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You Can't Hurry Love; 5/24: Early-Eveningish (Ali/Simon)
Topic Started: Apr 8 2015, 11:11 PM (260 Views)
Dazzler
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I'm the best at what I do, and what I do is roller skate
Mutant Camp - Admin
Seriously, such an absolutely amazing guy. Inside and out.

Definitely sweet (she'd mentioned that, right?), with a smile that could knock her off her feet, even when she technically wasn't on them, and the kind of awesome sense of fun and humor (when that was absolutely something she could use right now, maybe they both could) that was a lot harder to find than you'd think.

So Ali was more than completely content to be the thing Simon Williams' hands were full of presently. Also? Totally not the first time she'd been called a handful, but without any doubt at all the best. The Very Best. Awesome as it was that he wanted to share that title with her, the former singer was completely positive that one was all ihs.

That earned her another flash of those killer dimples of his that just about every guy she'd ever known would've sold their soul for as they moved on to a little elaboration on to how, exactly, 'ambient noise' figured into all this. With her and her powers and that whole, sparkly, shiny, walking transducer package.

Noise, especially the sustained, ambient kind was a big factor in the Dazzler Recharging Process. And not just her powers, but for her, too. Possibly because her powers kinda were her in a way the pink-haired woman wasn't sure she could explain, exactly. It was just something she knew. Though, actually, if anybody could probably get that without tons of words she'd have had to borrow from the ones Hank put in her head years ago and that hardly ever used and probably didn't have the brain power necessary to pull out right now? It'd be Wonder Man, wouldn't it?

At least from what she knew about how his powers worked, which was actually a lot less than she was interested in knowing.

The thoughtful nod that said she at least hadn't already moved into 'you might be made of noise, Ali, but I'm thinking not that way, what the hell are you talking about' territory. Or maybe that was because Simon had just as much going on inside as outside and could fill in the connecting parts she might miss or not even know needed to be there to make actual sense of that.

What she could tell him, though, was that it took rest, too, to manage a full Ali battery charge once she tapped into what she'd stored up and almost used that up. But, there had to be sound - outside sound - to really rebuild and, well, feel normal again. Like music, she'd told him that last night. And-

“Like words, on your skin,” he murmured, after one've those gorgeous smiles of his and just before his head bent, fingers pushing her hair off her neck and warm breath sliding over her skin like a soft breeze, words hitting her skin like raindrops. Something she physically felt (seriously, seriously loved his voice, couldn't say that nearly enough) and that she soaked in.

"Mmmmm." Kinda the only response she could give him for a breath or two, there, as her head tilted - the better to get the entire benefit of that - her fingers, slid up into his dark hair, and another've those amazing little shivers he could make happen to her way too easily slid through her again. Definitely not even close to too tired to feel that.

Did not think it was possible to ever be too tired to feel that.

"I really like that you remember that," Ali pointed out, just in case he hadn't noticed and complete with a smile right back for him. Oh yeah. Yeahs, she absolutely, definitely liked that he remembered that.

But! Right, back to the subject. She could do that and not get too distracted (even if distracted felt like something pretty awesome right now). Really she could.

Today hadn't exactly been one've the most strenuous she'd ever been through - pretty lucky with that, considering what some've the other teams, including Simon's, had been up against - at least physically. It was Moonstone, for god's sake. The kids had been tougher to take down. But she was definitely outta practice after years in the Camp, not being able to use her powers and not having time since to build up the kinda reserves she'd have liked. So, it'd all been more've an effort than normal and she was...a little closer to bottoming out than she was completely comfortable with.

That? Definitely not an experience she ever wanted a take two for if she could help it.

Simon was quite for a little bit after that, but not like he was trying to figure out why she'd gone all Drama Queen on him or had stopped making sense at all. Or Ali didn't think so. More like he was thinking and she wished she could take a peek at what was going on in his head as her fingers sifted idly through the soft strands of his hair, still.

He leaned back in the chair and it was no hardship at all to shift with him as he pulled her in close again. Warm and solid and comfortable and, man, she did seriously like that. This. The way it felt. How easy it was.

“Yeah, I absolutely hear you there,” he said finally, as she watched his face and his eyes. No better view ever. []“Been there, taken the couple of years to get myself back out of it and together again.”[/b] The look on his face was easy to recognize. Pretty sure it was the same one she'd had a little earlier and Ali nodded. To make sure he knew she got that. And knew that she got that. Sent another of those softer smiles that seemed to be all his, too, along with it.

