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This is Rosita. I'll hit you back when I can.

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"Well now you know, so you have no more excuses," she quips back, that crooked smile putting in another appearance. This one does reach her eyes as she starts to relax.

As she starts to consider what he's telling her in the present rather than the past tense.

"That sounds hard." She thinks again of Jesus, but they're from very close together; he didn't live a whole life here without her or vice versa before they were brought together again. And for however close they are - and they are - they are still just friends.

Jacob and Vrenille sound like more. "For both of you."

He gives a nod- no more excuses. But even as he does, he can't help but notice how that smile spreads across her face.

"It... has been." Jacob admits. "But I can't expect things to be the same, not after what has happened."

Not immediately anyway. Perhaps not ever. He loves Vrenille, and part of that love is not trying to make this any more unpleasant than it already is. He'll just offer what support he can.

He considers asking her how all this has impacted her contract, but he realises that's making some assumptions and, more over, it's highly personal. He volunteered the information about his contract with Vrenille, but he won't pry into hers.

"As it is, there's still work to be done. The group that kidnapped us, they seemed to havwxbeen very well organised for Zealots. But I've nor heard a good explanation yet for why they did what they did."

"And we may not ever," she answers in a voice that goes hard like the flick of a switch; she doesn't expect a good answer out of it, obviously. "The SIN guards took all the prisoners. If I'd been thinking straight I would've kept one, but I ran out of arms."

And no one was listening to her anyway. "When this is healed, if we still haven't heard anything, I'm going to figure out if LIERs can become guards." She'll have answers one way or another.

This is how long it takes her to put together the vague bits and pieces Jacob's given her, about things not being the same, about contract partners, about going back to the Down.

"Wait - how different are things now? Like awkward silence different, or I never want to see you again different, or something in between?"

"We may not," He says, nodding. "But that doesn't sit well with me. And clearly not all of this sits well with you, if that's what you're planning. We do need more information. Especially regarding that lot. It seems their number have dropped considerably. That alone might make it wasier to assimilate."

He wants to find out all he can about the bastards that did this. Make sure they are all dead and not just waiting for the next chance to fuck up all their lives.

He shakes his head regarding his contract, or lack of one. "It's nothing as dramatic as all that. He isn't used to me. Like this. It doesn't matter that I was the man he knew, the fact is... he doesn't think he knows me any more. Trying to have a conversation is a little like pulling teeth."

The thing is, Rosita isn't as hard as Michonne, but once someone's crossed her people, she's a very hard sell on forgiveness. She's killed - murdered, she supposes, in a society that still has laws - before and she readily will again if the situation demands, which getting her hands on one of the guards from the pit absolutely will.

Things she's learned not to say. She focuses on the part she can potentially do anything about, which is the personal pieces.

"Is that normal for him? To have difficulty talking at first?"

That desire is understandable. Jacob, should he find someone who was involved in the plot to kidnap and murder so many people, to drown a whole city, will not be letting that person live. But he will be extracting every last bit of information from them before he gets rid of them.

But he's not going to advertise that either.

"No. No it isn't. He works as a therapist. So this is... new and unpleasant. Talking about how he feels is one of his strong suits. I..." she's a perfect stranger, she doesn't need his hoped, dreams, heartbreak. So he clears his throat and finishes the sentence differently from how he'd intended.

"I think it may take him some time. Grief isn't something you can fix overnight."

A therapist. Christ. No wonder he and Jesus get along, she thinks, attention pulled back again from watching around them by the hesitation, by the clearing of his throat.

"What about you?" The man checking on people, insisting the best way to deal with pain and trauma is to talk about it, having his own reaction while mentioning how Vrenille is coping when she asks. They're strangers, it's true, but sometimes that helps. Sometimes there's no pressure to answer a certain way, or feeling judged by someone cared about.

Jacob should have known she was going to ask him. He should have been aware but... well. He wasn't really thinking about himself.

"Me? I... want him to be settled. To make peace with what's happened. Whether he wants to contract with me or not, I wouldn't hold it against him. I think I might be too old for him now."

And that hurts. If they had grown old together, it would have been better, it would have been wonderful. But that isn't what has happened, and he can't change it.

She considers him - he's older than her now, she thinks, or at least has lived harder years and wears them more plainly. But not that much older. As old as Abraham might have been now, as old as Gabriel might be.

Age matters a whole lot less to her these days, but it's easy to remember that it matters a lot to some. Something around her eyes softens ever so slightly.

"That's not fair," she says, quietly. Not that she's blaming Vrenille at all, but it's just not fair on the pair of them.

"Life isn't. You and I both know that. But forcing each other into something we won't enjoy? That is worse, in my mind." He says that seriously, because for him it is very true. "We contracted because we were... close. Emotionally and physically. We aren't either, currently."

