Note: I told you ;)

"Are you alright?"

The question came after Arlov had called it a night, leaving them alone in the stall with only a single guard for company.

Ronnie's gaze panned to her partner. He slumped in his chair, pinched eyes closed against the throbbing of his bruises. He looked horrible, like he'd fallen into one of those trash compactors from Monsters, Inc. The sight of him brought furious tears to her eyes, and yet he was the one asking her.

It was their first moment of relative privacy.

Arlov never would have left them to scheme without having a way to listen in, but at least it could feel like they were alone for a second.

"Tell me you're alright. Tell me he didn't —"

"Don't talk, Cho. I heard your jaw crack when he hit you." She murmured carefully, wishing she had some way to cover her exposed body as the air turned colder.

"It's fine." The dark haired detective shook his head slowly, and spat out a mouthful of blood. So, yeah, obviously, he was fine. "Ronnie, I'm so sorry."

She saw his head lift, his eyelashes fluttering like he was going to open his eyes, and her stomach twisted. "Please, Cho, don't look at me. Please don't see me like this."

He dropped his chin to his chest again and made no attempt to take in the sight of her. The glimpses he'd seen before his brain had caught up enough to remind him to preserve her dignity had been enough to sear into his mind forever. He'd never not see her the way he'd found her.

"I'm okay, Cho." Her voice came to him through the swarm of self hatred that boiled beneath his skin. "I swear I'm okay."

He heaved a great, tortured sigh, and clenched his fists behind his back. "I never should have left you."

"Don't give me that crap, Cho, you were doing your job. This isn't your fault." She snapped. She hadn't intended to face their reunion with anger, but if he was going to be blaming himself for her abduction and abuse, she was going to lose her mind. It was literally her fault that he was the one sitting there covered in bruises.

"He touched you." Cho surmised abruptly.

Ronnie's gut clenched. "Don't go there." Her brain flashed back to invented images of burying herself in Cho's shirt, feeling his arms wrapped around her body, trying to mute out that feeling, and she hated herself.

How dare she create that association between her best friend and that act?

"He did, didn't he?" He wanted to be discreet and respectful of the topic. He wanted to be careful with the trauma she'd experienced and never push any boundaries she wasn't comfortable with, but the image of her laid out naked on a table and knowing exactly what had happened filled him with unreasonable types of rage.

She gave him a few moments to breathe before answering. He had to know that Arlov was listening. He had to know that she wouldn't break because of a weak man's old tricks. "It wasn't a new experience for me, Cho. You don't need to treat this like some great violation."

But it was.

Oh god it was, and he knew it.

She would kill that Russian son of a bitch for what he'd done to her.

"I'm going to make sure you get out of here." Ronnie said firmly. "Being his mole isn't the worst thing in the world. I'll be protected by his people and I'll have powerful connections if I ever find myself in a bind." The former was entirely untrue and the latter was true on technicality but there was no way she would ever be afforded those resources.

Cho scoffed out loud. "No. You're not going back to that life. Over my dead body."

He had to know Arlov must be listening.

"That's literally what I'm trying to avoid. Let me get your life back. Leave Arlov to me. It will just be check ins here and there—a little information under the table on occasion. Our lives will go back to normal for the most part." It was easy to talk to him when she didn't have to look him in the eye. Later, when they could stand face to face, when they would have to start communicating like functional members of society again, she knew she'd fall apart.

While his eyes were closed, not seeing the state she was in, she could pretend she wasn't in it.

"No." Her stoic partner returned firmly. "I won't let you."

A few seconds passed as she forced herself past a wave of pain from her burns. "You don't make that call for me, Cho."

He didn't look at her, but she knew he wanted to give her that paralyzing glare that had become his signature. She could tell by the way his chin lifted like he was gonna open his eyes and level with her. "And you can't think I'd just let you do that. After all the progress you've made?"

"Alright, don't do that thing. It's not your choice, and I would inform for a dozen mobsters if it meant you were okay."

Cho's brow furrowed in blind confusion. "Don't do what thing?"

She threw her head back in exasperation, an exaggerated groan falling from her lips. "Oh, come on, that thing you do—where you go on and on like I'm this twelve year old with stunted development who's finally learned how to set boundaries. It's patronizing."

"I don't do that."

Her guffaw filled the space between them and he recanted ever so slightly, giving a stiff, single-shoulder shrug. "Alright, maybe I get a little overbearing about your psychological development."

"Maybe?" She threw a full-throat chortle at him, and all of a sudden she realized they were two tortured agents tied to various pieces of furniture, somehow teasing with each other like it was any other day.

"I don't mean it like that. Not like a therapist or a parent." Cho admitted carefully, staring at his shoes. "But I know your mom screwed you up. And I want to preserve the progress you've made with moving past it."

His words reached her with all the impact of a warm hug, and she allowed herself a smile. The first true smile in nearly a week. "I'll keep getting better. I swear. But I'll do anything I can to make sure you survive this."