"You died," she confirmed softly,something clutching briefly in the pit of her stomach. That was a story she remembered. One it couldn't be anything close to easy for him to talk about, either. Yeah, gorgeous, completely amazing guy.

“Together again in the literal sense, I mean,” he clarified and she nodded again, still watching his eyes as her hand moving around so her fingers could slide over his cheek. That had to have been terrifying as hell, where 'terrifying' was probably a complete understatement. “It was more than that if you count the time it took to get my head together enough-" his head tilted the other way. Yeah, that part would be more the 'try not to lose my damned mind completely' type thing more than the literal one, wouldn't it? “-to deal with dealing with it instead of completely freaking out every time I got somewhere where it could happen again.”

The first answer that came to her for that was exactly what she did. Leaned forward a little and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. Hella rough, to have to go through that and she wished he hadn't had to, but she was beyond glad he'd made it out the other side.

Not everyone did or was able to pull themselves out of something like that. Part've the reason they'd all been in this mess for the last few years.

"Powers and how they work and what they can do to you can be pretty damned terrifying," Ali commiserated. It was just the total truth. Didn't matter how you got them, or when, did it? Coded into your genes from the start or something that happened later for whatever reason. "Nobody ever warns you about the stuff you have to sometimes learn the hardest, scariest ways ever."

Like having to pull yourself back from 'death' and then figuring out how to keep going after that. Like bad guys who tortured you with your own powers in ways you never even imagined were possible.

"I never wanted any've the fighting and the super-villains and the craziness," she confessed - though she'd kinda at least hinted at that last night - after a second or two, head resting against his shoulder but still keeping her eyes on his face. "But, y'know, Dr. Doom happens. And the Absorbing Man happens. And Moonstone. And one day you're in roller skates trying to fight off the Enchantress with sparkly light powers. Scared the hell outta me for a long time." And, in the case of Amora at least, still kinda scared the crap out of her. Little bit of a smile for that, though. You'd have thought she'd have clued in to the inevitable way before she did. "I tried really hard to get away from it." Not something that'd ever been a secret, really, but also not something she talked about much. Just like last night, though, it was actually very much okay. "Because dealing's never as easy as you think it should be, huh?"

At least not for her and, it sounded like not for him, either. Or for a lotta others. Kinda thought the ones that made it always made it look easy were the real exceptions.
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Wonder Man
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Ah, that was better. Ali had come with him as he’d settled back into the chair, and slight as she was, she was real, and solid, and comforting to have sitting with him (okay, on him), as he held her. It could have been considered kinda a minor rearrangement in the scheme of things, but to Simon, it felt like a big one. Big enough to feel ready to find the words he needed to respond to what she’d said.

Because yeah, he absolutely heard what she was saying there. He’d been there himself, to the tune of out being distressingly semi-permanently subatomic-particulated for a couple of years before he’d got himself back together again.

Not his favourite memory. Or, technically, a memory-blank, but Simon wasn’t about to dwell too much on the exact details there, and definitely not after the way the woman in his arms managed to make a nod and a smile speak for a mix of understanding, genuine big-heartedness, and maybe more than a little fellow feeling too. God, she was amazing.

“You died," she confirmed softly, so maybe she had heard about that from Hank or someone, or maybe it was just that she was perceptive or intuitive enough to read between the lines of what he’d said, and figure it out.

“It felt like it at the time,” Simon agreed, running one hand a little absently down the line of her shoulder, which at times like this felt like it helped to remind himself that he was still alive, and real, and could still do things like touch people. Not that he hadn’t dealt with it by now, but these things did have a sneaky way of sneaking up on you again when you knocked the scar and talked about them again. “It was probably the next closest thing, really,” he added, considering what he knew now. “I pushed my powers so far there wasn’t enough left over to hold myself together.”

Which was where, if he’d been talking to someone else about this, or if he’d felt the need to change the mood, he’d have inserted a joke about a look this good taking a good chunk of energy to hold in place. But instead, since that felt like it would have only broken things up, or maybe because it just didn’t seem as necessary as it might have to deflect, Simon just stopped to clarify that he was actually meaning ‘together’ in the literal sense before going on with the story (such as it was) that he’d been talking about.

