addy didn't have to carefully pick out her every meal to avoid hives and a rash or – worst case scenario – a closed wine pipe. Grains, meat, basic vegetables that she'd always been able to stomach if not enjoy… it was a relief to not have to monitor her food intake so religiously. Even having so much food to eat was a novelty for her as Frank greatly enjoyed starving her for her imagined crimes in "his house."

But it wasn't easy.

Addy found it surprisingly difficult to trust her relatives, despite their generous hospitality and their warm hearts. She was especially skittish around Henry. And yeah, yeah, before you get started, she knew already how silly it was to fear a whole gender based on the actions of one douche canoe. Logically, she knew how ridiculous she was being, but she'd spent too many times under her step-father's fist to be comfortable around men (or adults, really) without time around them to see for herself that they weren't a threat. She kept waiting for the other shoe to fall and the beatings to begin here, too. She tensed every time Henry reached for a strong drink or pat her on the back.

Adelaide could see her aunt and uncle knew there was something wild and angry about her. They would watch her when they thought she wasn't looking and shared meaningful looks over her head they thought she didn't understand. And then, of course, there had been that first night where Lillith had seen the bruises. Addy hadn't been thinking about the blue and purple blotches under her skin. She hardly noticed the pain anymore. She'd only wanted to strip over her top layers and sleep after the long voyage through space.

As soon as she'd unbuttoned her shirt and let it fall off her shoulders, she'd heard a sharp gasp from behind her and looked at her aunt over her shoulder, startled. The blonde woman was holding one hand over her mouth, eyes wide, and her other hand to her chest, her gaze locked on Addy's discolored shoulder. She'd looked down at the ugly color and cursed to herself for such carelessness. She could already see the questions forming; the theories and dread. Addy scrambled for some reason to give, some explanation that would deflect her aunt's attention away from step-father. She had no idea if she could trust these people, she'd only just met them, and if they found out about what it was like for her at home, what would they do? Would they call Frank? Winona? The authorities? What could they possibly do for her, legally? Her mother was still alive, and married; her aunt and uncle had no say about what could happen to her. And besides, why would anyone cared what happened to her? She was a nobody.

Lilith had looked up into Addy's sharp blue eyes, and the teenager could see they were shiny with unshed tears. Her aunt had been waiting for some kind of explanation, but she gave none. Simply blinked at the older woman and turned away, continuing on with her tasks. She didn't want to lie to someone that was giving her shelter and food, but that didn't mean Lillith was entitled to her life story. She'd anxiously waited for the sound of her aunt retreating down the hallway to hear own room, and hadn't let out her breath until the floorboards creaked.

For the next week, she'd made herself scarce around the house hold, and was sure to cover her injuries no matter the temperature, to avoid any pesky confrontations. Lillith hadn't come to her about it, which Addy appreciated, save for a long stare the next morning at breakfast.

She'd been here nearly two months now, and Adelaide couldn't honestly say she trusted these people, not yet. But she was certainly more comfortable around them than she had been. Addy pondered all of this as she walked through the forest, enjoying the damp, cool air. Leaves and twigs crunched under her boots as she followed and animal trail. She loved the forest. She spent most of her time here, exploring the untamed wilderness. She felt more at home with plants and animals in their natural state of kill or be killed than she did in the pretty, little house behind her. Her relatives had warned her against wandering too far from the colony on account that not all animals had been recorded and categorized, and it was dangerous. But they let her be so long as she kept up with the chores. So far she'd discovered several plants similar to those she'd seen on Earth, and many that was alien to her. She'd found a stream of cold water and followed it upstream a great many miles to an expansive lake that took her breath away. She'd explored much of the area around the lake and even found a cave not too far away from the shore. She'd cautiously inspected the inside and found it was larger than the opening led her to believe.

It was on one such exploratory walk that Addy thought over her time here on Tarsus and the family she had here, when she literally stumbled onto a small child. She gasped and threw herself backward to keep from tripping over the small boy and hurting him, landing hard on her ass where a tree root dug into her hip painfully. Wincing, she moved gingerly off the offending piece of earth and examined the child carefully. She panicked when she saw he was unconscious and crawled over to him in a rush. Tear tracks stained his dirty face, and his eyes were red and puffy from crying. His left knee was cut and she could see blood, but it had long since dried. Holding a hand over his mouth and nose, she relaxed when she felt his small breaths and took a more extensive look at him now that she knew he was alive.