"Besides. If its something he wants in the future, then I'm here. I've no intention of getting killed again and coming back in another twenty years. At sixty? The only reason to sleep with me would be for my massive fortune and I don't think I'll have one of those."

Edited Date: 2022-10-21 10:28 am (UTC)

"Is he being a dick about it?" she asks after a few moments of navigating the trail in silence.

"Because... I mean yeah, the dying. But you didn't know this was going to happen. I haven't heard of it happening to anyone else."

"Christ, no," Jacob says, quickly trying to dispel that. Vrenille is most certainly not being a dick. He can be a sarcastic little shit, but they're normally laughing and happy when that happens. When it happened. "He's trying, very hard, to be normal. But that just makes it more unsettling. I don't think... he's been able to accept it yet. And because he hasn't accepted it, he can't accept me."

It's not an easy thing to say. But there's no blame attached, no anger. Things have changed, and they changed rapidly, horribly, and Vrenille has had to deal with that. Jacob doesn't know how to help, apart from offer encouragement when Vrneille wants it, but for the most part, it seems best to stay out of the mesmer's way.

"No one knew. If I'd died and... come back as everyone else had, I doubt there would be a problem. But that isn't what happened. There's nothing we can do about it apart from adjust. And I have... somethings that I have to work through too."

She understands he's not asking her for anything. She does. Honestly if he were she might tell him to go fuck himself, but he's not. He's just talking.

She presses her lips together as he talks, nodding to show she understands. He sounds like he's being very reasonable about it. So does Vrenille, more or less.

In her experience that's bullshit but then most things are.

"Has this happened to you before? Having someone you're close to dying here, I mean."

She asked the question. Jacob isn't wanting anything from anyone- he will go back to the Down, wait out his three months and that will do just fine. True, it's getting into winter, it's cold, his eye is still sore, and the Rubies can't wait to skin him alive. But those are minor considerations. He can manage and has managed, worse situations than that.

"No. But... people left. Disappeared back to their own worlds, and came back different. Changed in ways that... took time to get used to."

There's was Hellboy, who also had lost an eye, been to hell and back, there was Anduin, who had never managed to talk about what had happened to him. Chris who had one body before and came back with a different one. There was... so many changes. Some of them were welcome, some of them weren't. Some of them hurt far more than others.

Rosita nods, and considers that while she carefully navigates a fallen tree across the path, sure footed but still a bit off balance with one arm strapped to her torso. When she doesn't have to pay attention to that anymore, she considers again if she wants to say anything. It's not like she knows anything. She really doesn't, not here.

But she knows her life, so she takes a deep breath.

"My friend - Jesus. That's just what we call him, not his real name, obviously." He enjoys it though, and so does she. "We're just friends, mind. But friends... mean a lot more where I'm from than they used to. Everyone together in my community and his wouldn't even come close to breaking into triple digits, and not all of them fight, but he and I have, together. He and I've stood shoulder to shoulder on a firing line, caught dead to rights." It's a deep bond, one that has more trust than most marriages she remembers from the old world.

"He died, the day before I came here for me. I went to his funeral. I hammered a nail into his coffin, helped dig his grave, threw a handful of dirt back in. I had just started the process of remembering not to look for him at the gates, not to listen for him greeting us at the breakfast table, not to want to run something past him for his thoughts anymore. And then here I am, and here he is, like it never happened."

The touch to her back to stop her slipping is instinctive. He doesn't need to think about it, he just moves, making sure she doesn't fall or break a leg as well as an arm. She'd probably insist on crawling her way to a doctor, rather than be carried. Or refuse to see a doctor at all.

Jesus. A name that seems to keep popping up, like he's managed to get tangled up in a church outing. He keeps that to himself, because what she says doesn't need his disrespectful thoughts.

"I'm sorry. I can't imagine how jarring that must be." He wonders if she's realised, if she goes back, she'll be without him again. She must have done. But that's a horrible thing to have on your shoulders. All the worst if he doesn't know himself. "I've never had anyone from home here with me. But if I did, I'd treasure it. Unless, of course, they were a complete wanker."

If he had Jack. Jack from before the madness set in, Jack from before all the pain, he'd be a happy man. He'd happily have Evie, even if she'd miss her husband. Best she's at home, away from this mess.

She's surprised by the touch, glancing quickly back but keeping what balance she has; they're in the forest and that means scouting rules, that means no touching unless it's to signal silently.

But they're not scouting. There are no rules. She settles again without saying or doing anything about it.

"I just mean... As people, there's a shock that comes with someone we love dying. A finality. It hurts like hell but part of the reason we can move past it is it's just the way it is. Done. No changing it. Except here, that process is interrupted. I'm just wondering if that's factoring in at all for Vrenille."