Two years ‘dead’, or sub-atomized - however you thought about that, and he personally vacilated between the two at a semi-regular rate - but definitely more than that if you were counting the time it took him to get his head together (not in the literal sense anymore, but in the sense that he’d been the next best thing to a basket case for a lot of the time with the Avengers when he’d first come back from that). He hadn’t been dealing with it, so much as pretty much completely freaking out, terrified out of his wits, any time he got close to a situation where it could have happened again.

If anyone needed to check that, he was pretty sure Clint would still be ready to explain at length about how useless he’d really been back then, when the government had tried to keep him on the team for his power potential over a ‘trick archer’. Not always one for letting things go, was Hawk.

Not that he was going to mention that here, in front of Ali. Or maybe he would have actually thought about it, but he hadn’t really done much more than stop for breath (unnecessary, technically, but tell that to his brain) that she, gorgeous, amazing, fantastic woman that she was, leaned in and cut short anything else he might have had to say by kissing him on the lips.

That absolutely, but in ways he couldn’t have even begun to try to explain, made all of it feel a whole lot better. Wow.

“Powers and how they work and what they can do to you can be pretty damned terrifying," Ali commiserated. Yeah, she definitely knew what she was talking about, didn’t she? You didn’t have to be Terry Trauma, the boy who thought he was everyone’s nightmare, to experience that, even if it what had gone down in the Ops room earlier in the day for him had been one of those pointed reminders of how it could be when you were at the short, sharp end of the getting to know your powers, hadn’t it?

“Nobody ever warns you about the stuff you have to sometimes learn the hardest, scariest ways ever.”

“Or the things they warn you about turn out to be straight up false,” Simon added to that, forehead wrinkling a little as he thought about the line the Baron had tried to feed him about what would happen to his powers if he didn’t play ball and earn the ‘shot’ the ageing Nazi claimed to have made for him. No need to go into detail there, though, because he preferred not to when he could get away with it, just because it was honestly kind of embarrassing sometimes how talking about the origin of his powers got you into a Catch-22 about Godwin’s Law.

“I never wanted any've the fighting and the super-villains and the craziness," she confessed, looking up at him from the spot she’d found against his shoulder. Didn’t it just say something about the sort of people they knew, that you had to make a point of pointing it out when you hadn’t come in looking for that? Semi-lopsided smile back at her for that one, because he’d pretty quickly come to realize that he didn’t want that either, back in the day. And yet here they still were.

Or, as Ali put it. “But, y'know, Dr. Doom happens. And the Absorbing Man happens. And Moonstone. And one day you're in roller skates trying to fight off the Enchantress with sparkly light powers. Scared the hell outta me for a long time.”

“Zemo happens,” Simon agreed with a wry twist of his lips (but hey, it had seemed better than jail at the time). Squeezing a little tighter around her with one arm as he did though. That was a little easier than actually getting into his own Amora-saga issues, all things considered.

“I tried really hard to get away from it.”

“On roller skates?” Simon suggested, meeting that semi-ironic smile that she was flashing with a little one of his own. Really, how could he not ask, after that?

“Because dealing's never as easy as you think it should be, huh?”

Sobering a little, Simon nodded, then slowly let his breath out before he answered that question, whether it had maybe been rhetorical or not. “Not when those things keep happening and trying to smack you in the face.” If they’d just hold up sometimes, and not come one after another in an endless precession of things that kept you from ever getting your feet really back under you… but they never did, did they?

“I really couldn’t do it at all till I got away from all of that Avengers stuff for a while,” he admitted, thinking back to the point where he’d finally decided to go beyond just taking that ‘inactive roster member’ courtesy slot, and actually got himself out of New York, then starting to smile again with just a little bit of a twinkly sort of amusement the next moment that he directed back to grinning right down at Ali. “In fact, Hollywood totally saved my sanity. I actually can honestly say that.”

And how many people could really say that?
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Dazzler
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God. Yeah. Death was what that had to have felt like. And, even before he clarified, she already knew - or had made a decent guess - he meant that holding himself together thing literally. Not even close to a euphemism and it couldn't have been anything close to easy for him. Physically or mentally.

No big surprise he'd been freaked out and worried about it happening again. Anybody would be and it was another amazing thing that he'd come out of two years in, well, Ali guessed limbo might be the best word - just not the kind with teleporting blonde teens and demons - and then all that with any part've his sanity intact. Much less the totally and completely amazing man he was now.

Did he even have a clue how exceptional he really was?

Something kinda told her that he didn't, even if he should, and the very best way the pink-haired singer could come up with to even start trying to tell him was with a kiss. A little more brief than it might've been (or that she'd want it to be) another time, but definitely not any less sincere.