His clothes, under the expected grime of the forest, were very nice. His brown hair was trimmed into a boyish hairstyle, and his cheeks were still chubby with youth. He was so small, and Addy wondered how she'd ever been that size. She found two other cuts, and an impressive goose egg hiding under his hair, but otherwise he was unharmed, and for that, she was grateful. She was wondering how on earth he'd gotten this far from the town when the boy whimpered and stirred beneath her. She tensed as his dark brown eyes blinked open and looked up at her groggily.

The pair stared at each other for a couple heartbeats in silence before the boy's face crumpled and he burst into tears. Addy's heart fell. What had she done wrong? Just as she was moving to back away from the boy, he flung himself in her lap and wrapped his tiny arms around her neck, sobbing into her neck. She froze, not comprehending exactly how this was happening, but calmed herself with the knowledge that this was a young boy no older than four years old. Obviously lost and separated from his family and terrified out of his mind. He was probably cold and hungry, too. Then Addy found him, and he didn't know what to do with himself he was so relieved to see another person. He hadn't meant to startle her by invading her space.

With this realization, she relaxed and wrapped her arms around him, making him cry even harder. She tried to remember what her mother would do when Addy was a child and woke from a nightmare. She stroked his hair and rocked slowly, whispering in a soft voice words of comfort. She felt awkward, and like she wasn't really the one trying to calm this child down, like she was only pretending (which, in a sense, she was). She didn't know how to handle a situation like this. Crying made her uncomfortable. It had never solved any of her problems and often times brought Frank's wrath down on her harder, and was shocked when others let go of themselves so easily. And that wild, angry part of her didn't know how to interact normally with humans anymore and despised such signs of weakness to the point of disgust. But with the little brown haired lump of flesh clinging to her for all he was worth, she didn't seem to mind as much.

Several minutes later, and the boy calmed his wild sobs and hiccups to sniffles and the occasional broken sigh.

"Feel better?" she asked hesitantly. The boy nodded without letting go of her and she sighed. "What's your name?"

"…Kevin," he whispered before turning his face away from her neck and looking out towards the trees by her shoulder. She pursed her lips and awkwardly stood to her feet, almost toppling over with the extra weight. At least he wasn't suffering any memory problems, so he was probably fine other than the scare of being lost in the woods all by himself. She turned towards home and walked on, cursing how late it was. She needed to hurry home; the forest would be impossible to navigate at night.

The end of three hours saw Adelaide on the cranky end of her mood spectrum. She was standing in the transporter room, tapping her foot impatiently. Bones was leaning against the wall next to her, his arms crossed, lost in thought, and that was just fine with her. She didn't know if she could handle speaking to him right now. Any minute her two security escorts were going to walk through that door, and then she was going to give the order to the red shirts at their stations to ready the trans pad and the hunt for Kodos would begin.

How fucking wonderful.

Addy pulled irritably at her civilian shirt. It was a deep ocean blue with splashes of greens and purples in an abstract pattern. She had dark black skinny jeans, and classic black converse high tops with a black leather jacket. She had her hair up in a half ponytail and a light dusting of makeup on. Bones was wearing weather blue jeans and a brown v-neck over a white cotton shirt with the sleeves pulled up to his elbows and his favorite pair of cowboy boots. Simple and clean, and if she weren't so pissed off at him, Addy would be sneaking looks at her best friend and admiring that extremely well-toned body he had the bad habit of hiding. As it stood, she was doing her very best to ignore his entire presence, and breathed gratefully when the door to the transporter room whooshed open and two men walked in, followed by her first officer.

Their grim faces filled her with a small kind of grief, and she wished she could do this on her own, but past experience had taught her how stupid it was to take Kodos on by herself. Addy had her pride and the bad habit of letting it put her in danger before she asked for help, but she found it wasn't hard to set it aside this time. Though, she had to admit, she wished she didn't have to bring her people into this. She wished she had the means and the peace of mind to go get this fucker all by her lonesome, but just the thought of it made her hands tremble.

With a frustrated sigh, she pushed off from the wall (ignoring Bones when he followed her) and walked over to the three men. She knew the security officers Witwer had sent over; at least she recognized their faces. She couldn't seem to recall their names, however. She frowned and worried at her lip for a moment before opening her mouth to speak.

"Gentlemen," she said with a nod, "thank you for your help. I want this to go as smoothly as possible, no hiccups no mistakes. None of us needs to be a hero. This man is dangerous, and I want all four of us back here, alive, am I understood?" The two men nodded stiffly. They looked rather pale. Poor guys.

