It's silent in the car, pretty usual for them really. Carrie's looking out the window, thinking about her fucked up situation. And Quinn hasn't said anything since asking for the address of her storage locker, seems to be caught up in thoughts of his own.
It doesn't make any sense, Carrie thinks for the millionth time. Why the hell would Saul want her dead? All that shit that happened after Islamabad is long in the past now. Sure he seemed pissed off at her choice of private employer, how they left things at the CIA. But that's not exactly shit that gets you on a kill list, not unless things have changed a fuckload in the two years she's been gone.
And then, even if Saul wanted her dead. Why the fuck would he send Quinn to do it? She thinks it was pretty clear how Quinn looked out for her at every turn those years they were together. And she knows Saul must have seen it - everyone else certainly did. Even obtuse her, in the end.
Could Quinn have changed that much in two years? It's not impossible, she thinks. He always did have a harsh, unforgiving side to him. And Saul could know better than her, especially after all this time.
Carrie looks over, glances at Quinn now, can see he's still doing his best to remain steel, hard and unbendable. Could he really be that cold that Saul would think he'd go through with it? It was just so unlikely.
Because when she looks at him, all she sees is Quinn, trying his hardest not to feel his feelings. She's seen it before, many times, to different degrees. And it explains his current hardness, his desire to quickly get her out of his life. She knows he does not want to care, also that he can't help himself.
Which is why she's still alive, has a chance to escape. Carrie wonders if someone else got her name if she'd already be dead - Frannie without any explanation, Jonas with no idea what happened.
For a moment she wonders what Jonas is doing, knows he must be flipping his shit by now. And of course she feels bad for everything, doesn't even want to think about that day, the choices she made. Putting all of that on him, forcing him into a situation he wasn't equipped to handle. And now she has no way of letting him know she's okay, has to get used to the idea of everyone thinking she's dead.
Two years. A new life. Gone, just like that. Carrie takes a breath, still has a hard time believing it. Tells herself she will make contact with Jonas when it's safe, at least give him some closure. Though she knows at this point it's possible she will never really be able to talk to him again, that this is now the fucked up ending to their relatively normal time together.
From one trip to Lebanon, straight to a manic episode in the woods, armed with a rifle. Carrie shakes her head at the memory, thinks at least she still made a valiant effort, especially if she had almost taken Quinn out.
It's a good thing he'd been wearing a vest, she thinks to herself. Even smirks a bit to know he considered her that dangerous, had taken full precautions. Then loses her amusement when she suddenly realizes for the first time how close it had been, thinks thank god she didn't kill him. Because she would have seriously lost her shit to have found him dead in the woods, stalking her with no explanation.
Carrie looks over again as Quinn turn into a parking spot at the storage facility, watches as he pulls to a stop. Thinks how unlikely it is to be here with him right now. Then gets out of the vehicle, makes another step towards a new life.
#
Carrie's looking through her stash, pulls out stacks of cash, bottles of lithium, an untraceable weapon. No more time for thinking, remembering, she tells herself. If this is it then she has to make sure she has what she needs to be gone a long time. To survive on her own, start up as someone else.
She's set Quinn to looking for spare passports, the best of the bunch. Is immersed in her own searching when he finally says something, quits his silent act.
"You moved to Berlin, got a new job, a new guy. But still kept your fallback plan," he comments, a certain tone in his voice.
Like he's accusing her of something, doesn't believe she's really out. Just like his little snide laugh when she suggested she might not have a fallback plan anymore. It rankles because it's true, because even after two years of relative calm she can't imagine living without a getaway stash.
"So?" Carrie asks, wondering if he has a point, or if he's just trying to get under her skin.
"So I guess you weren't sure your new life was going to work out," Quinn replies, in a manner she can't quite read.
Carrie shakes her head, then turns to look at him. Doesn't want to argue, have to guess at what he means, deal with his testiness. Remembers how quickly things can get personal between them, the friction that comes with every interaction. Tells herself not to fall into that trap, not to get defensive at his insinuations.
"I found a good life here," she replies truthfully, doesn't care if he believes it or not. "I was happy."
And the thing is Carrie really means it. It had been a good life, and in a different way then she had ever experienced before. She had found herself able to be settled, calm, more content than she had ever been before in her adult life. When she was younger she had really needed the adrenaline of the job, the exhilaration of being in the middle of it all. But she meant it when she said she was done with that kind of life, that she had someone to come home to now. Two someones, a family of sorts. Love, in a way she had never experienced it before.