Yeah, that codename of his really was kind of a perfect fit, wasn't it?

Powers, though? Hell yeah, they could be, and a lot more times than you'd think were, absolutely terrifying. They didn't come with warning labels. You got to learn it all the hardest, scariest damned ways possible sometimes. And she'd known plenty of people - by this point, they all had - who weren't able to make it through that.

“Or the things they warn you about turn out to be straight up false,” Simon added to that, forehead wrinkling a little as some of his own examples from the past probably ran through his head (he'd got his powers from that evil German guy with the purple rubber tea cozy or whatever on his head, right? So yeah, probably not a lot of truth had got dispensed there). Totally could sympathize with that, too, but otherwise he seemed...pretty okay talking to her about it and that...that was more than a little amazing and awesome, too.

Plus, it made it even that much easier for her to keep pulling out bits of her own past, though she'd realized last night that that sort of thing was a lot easier with Simon than she'd ever thought it would be with anybody. So it was pretty easy to confess that this kinda thing (codenames, costumes, fighting the bad guy special of the day)? Had never been anything she'd wanted. It was something she'd actively tried to get the hell away from, in fact.

And no surprise at all that Simon, as she looked up into those completely amazing eyes of his, got that, too. That smile he sent back her way said so. Including the part where powered bad guys, and the occasional psychotic Asgardian goddess, just sorta happened. And then kept happening until you gave in, other plans for your life or not.

“Zemo happens,” Simon agreed with a wry twist of his lips that had her smiling back, not quite resisting feathering her fingertips over his lips lightly, maybe just a little playfully, as he gave her a very welcome little squeeze.

"And he keeps happening in that weird, rubber head thing," Ali added. Seriously, what the hell was up with that? Was it a German fashion thing?

But, yeah, weird Germanic super-villain fashion statements aside (way aside), she'd tried like hell to get away from it. Not exactly a secret in her case, but not that many people know exactly how much most've that had scared the living hell out of her back in the day.

“On roller skates?” Simon suggested meeting her own kinda lopsided smile with a flash of his own. Which totally turned hers into a full blown grin.

"I am amazing on roller skates," she insisted with a nod and a hint of a twinkle in her eyes. Maybe not at all modestly, but hey. She'd spent years on those things. She'd gone head to head with the Hulk on roller skates. Been a herald of Galactus on roller skates. Seriously, she was not even close to exaggerating here. "I could totally take you on skates."

Okay, that might be an actual exaggeration, especially after years not on skates, but still. Pretty sure she could hold her own enough to not totally embarrass herself at least. Maybe not right now, what with the lack of energy stores and probable falling over ten seconds in, but later for sure.

Right, though. Back on topic. The one where dealing with extreme, power related crap was never as easy as it should be. Or as easy as it seemed like it should be. Or you wanted it to be. Pick one or all.

Back to more serious now, Simon nodded, letting slow breath escape as she let her hand rest on one, broad shoulder, fingers making little light circles there. “Not when those things keep happening and trying to smack you in the face.” Man, so true and they did that way more than ever seemed fair.

“I really couldn’t do it at all till I got away from all of that Avengers stuff for a while,” he admitted, and she nodded, glad to see that smile of his winking into existence again. “In fact, Hollywood totally saved my sanity. I actually can honestly say that.”

Definitely not the normal reaction to LA and the Hollywood scene, but a really great one.

"And I'm amazingly glad that it did." It was something she said softly, totally sincerely and nothing but, telling him that. Easy to add a smile there, too, as her hand slid down his arm, finding his hand and curling her own over it. "Kinda makes me like LA more than I did already."

Still smiling, because that was easier to do after all these years when she thought about her own time out there (the first one, anyway), and easier still when she was looking at him, even if her smile dimmed slightly and went a little thoughtful. "I loved living there, even if I kinda can't say the same about keeping a complete hold on my general sanity. Totally not Hollywood's fault, though," Ali added with a not-all-that-bothered little lift of her shoulders. Her fault, for trusting where she already knew she shouldn't and not trusting her instincts. "But it's where I learned to put it back together again, and that I could." Hank had helped with that, but she was guessing Simon already might know some of that, too. "And where I figured out I'm a lot harder to get rid of permanently than I had any clue about, so I should probably get some actual training if I was gonna be doing this for a while."