"Yes, Captain," the answered her somberly. She nodded crisply and turned to Spock, but he was examining Bones with faint curiosity. She knew how uncomfortable Bones was with the Vulcan and could only imagine how hard it was to not squirm under such an intense gaze. Addy wanted to giggle, but her mood was too sour for such a merry action.

"Commander?" Spock blinked and looked over at her.

"Yes, Captain?"

"Something wrong?"

"No, Captain. I was merely attempting to perceive the reason why Doctor McCoy is accompanying you when you yourself spoke of the importance of a small team." Addy shrugged and decided to go with a half-truth.

"He insisted." Spock thought over this for a moment before turning to the southern man behind her.

"May I query as to the reason why, Doctor?" Addy tensed at that, she knew this could go very badly for her if Bones suddenly decided this trip would be too much to handle or he was just feeling like a spiteful bastard. However mad at him she was though, she doubted he would do something just to be mean to her. He'd felt betrayed when she hadn't told him about Kodos, sure, but he was still a southern gentleman through and through, and was the closest person to Addy in her whole life. He cared for her, and he wouldn't just toss that in the garbage at the first sign of trouble.

"Sure ya can," Bones snarked, "but I wouldn' answer seein' as my reasons are real personal like."

"I see," was all Spock responded with before pursing his lips and turning to one of the transporter techs. Addy let out a deep breath at the near catastrophe, and flashed Bones a grateful look before hardening her face. She was still pissed at him, after all.

"All right, men," she spoke to the three guys in front of her, "I've been told by Starfleet command that Anton Karidian is the ring leader of an acting troupe currently settled down on this planet for some fair they have going on. Now stay close to each other, but don't look like we're all together. Doctor McCoy and I will walk around picking up what information we can, and I want you two to follow behind and keep a watch on things. You've both seen his face, right?" The two security men nodded stiffly. "Good, keep an eye out for him, and if you see him, alert me immediately, but don't pursue him without company."

Addy shook her head as the three men walked on the beaming pad, and she put her fists on her hips, watching them for a moment before sighing and running a hand through her curls. She let her fear stew in her belly as she turned to her first officer for her parting orders.

"Commander?" Spock stopped what he was saying and turned his head around to look at her cooly.

"Yes, Captain?" She bit her lip, feeling her hands breaking out in a sweat. Fuck, but she didn't want to do this. She really, really didn't want to do this. Like… she would rather go live with Frank again than do this mission. She rubbed her clammy hands against her dark jeans anxiously and did her very best to school her face into the perfect mask of professionalism.

"I'll check-in with you in two hours, and the four of us will return in three no matter what. Is the brig ready?" He nodded once.

"Aye, Captain."

"Good, good… that's good." She trailed off, avoiding looking at the beaming pad at all costs. Shit, she felt like she was going to cry. Addy took a shaky breath in as everyone in the room waited for her to move up to the pad. The fear in her stomach spiked, and her traitorous hands shook. She shoved them in her pockets and sighed, picking up her heavy feat and making the few steps up to her place on the beaming pad. Her heart was pumping blood at a wild pace, and her head felt light. Bones was standing next to her, and she could almost feel the trails of his eyes on her skin. It was making her nauseated. Shit, she hoped she didn't puke in front of everyone.

"E-energize," she ordered shakily, and with a faint purr and bright yellow light, she felt a push to and pull from all directions, and a popping sensation before everything went black.

It was evening on down on planet Q, and Adelaide was grateful for the jacket she'd thought to wear, as there was a bite to the air she hadn't expected. Bones shivered and pulled down the sleeves of his shirt with a frown. With a look behind her, she saw her security men were dressed in warm casual clothes, and was astounded with how out of her game she was if she was only realizing now that her men weren't dressed in uniform. She needed to keep it together. She needed to be stronger than this.

"Well," she said slowly, looking over toward the lights of the fair, "now or never, I suppose. Good luck to everybody." There was a soft murmur of agreement between her three companions and with a short nod, Addy and Bones set off toward the sounds of the festival. The other two wisely waited before following after, so people wouldn't think they were here together, and she was pleased with Witwer's choice in men. She swallowed heavily as they drew closer to the crowds of people, and drew her hands from her pockets to cross over her chest. Her heart was still beating at a wild pace, and her hands were still clammy, but the cool air helped settle her stomach, so at least she didn't have to worry about emptying her stomach for the moment.