Cho rolled his eyes and scowled at her.

Time stopped.

He blinked, eyes focused like a laser on her face.

She could see the paralysis in his expression—the voice screaming at him to look away or close his eyes—and tears swarmed in her vision.

But then his gaze wasn't locked on hers. His new perspective was a tunnel vision view of her lower abdomen, his eyes tracing over the array of burns. The faint little electrical burns around her belly button, the bubbling blisters from the torch that split and oozed, the nerve-deep patches of cooked flesh that dotted the landscape of her hard earned abdominals and rendered them all but useless.

"Cho." Her voice caught in her throat, understanding his object of interest but also knowing that her breasts and bikini area were sandwiching that portion of her body rather tightly.

He couldn't see her like this.

Yes, her injuries were medical matters that would be photographed, documented, poked, and treated for hours upon hours once she was released, but she should have had the right to cover the rest of herself.

"Please, Kimball, I'm really not okay." Ronnie begged brokenly.

He'd seen her stomach before. He'd seen her back and legs before.

The closest he'd ever come to a glimpse at her entire breasts was when she'd fled to his apartment that night so long ago and showed up in skimpy pajamas without a bra on.

He remembered that night without discrepancy.

Cho swallowed stiffly, his heart pounding wildly. He felt nothing but pure rage. The pity would probably come later, in the moments when the vulnerability that had been forced upon her would become evident in the near future, the pity and the sorrow for her, but in that moment all he knew was murderous fury.

He forced his eyes to close. "I'm sorry. Didn't mean to."

She realized that tears had begun to slip down her cheeks. Feeling powerless and scrutinized against her will was no new feeling, but she absolutely despised it when it was Cho. Nothing felt okay about feeling that way with Cho sitting before her.

"I'm sorry, Cho."

"This isn't your fault."

Her sigh just filled her lungs with hay particles, which lead to a series of dry coughs. When she'd recovered, she settled back on her table in the hopes of being able to rest. "Did you check in on Pike?"

"Yes." Cho reassured her. "He's being monitored until this situation is resolved."

"It won't be resolved," Ronnie returned simply. "They'll have to keep monitoring him, which is good because I don't want Arlov using him as incentive for me. You either, but at least I'll be able to keep an eye on you."

"That's a stupid assumption." Cho deadpanned. "I wasn't able to keep you safe."

She let the words settle between them for a minute before giving him a response. "It's not your job to keep me safe, Cho." It was her job to keep him safe, and there he was, strapped to a chair and tortured in her name.

"You've been here for a week, Masters."

The anger in his tone wasn't directed at her, but she almost wished it had been. At least then it wouldn't be directed at himself. As much as she wished she could have reached out to him, convinced him it wasn't his fault, begged him to believe that Arlov would have captured her even if he were in the same room when she'd been taken, she knew he wouldn't hear her.

Not now, not like this.

Not while she hadn't even been clothed yet since her assault—not while he sat bleeding in cuffs still. There would be time for reassurance and comfort after it was all over.

But for now — "You know what I can't get out of my head?"

Cho wiggled his feet. His legs were probably falling asleep. She remembered sitting there until she was on pins and needles. "What?"

"I have been craving my cucumber chips like crazy."

He scoffed outright, wincing as he screwed up his face in disgust and agitated his wounds. "Sprinkling white cheddar popcorn seasoning on slices of cucumber does not constitute a chip. I'm begging you to stop eating those."

Her stomach growled fiercely at the thought. "I can't, Cho. I'm dying for them. They're amazing."

"You're gonna get cancer from that nasty seasoning salt." He tossed back, audibly relieved by the lighter turn of their conversation.

"MSG isn't cancerous, it's flavorful." She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. "I would absolutely kill for those chips. You know what else is good with popcorn seasoning?"

"Please don't tell me, your fake healthy dietary habits already scare me."

"Watermelon."

"Jeez, Masters, that's disgusting."

She tittered gleefully at his very predictable reaction. "Come on, don't give me that. You eat all the protein powders and power bars and energy drinks that I do. It's not like you don't eat chemicals."

A few seconds passed.

He sucked in a deep breath.

The smile on her lips grew.

"Whatever. Your cucumber chips and watermelon popcorn are gross." He grumbled miserably.

Ronnie ached for her cucumber chips. "How else am I supposed to stay hydrated if I don't eat those?"

"Drink water."

"Boring."

Suddenly, somewhere, a series of banging commenced, like doors being slammed open. The guard outside of the stall jumped to his feet, unholstering his weapon and pointing it at something Ronnie couldn't see.

She heard him shouting in Russian, too quickly for her to reliably translate, and then bursts of footsteps coming from multiple directions.

The next words came in English, from someone else and Ronnie couldn't believe their impossible luck.

"FBI—put the weapon down."

Note: guess who