And she really doesn't want to think about any of this right now, everything she's leaving behind. Definitely doesn't need to justify her choices to Quinn. So she turns towards him and changes the subject, puts it back on him.
"Where've you been?" she asks, a bit sharply.
"Syria," he replies, still looking at the passports, avoiding her eyes.
It's not unexpected but it still hits her in the chest, makes her quickly realize what his life has probably been since the last time she saw him. And instantly, whatever irritation she had just felt towards him for questioning her life transforms into concern, guilt.
Two years in Syria. No wonder he's acting as he is, Carrie thinks. And now she remembers that last phone call, figuring out what it was about hours too late. How upset she had been, how she had tried to threaten Dar Adal.
Fuck, she thinks. It's something she has deliberately not thought about in a long time now, part of everything she tried to put behind her.
But now, standing here with him, possibly for the last time, Carrie realizes what she's about to say, that he has to at least know. And it's not the sort of thing she would usually tell him, not even something she fully admits to herself. But it's the truth, and maybe he will hear the apology in it, understand that she didn't just forget about him.
"Quinn, the last two years, everywhere I went I looked for you," she says, as honestly as she can. "I tried to find you. I never stopped thinking about you."
Because she really did still think about him, even here in her new life, where she tried her best to avoid her past. Random memories of Quinn would float by and she would wonder where he was, if he was still alive, if she would ever see him again. Or she'd see someone from a distance, or out of the corner of her eye and she'd have to do a doubletake, make sure it wasn't him.
And now here they are, caught together in a shitty situation again. Quinn lost between war and life. Her own attempt at happiness suddenly torn to bits.
Carrie knows nothing she says will change anything that's happened, that he will try to just shrug it off. Yet she thinks he deserves to know that he was missed, that he was never forgotten. And, despite his hard demeanour, she thinks it will still have an effect, remind him of that undefinable thing between them, that things were different once.
#
"Quinn, the last two years, everywhere I went I looked for you," Carrie says as he refuses to meet her eyes. "I tried to find you. I never stopped thinking about you."
She even sounds sincere, like she actually means it. And instantly Quinn feels his innards freeze solid, his self-defense mechanisms kick in hard.
It's exactly what he does not want to hear, curses at himself for leading himself into this conversation. He should have just stuck with the silent routine, killing off emotions as they threatened to rise to the surface.
But it's like he just can't fucking help himself, all of his self-discipline gone the moment she's back in his life. There was no reason he had to ask about her life, question the path she chose. Except that he wanted to know if she had really managed to do it, find a way out, change her style of living, meet the right guy. Everything he could never do, exactly what he tried to ask of her two years ago.
Fuck. Quinn thinks to himself. He really set himself up to fail.
He supposes he never expected that she would actually say something like that to him, discuss the past at all. Thought that they could just gloss that all over with a mutual understanding of things that didn't need to be talked about.
But Quinn's starting to realize that he doesn't exactly know this Carrie, so open with her emotions, softer and more giving. Watching her make that video for Frannie had been fairly torturous for him, a part of her that he had did not want to see. And now this, for her to say she looked for him, never stopped thinking about him.
It's a straight up attack on his emotional wall and Quinn tells himself to hunker down, perceive it as such. Which means he needs to push it off, defend himself at all costs. Because soon she's going to be on a train to a new life. And he's going to let himself fall to the bottom of a dark hole, try and forget this little episode ever happened.
"Doesn't matter now," he says, finally able to look her way again. Tells himself that he's put it all away, that he just needs to get her to safety before he suffers any more structural damage.
Thankfully Carrie gets the hint, doesn't say anything more as he walks over, sticks the passports in the bag. Then she puts on the wig, asks him how she looks.
Fuck, he thinks again. Bites down on the impulse to actually think about the question, reminds himself that these are not things he's allowed to consider.
Looks her over, tells himself that this isn't the Carrie he knew, that there is nothing left of the little they had. That they are both different people now, on different planes of life. And his only job is to get her safely on a train, say goodbye to his favourite achilles heel before he fucks it up with her yet again.
So Quinn does his best to keep his expression grim, his emotions in check. Tells himself that this is the only way.
"Like someone else," he replies, still trying to convince himself that it's true.