"So," Bones said. She stiffened as they crossed over from the grassy plain to gravel and the different booths of the fair. "How are ya?" Addy narrowed her eyes without looking to her side.

"Oh, that's rich," she muttered darkly. Bones stopped walking instantly and grabbed her upper arm, whirling her around to face him. She glared up at his face harshly, and was shocked to see not a scowl, but a deep look of hurt over his face. His warm hazel eyes were bright with the lights of the fair behind her, but they cut her deep to a place in her chest with their pain. She felt a flush of guilt for how horribly she'd been treating him without realizing how much it hurt Bones to keep him so far at a distance like this.

"Alright, that's it," he said darkly, "I've had enough of yer tantrum. Yer pissed, I get it. I stepped over a line for ya, and ya don' appreciate my threats. But do ya have any fuckin' idea how much I've been worryin' about ya?" Addy opened her mouth to throw a sharp response back, but he shook his head.

"No, shut up and listen." She snapped her mouth shut, glaring up at him and battling her anger and guilt. "Do ya remember when I first found out about Tarsus?" Addy's face softened and she nodded softly.

That had been a bad day for everyone.

Adelaide hated doctors. All those checkups and exams and nudity and questions when they saw her scars. And those hands. Always covered in plastic gloves and so harsh. So unfeeling. So demanding for total access to her life. So… so fucking dominating. She'd been dominated before in her life, in the worst ways, and it had been a lasting experience for her that she knew would sit on her soul like a stone for the rest of her life.

Doctors brought up too many memories for her.

She hated doctors.

Lucky for her that one of her first friends in Starfleet happened to be one. Bones. Bones, Bones, Bonesy Bones. It had been on that very first shuttle out of Iowa that she'd learned he was a medical professional. He'd been a doctor down in Georgia before his ex-wife had screwed him over in the divorce and he'd enlisted. Now he was going to Starfleet to study to be a doctor on starships. At first, when she'd learned that, she'd had an immediate distrust for the man, no matter how handsome and likable. But he rolled with her eccentricities easily, going with the flow of her life as smoothly as water flowed over rocks, and he truly seemed concerned for her well-being above all else. He didn't seem to be after a way to control her decisions through medical advice, which she appreciated. But yet…

He was a doctor.

She was at a crossroads. She had to have a physician in Starfleet, as well as a physical she'd been avoiding, and a good bill of health to go into space. She couldn't advance without one, and she didn't think she could live with one. But maybe… just maybe Bones would do.

Addy asked him first, and he'd seemed confused, but happy enough, if the board would allow it.

They hadn't.

Well… not at first, anyway. Mr. McCoy was still a student and not yet a Starfleet approved medical professional and they would much prefer someone with several years of experience under the belt for someone they had so much hope for. Addy was firm in her decision though. He was already a doctor before enlisting, she'd said. He was for three years before coming to San Francisco, she'd said. He's got the experience with humans and I'm not alien, and he knows the modern technology at hand, she'd said.

They'd still said no.

Then she'd threatened to walk, and they'd finally (grudgingly) relented, but only if another professional of their choosing could look over his findings and reports before putting them down on record. Addy had conceded when she'd made sure their own doctor wouldn't actually be in the room with her during the physical, and boom. Done.

Now there was the problem of her body.

Riddled with scars and burns after her time being tortured on Tarsus IV, she knew Bones would have questions. She'd stayed the whole night before her appointment, wracking her brain for a suitable excuse. They were too numerous to claim childhood clumsiness. Some of them she could chalk up to Frank's methods of "raising" her, and she wouldn't even be lying about it, but that still left a lot of her story unaccounted for. With growing dread, she'd walked across the quad to the teaching hospital, feeling with every step she should have just called her own bluff and left. This was stupid, how was Bones ever going to be able to look at her the same after he saw her today? She should have just chosen a stranger and bared it for the thirty minutes the exam and questions would take and never gone back. Why had she thought a friend would be better? Stupid, stupid, stupid.

The receptionist had called Bones to let him know his appointment was here, and a nurse with black hair and eyes and walked her to the exam room with a smile. She'd strapped a device around Addy's arm and had her sit on a biobed, and her vitals had popped up on the screen imbedded in the wall and left with a reassurance that her doctor would be here soon.