Not a thing she'd learned in any kinda easy way, but then did any of them get to learn that the easy way?
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Wonder Man
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Yeah, people like Doom, or Amora, they happened, didn’t they? Zemo happened.

“And he keeps happening in that weird, rubber head thing," Ali added, as it occurred to Simon that the old (or slightly younger replacement) Nazi could maybe keep happening on some level if mentioning it was going to get that kind of delicate feather brush of a touch across his lips. Or yeah, probably not, all things considered, but he’d take this, here and now, with this gorgeous woman, and feel quite a lot better about it than he usually did.

“Oh, I know, right?” he agreed, meeting her eyes with a little casually bemused fellow feeling for the very wrong mismatched failure of a bondage mask of it. “Two generations of it.” Helmut and Heinrich, or Heinrich and Helmut, or… well, you probably needed to have been Steve to have it all sorted out, and…

…oh hey. He could actually go and ask the old Nazi Encylopedia to explain it all over again for the sixteenth time now, couldn’t he? Well, not now, because he wasn’t insane, but… huh. Yeah. Steve was not only alive, he was actually back.

He was letting his thoughts get away from him here though, Simon reminded himself again, and let those considerations drift back out of his mind as he focused back on Ali, who had a look on her face like she might have gone back to those lines of thought that were about something a little more than the oddness of inherited trends in Nazi fashion.

“I tried really hard to get away from it,” she said, and maybe it was the bondage Nazis, or maybe it was remembering that somehow, by some crazy stroke of the kind of good fortune he’d kind of thought they just didn’t get anymore, Steve was actually back with them, but Simon couldn’t quite resist a sudden urge to inject a little of that sense of fun and teasing they’d had a fingerhold on just a few seconds before back into the conversation.

On rollerskates?

She’d brought them into the conversation, not him. Totally opened to a little cross-examination now, your Honor.

Yeah, see - that had a bit of that twinkle sneaking back into those gorgeous blue eyes that had a complete hold on his, didn’t it? “I am amazing on roller skates," she insisted with a nod and a really sexy degree of confidence on that front. About roller skates. Totally charming - or maybe that was just that thing he’d always had about Roller Girl in Boogie Nights, and before that, from a very confused corner of his childhood, ONJ in Xanadu. “I could totally take you on skates.”

Be still his non-obligatorily beating heart. That little grin. Maybe not packing the kinda wattage it had been at last night, but it was still getting him, just as much. It still looked amazing on her face. And really amazing when that face was directing it at him.

“You’re cocky. I like that,” Simon answered, bringing out a dimpled one of his own to match. “We’re definitely going to have to test this out.”

But there was only so much lightness you could inject into the moment, and the day that they found themselves in before the stores for that got a little exhausted too, and those edges of seriousness closed back in like a final curtain call after the last bows had finally come and gone.

Not that it felt so bad either, in this context, with this amazing woman working her fingers in those light, comforting circles over his shoulders. Ali was absolutely right when she said that dealing, it was just wasn’t as easy as you thought it should be. Not when those things, the things that they might be able to joke off for the most part, but that weren’t really things you could keep shrugging off kept on happening and trying to smack you in the face.

He, personally, really hadn’t been able to do that dealing at all until he’d just plain got up and left the Avengers entirely for a while. A nod from Ali there, and that might have been enough to capture a little more of the lightness.

It could also have just been having a working sense of irony, though, because it wasn’t just getting out from the Avengers that had saved his sanity. It was actively Hollywood, Tinsel-Town in its own little bubble that had done it. Not joking even a little here, and he could definitely appreciate the joke in that.

“And I'm amazingly glad that it did.” Man, she really was the sweetest person in the entire world, wasn’t she?

“What can I say? Stunt work’s a great way to work through your discorporation issues in a safe place,” he said, watching her smiling at him in a way that didn’t even feel like she was humoring him, and the soft touch of her hand, sliding down his arm till it came to his own. Simon folded his own around hers, stroking his thumb over the back of her slender fingers. She really was pretty amazing, to keep rolling with all the random things he couldn’t quite seem to stop himself from tossing at her right now.

“Kinda makes me like LA more than I did already.” Yup. Absolutely, hands down the sweetest, darlingest person around. Not to mention the good taste. “I loved living there, even if I kinda can't say the same about keeping a complete hold on my general sanity. Totally not Hollywood's fault, though," Ali added with a not-all-that-bothered little lift of her shoulders. Simon nodded, slipping her hand another commiserating squeeze. Yeah, he knew - if not directly personally - how that could go for people. Hollywood had been great, but it played by its own rules, and it didn’t always stop to take prisoners.