It's not meant to be something that surprises her, but then again, it's the first time he's ever touched her, and it was unbidden and unexpected. The glance back tells him that, and more besides. She was expecting something else, not help, not for him to try to keep her steady. She wasn't expecting him to hurt her either. He's sure that if she thought he might try to hurt her, he'd probably be on his back right now with one of those knives to his throat- or already buried there.

But then she's on the other side of the fallen tree and nothing is said about it, no warning, no nothing. Then again, does anything need to be said?

"I know." They've both lost people. He hasn't asked about her family, friends, partners. It seems callous to do so. He wants her to share, if she feels she wants to, but to ask, and learn that everyone she loves is dead- he doesn't want that. He doesn't want to make her say it. "And I think you might be right. Everything that you should do, that you would do? It's different here, messed around with. And I'm not... I'm not the right person to speak to him about it."

She nods at his answer - she can see that. Hell, she hasn't said more than the bare bones to Jesus since they were reunited, and he hasn't brought it up at all with her; they each have their piece of it to deal with, and all the sharpest edges are aimed at each other or themselves, so they just keep moving forward instead.

It must be so much worse when there's a more formal partnership involved. More direct influence and expectation on each other's life, and that's before the contracts even enter into it.

"You remember enough you still love him?" she asks, because she's still a little fuzzy on how the whole memory thing works, and she'd rather ask than assume with this one.

Moving forward, dragging their deadweight behind him. Jacob doesn't want to drag this, he doesn't want any more pressing down on his shoulders. He wants to find a way to forgive himself for all his sins, for his mistakes, and let go of it. But he's not sure how he can. Not when there's so much blood on his hands. The people he killed directly. The people Jack killed. The people who died in the Pit because he didn't know the right way of saving them.

But the talk is of Vrenille, as they reach a little shallow stream, large stones just peaking out from the surface as steps across. The sound of the water is... peaceful. It helps him banish those negative thoughts.

"I don't know if love is a memory, or if it's something else somewhere in you. But I never stopped or lost it. The fact was just... in some part of me I didn't know about."

Rosita doesn't find any joy in the blood on her hands, human or walker, but she refuses to feel bad about it either. Maybe that's the tradeoff: the weight she carries with her doesn't include any of the people she's killed, only what comes with still being alive.

"That doesn't make any sense to me," she tells him, not unkindly, but not particularly carefully either. It's true, for her: "You can't love someone you don't know exists."

She hesitates at the water's edge, checking up and down it to be sure it really is as shallow as it looks, that the water is clear, and then checking the way across.

Jacob knows he did what he had to do, to try and save lives, some people had to die. There's no doubt about that. But like Rosita, he never asked for the life that he's got, never wanted it, it just happened to him. And once you're an assassin, you can't ever stop. You know too much about the world, you know too much about how other people want to hurt others, control them, enslave them. If you leave, you turn your back on all of those people who need you. He just can't do that. But it doesn't mean he doesn't dream he could have had a different life. Duplicity offers him some respite.

"Oh, you're right. But when he walked into that cave, and I saw him again? It came back like a flood. Like it was never gone- like I hadn't been gone." He explains, "That's why it feels like it was always there."

And of course, if he doesn't remember something, he won't know until Vrenille says it - and Vrenille isn't talking to him right now.

She shakes her head, and steps out onto the first rock, moving quickly and competently across, good arm out to balance.

"Space is probably best," she has to agree, "Even just for a little while. Let things settle, let things pass. But I am sorry."

"Thank you." He knows that it will settle, things will work out. Somehow.

Most of his memories are coming back, their discussion in the Pit, his talks with other people, what happened before the kidnappings, the life that he had before he di- went home. He doesn't feel like he's died. He knew he came close when Jack had him prisoner, and those days and the days in the Pit still feel confused and interchangeable. But he's sure he remembers things about Duplicity as well as he can be expected to, with the strange passage of time.

She doesn't need his help, the stream is hardly more than a few inches deep and the stones seem sturdy. He follows her, listening to the noises of the forest around them, the rustle of the leaves, the birdsong. But beyond, there are the sounds of the city. He likes that. Being apart but still close.

"The world must sound a lot different, for you. No trains and factories."

"The old world where I'm from has been dead for years," she answers, waiting for him where the trail picks up on the other side. She keeps glancing at the water while they're beside it, then checks around them again as they move on. The longer they're out, the easier it becomes both to relax and, as a result, sink further into the old habits she developed over time to watch for walkers.

"It's hard to tell how long exactly but it's been over ten years since the big cities went down. Everywhere I know of ran out of gas a few years after that? Makes it easier to hear the walkers." A beat that lasts a few easy steps. "Makes it loud here. That's taking some getting used to. And how many people there are."