Bones had been awkward at first, fumbling over his words while he went through the preliminary questions, especially when he asked about her menstrual cycle. She'd been tempted to tease him for the blush on his face, but she'd been too wracked with her own nerves to listen to her compulsion. The questions weren't a problem. She had no qualms telling him the answers. Hell, she wouldn't have minded telling the board of admirals, she cared that little about being embarrassed over her bodily functions.

No, it was the future lack of clothing that had been the problem. For once.

As soon as she'd stripped down to her undergarments, she'd regretted ever joining Starfleet. Bones was dead silent, staring at the evidence of what could only be gruesome torture carved into her skin. Addy hadn't been able to meet his eyes, instead staring at the floor, her face flushed in shame, and her eyes burning with unshed tears. Why had she picked a friend? For someone so fucking smart, she was really fucking stupid sometimes.

"Lie down" he'd said, in a voice that was cool and restrained, and she knew she was done for. He'd given her a quick pelvic exam, and looked over her body, looking past the scars, and declared her fit for duty and instructed her to put her clothes back on. She'd never heard sweeter words in her life.

When Bones was done and had marked down everything he'd needed to, he'd opened the door and called for a nurse. He'd handed her the papers, and told her to delay his next appointment by twenty minutes. That's when Addy knew she was in deep shit, because he was done being a doctor to her now that the physical was finished, and he was just her friend now, so he could be as brash and accusing and demanding as he wanted. The door to the exam room had shut with a kind of finality that made her want to weep, and she couldn't help the feeling that he was shutting the door on the only real friendship she'd been able to cultivate all on her own.

Bones had looked at her long and hard, and she still hadn't been able to meet his gaze fully, watching him warily out of the corner of her eye for any sign that he was going to turn nasty. She couldn't really believe he would get mean, that didn't seem like the type of guy he was, and she was a pretty good judge of character, but she also knew better than most how well people could hide their true selves.

"Oh quit lookin' like that," he'd said calmly, walking over to the chair for physicians and sitting down. "Ya look like my mama's horse whenever it was time to clean his hooves." Addy said nothing. There was nothing for her to say.

"Now, I'm gonna bring up the elephant ya don' wanna talk about and say that no one has scars like ya do unless they go through somethin' truly awful. I tried lookin' up yer medical history, but its sealed before the age of thirteen, and there's not really many visits to go off of after that hot mess." Addy slowly tensed and relaxed her shoulders, daring to look up at Bones' face, dreading the horror and disgust she knew would be in his eyes. She was surprised to find only concern and a suspicious dread.

"Ya've gone through somethin' awful, that'd be obvious to anyone," he said softly, and here it comes, the questions, the never-ending questions, "and I understand it's hard to talk about… but if ya ever feel like ya need to tell someone and share the burden with them, I'm happy to help you."

Addy couldn't help it, her jaw dropped. She gaped at him openly, shocked beyond compare at Bones. He was telling her exactly what she'd always wanted to hear from someone. When she'd finally been rescued from Tarsus, she'd been questioned so many times that they all blurred together into one great experience of fear, rage, and certain type of numbness that had stuck with her for far too long. Then there had been doctors after that, and always the same damn questions, with no consideration as to whether or not she wanted to answer them. They never gave her the option to say no and choose to tell them of her own volition, they'd always just expected that she would tell them freely and without complaint.

Oh, had there been complaint. Very noisy, loud, obscene complaint.

And here was Bones, throwing away everything she'd been trained to expect from the world and letting her set the pace for not only their professional relationship, but their personal one as well. Really, she couldn't be blamed when the tears started flowing and she hugged the man. He'd floundered at first, before wrapping his arms around her just as tightly, freezing only when she opened her mouth and for the first time in her life, told someone her horror story of her own free will.

"Tarsus," she'd sobbed against his shoulder, "It was Tarsus IV."

Addy blinked as the memory faded and she looked up at her friend's expectant eyes. She looked away, her emotions considerably subdued.

"Of course I remember," she murmured. He let go of her arm, satisfied that she wasn't going to bolt at the first chance she got.

"Do ya remember how hard it was to hear everythin' ya had to tell me?" Addy grimaced at the memory. She'd made him nearly throw up, and she hadn't even told him everything, because there were some things that she would never be able to tell another soul and just… no. No. And after that, Bones had gone through a phase where he'd been insufferably protective over her, like she hadn't been surviving without him her whole life already. She'd been slightly offended and touched at the actions, and told him as much, and he'd told her to piss off, he was dealing with things in his own way and would tone it down just as soon as he was able. She'd shrugged it off, and he'd held true to his words and got off her back a couple months later, though that protectiveness never really left.