“But it's where I learned to put it back together again, and that I could.”

There was a note in her voice that restirred part of those memories of that one time he’d met her out there. That guy she’d been at that party with - the one who’d turned out to be even worse news than he’d known, and he thought he’d known the guy for bad news. Eyes turning a little softer, Simon leaned in and gently kissed her forehead. Not interrupting her with any words this time She’d definitely got the worse end of the Hollywood stick, hadn’t she? That was an absolute shame, because she deserved the best of it.

Well, who knew, maybe there really would be a whole renewed world coming back, after today, and maybe they’d be able to find a way to navigate that so that there might be another shot at it. Stranger things had happened, right? Zemo had happened twice, after all.

“And where I figured out I'm a lot harder to get rid of permanently than I had any clue about, so I should probably get some actual training if I was gonna be doing this for a while,” she added, sounding thoughtful, but that one didn’t stir the memories he had of her - either back then or in these last few crazy days, so Simon had to take a moment to think that one out.

“You died, too,” he said then, when he thought he’d got a hold on what she was saying. “Out there?” He was pretty sure he’d never heard that before, but… well, it fitted with everything she’d been saying, didn’t it?
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Dazzler
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Cocky? Oh, yeah, she totally was and Ali flashed him a grin right back. No, seriously. Roller skates, she was totally awesome on roller skates, if she did say so herself.

"You are so on."

They'd just make that another date, along with that training she'd mentioned back in the Ops room, so she could get herself back up to standard. Or they could just combine the two things. That had definite potential.

Later, though.

When there was more energy and a day without so much of everything they'd had in this one. Now, she was more than content (and, man, that was a word she hadn't thought she'd be using, or be able to use, again for anything in the rest've this particular day, but it was still completely true) to sit here with Simon, his arms around her and him nice and close as she told him how amazingly glad she honestly was that Hollywood had saved his sanity.

Maybe it wasn't something you'd expect from Tinsel Town, but she definitely got it.

“What can I say? Stunt work’s a great way to work through your discorporation issues in a safe place,” he said as his fingers closed over hers, pad of his thumb stroking lightly over her skin. From what she'd seen of stunt work while she was in LA, 'safe' might not be exactly the word she'd use (or maybe that was because most've what she'd seen came from Bill Remington, who'd tended to set himself on fire, blow himself up, and jump off cliffs without a net a lot and definitely without any superpowers to back him up).

Except it was actually a hell of a lot safer place to deal with that kinda thing (the 'my powers are really screwing me up' kind) than having to deal with perpetual, unexpected aliens and massively super-powered bad guys and demons and whatever actively trying to turn you into a whole lot of nothing without a second's notice twenty-four seven.

"By being blown up and set on fire in a controlled setting?" Ali couldn't help but ask, or guess, maybe, brows raising thoughtfully. "I can totally see that, actually," she added entirely seriously and throwing in a little 'I really do know what you mean' smile and squeeze of his hand to go along with it.

Even if it was the kinda work that might seem a little nuts to most people, they weren't most people and a little normal, every day nuts was a nice change. Made her wish she'd dropped by some of his sets. Call it a hunch, and a little Hollywood word of mouth, but everything she knew so far told Ali he'd have been great at that.

Definitely made her more fond of LA than she already was if it'd managed to do that for the completely amazing, sweet, thoughtful man she was talking to. Even if it hadn't so much helped her keep hold of her own sanity. It wasn't totally Hollywood's fault. She'd got herself into things she knew she shouldn't have, put herself in situation against her better judgement because she wasn't listening to her own instincts.

Simon nodded, gave her hand another squeeze. Yeah, that's something he'd get, too, wasn't it? If you'd ever been any part of that, you got how it wasn't a place that let you make too many mistakes, be too trusting, and get away unscathed. But it also hadn't totally broken her.

With some help from a big, blue furry guy with an equally big heart that she'd probably always miss (and that Simon probably would, too), and a few other people thrown in the mix, Hollywood had been the place she'd learned to put herself back together again. And that she could do that.

He'd seen a little part've that, the part where it was all going wrong. Probably heard more from Hank. The way he was looking at her, though, and the kiss he planted on her forehead, made it more than worth it to pull up those memories.

It was something she could really get used to, that kinda look from Simon Williams, and her free arm tightened around his neck briefly. Just a gentle little squeeze.

All that (which wasn't just the Gladiator Arena or the being drugged utterly beyond stupid, but was a whole pile of completely ridiculous happenings as a group) was also where she'd finally figured out, well, that she was unexpectedly sturdier, and a lot harder to get rid of permanently, than she'd clued into. So, yeah, maybe it was a little late coming, but it finally dawned on her that this wasn't something that was just gonna go away and she probably needed some actual training.

Instead of playing it by ear and scraping by. As a bonus, it made Logan stop facepalming every time she saw him.

“You died, too,” Simon didn't so much guess as work out after a little bit of thought. See, totally smart guy. “Out there?”

"A couple've times, yeah, before I clued in," Ali confirmed, one corner of her mouth twitching up a little higher again. "What can I say, I'm a little slow on the uptake sometimes." Lacing her fingers through his, she exhaled softly. Not something she'd ever tried to explain to anyone else, not even Hank.

That way had lain tons of testing, big words, lots of questions, and then probably more testing.

Still wearing that self-deprecating smile, she lifted on shoulder in a shrug. "The first time, I ran out to attack a tidal wave to save my dates beach house. And, you know, my date." Yeah, not exactly her best idea ever, but she'd thought Bill was still in that stupid house he hadn't wanted to leave. "So I could...defeat the giant wall of water with my amazing laser powers. It was kinda the spur of the moment."

Right, so, not the best idea she'd ever had.

"I totally saved most of the house, though," the former singer continued, head leaning against his shoulder again and letting the smile fade in favor of something more thoughtful. "But I remember getting hit by all that water. Like a building falling on me." Crushing. She definitely remembered that. Remembered being dragged under, breathing in the ocean, before everything went black. "It was about an hour before I washed back up on shore and anybody found me. Not breathing, no heartbeat. I woke up, totally and completely fine - not so much as a bruise or a scratch, not long after that and told myself I was just amazingly lucky." She smiled up at him again. "But I think I got even then that wasn't really what was going on."
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Yup, pretty much exactly by being blown up - not to mention set on fire - in a controlled setting. Throw in a few potential crushed to a pulp scenarios, and you had, if not everyone’s idea of therapy, the one that had worked for him when he’d come out to Hollywood. Immersion, without the same consequences if he happened to screw it up, had been his safe place for a while.

Enough said though, really, Simon was figuring, because Ali had clearly got just what he meant without looking at him like he was too crazy, and the conversation drifted on again. To LA, and Hollywood, and how it had been for her, when she’d been out there.

Maybe not quite the same, safe space-wise, from the way she was talking about, but she was quick to declare that she didn’t blame Hollywood for that, which was definitely kinda nice to hear. To think of someone as fantastic, and talented as her, getting driven off by the side the town could show with all its teeth, would have been an utterly textbook definition of major shame.

That wasn’t her, though, was it? No, the way she was talking about, she absolutely had that thing that characterised the best in the business, whether the business in question was Hollywood or the other costumed life that had kept on dragging him, and probably her too, back into it. That thing being the little hook in your make-up that got you up again when it had all been blown apart, knowing you could put yourself back together and do it better next time.

He’d seen - or mostly heard, second-hand, really - a little of what she’d been through out there at the time, but look at her. Just in the last few days he’d had more than a little first-hand glimpse into the way she could and did put herself together, outside and in, and got through things that he’d seen break too many people over the last years.

Definitely nothing to be done but kiss her right now. Just there, on the forehead, so he wouldn’t be interrupting anything if she was planning to say anything more just now. Though in fact she didn’t, answering it with just a quick extra dose of light pressure on the arm threaded around his neck. Alright then.

She did have more to say though, after that, which was more than okay with Simon, who’d decided at least a day ago that he could listen to Alison Blaire talk about whatever she wanted, but most especially about what she knew and how she felt, without ever tiring of it. This time, about another aspect of what she’d learned out in California, though it took him a little more careful consideration to figure out what she meant about what had driven her to go looking for a place to get actual training.

She’d died, too. That was what she meant, wasn’t it? Out in LA?

“A couple've times, yeah, before I clued in," Ali confirmed, with a twitch of her lips that said she appreciated the irony there. “What can I say, I'm a little slow on the uptake sometimes.”