"Yes…"

"Alright. So how can ya stand there and judge me for how I responded when I heard who it was we're huntin' down?" Addy sighed, more tired than anything now, and wishing this night could be over already so she could fall into her bed and live in the bliss of sleep where she could forget her problems for a few hours amid the fantastical things of her subconscious.

"That's not –"

"Don't you dare," he interrupted accusingly, "try and tell me that isn't exactly what ya've been doin' since we talked yesterday." Addy snapped her eyes up to him and glared hard. She'd had it with the whole holier-than-thou act up until now, and the guilt tripping bullshit.

"Fine. I have. I've been judging you. But not on your freakish protective streak for me, because when have I ever judged you for that?" Bones opened his mouth for a retort but she cut him off with the harsh tone of voice she reserved for when she was well and truly hurt. "No! I may complain and bitch and make your life annoying because of it, but I have never once judged you for fucking caring about me, you asshole! I judged you because you let me down. This is hard for you? Fuck you! You have no IDEA how hard this is for me to do without dropping to the floor in a sobbing mess of nerves and memories. Some of which, I haven't shared with you, by the way, for your own sanity.

"And when you found out what I'd kept from you and got angry me, do you know why I was so hurt? Because I was hoping that despite everything, despite all the rumors on my fucking ship, despite all the doubts in my fucking head, despite the nightmares that wake me with tears and vomit every. Fucking. Night... I hoped that you would be the one person that told me I could do this, knowing my history with this man. And you stood there, telling me that I can't. That I wasn't strong enough. You were telling me everything I already fear, and you have no idea how much that fucking hurt coming from you, Bones. You have no idea how betrayed I felt. So don't stand there being all high and fucking mighty with me like you're better than me and the victim in all this shit, because now not only do I have to do this whole shit storm without your support, I also have to convince you I'm not losing my marbles so you don't take my ship away from me and expose my personal past to someone that has no fucking business knowing what I've been through!"

By the end of her explosive rant, Adelaide was shouting, and her chest was heaving with her heavy breathing. The few stragglers this far on the edge of the fair stared at her with interest and worry before walking on by. Bones was staring at her more surprised than she'd ever seen him. His eyes were wide and his mouth was agape, and she could see the guilt reflected back in his own eyes. Good, let him feel like shit. There was a large part of her that screamed he deserved it. Addy took a deep breath to steady her rising fury and let it out slowly, and didn't speak again until she was confident she wouldn't end it by shouting once more.

"So do me a big favor, will you? Take your anger with my 'tantrum' and kindly fuck off." With that, Adelaide turned away from her speechless friend and stomped toward the fair, fuming. She didn't even care if he followed or not. If she found Kodos, she'd call one of the security guys over to handle it, not Bones. She didn't know if she could even be in his presence right now without exploding again or bursting into tears and sobbing for forgiveness. Because despite how good it had felt to unleash all her anger and hurt at him like that, she hadn't been very mature with how she'd executed it. Bones did have a point to his argument that she'd conveniently forgotten amid her outrage.

Addy let the cries of the game vendors wash over her and called on breathing exercises she'd been taught many, many years ago when the pain of Tarsus was still fresh. Slowly she let her anger seep out into the ground beneath her converse, and ran a hand over her face, looking around at the colorful prizes without really seeing them. She sort of felt like crying, but she'd cried so much already, she didn't know if she had any tears left. With a broken sigh, she drifted over to a game that involved guns and paid the man for a go, feeling the antique shotgun in her hands, hoping she could win something cute and fuzzy to apologize with later when she came back to Bones, groveling.

Addy decided with a grim sense of finality that her life sucked, and nothing about that would ever really change.

Alright, babes. That fight, that was a doozy, wasn't it? Addy really let Bones have it. And Bones was pretty insensitive with his 'tantrum' comment, don't you think? But I did that on purpose to try and illustrate just how frayed everyone's nerves are by taking on this mission. Bones is freaked beyond all measure for Adelaide's safety because, well, he's Bones but it's more than normal because this is Kodos. And Addy is a very proud person, she doesn't ask for help easily, but she relies on Bones a lot more than she lets on to him, and he let her down.

Taking that into account, was the situation believable? I like to think so. Tell me if you agree with a review! A lovely little review. Just go type it up, press that button... like right now. (;

Peace.