Feeling slender fingers threading through his, and the light sound of a breath being let out slowly, Simon pulled that hand that had just got entwined with his up to his lips. “Hey,” he declared comfortably, “that’s an easy thing to miss. Pretty much no one expects to die and then just get better, after all.” Definitely not the way it was supposed to work, even if there had been a point, maybe six years ago, where maybe for a while it had started to feel like that was a rule that had an exception where it came to people in the spandex and kevlar business. That had changed again, but the point was, you definitely couldn’t blame anyone for overlooking the possibility that dying wasn’t actually always as permanent as advertised.

Never mind, there was a smile from Ali, and a little shrug that he was pretty sure was going to be the lead-in to a little more information about the specifics here. Excellent. “The first time, I ran out to attack a tidal wave to save my dates beach house. And, you know, my date.” Simon lifted his eyebrows, dimpling just a little. He’d seen enough of LA to draw himself a picture of the date whose presence was kind of an afterthought to their real estate. “So I could...defeat the giant wall of water with my amazing laser powers. It was kinda the spur of the moment.”

Alright, maybe a little more dimpling than just a little. There was something about powers, wasn’t there, no matter what they were (or even if they actually weren’t there at all, thinking of some people he’d known and worked with over the years), that just kind of automatically led you into that kind of thinking, wasn’t there? Someone ought to do something, so it might as well be me, right now.

“I totally saved most of the house, though," the former singer continued, head leaning against his shoulder again and letting the smile fade in favor of something more thoughtful. "But I remember getting hit by all that water. Like a building falling on me.”

Without speaking, Simon squeezed the fingers entwined in his own carefully, and stroked the palm of his free hand lightly over the pink-haired woman’s hip. Even when you knew you were going to survive it, being hit by a tsunami was one of the more terrifying things he could think of. Being pummeled, suffocated and swept away, at all once.

And if you didn’t already know that you were eventually going to come out the other side…

“It was about an hour before I washed back up on shore and anybody found me. Not breathing, no heartbeat. I woke up, totally and completely fine - not so much as a bruise or a scratch, not long after that and told myself I was just amazingly lucky.” And just like that, she looked back up to him, and wouldn’t you know it, somewhere she’d still managed to find that amazing, gorgeous smile to fix on him. Totally in the class of Best in the business, no doubt about it. “But I think I got even then that wasn't really what was going on.”

Well. Even if that story meant that he definitely wasn’t intending to stop holding her close like this for a good while longer, Simon had to think that that smile was like an offer deserved at least some kind of attempt at playing along in kind. So, letting out a low whistle of something like appreciation, he shook his head, eyes twinkling just a little as he declared, “And to think I thought some of my dates have gone badly.”

Never quite so bad as to end in the other person running out head first into an oncoming tidal wave, though, so there was a definite thing he could take as a boost to his ego.

“Did you ever end up figuring out what it was with the dying?” he asked then, slipping back into a more thoughtful expression just as quickly as he’d gone out of it. Though maybe not making a lot of sense with that particular choice of words, huh? Try that again. “How it works, I mean?”
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Right, so, she'd run out to fight a tidal wave the size of the Chrysler Building. It was a brilliant plan. Really.

Actually, that lift of Simon's brows and the growing dimples peeking out there almost made it worth getting smacked senseless by a skyscraper sized wall of water.

Something she could relate with a smile now (and something always easy to do when he was nearby regardless) for how totally insane it was, but she never forgot what it felt like, getting hit by that giant building sized piece of the Pacific ocean that wanted to let her know definitively that she was it's bitch.

The way he squeezed her hand as his other one stroked soothingly along her, that definitely made it all easier, too. Ali gave him a return squeeze and shifted a little again, just for more of that comfortable contact.

The better to appreciate the soft whistle, the shake of his head the amazing guy (and getting more amazing the more she knew) that was Simon gave her and the equally amazing (man, he really was gorgeous, there was no other word for it) look that had a little spark of maybe teasing shining there in his eyes. “And to think I thought some of my dates have gone badly.”

"What can I say?" Ali asked with a little bit of a mischievous grin of her own,"That's me. Go big or go home." Or, you know, under water. "I set the bar majorly high" Leaning in just a bit more, she pressed a kiss to his neck, there just under his ear where she could reach just right. "Not at all getting how a date with you could go anything close to bad, though," she added, seriously and totally baffled by that idea.

He was way too genuinely sweet, and charming, and engaging and fun for even her major league imagination to manage getting a grasp on that. Some girls just had no clue about recognizing a good thing, obviously, if they were letting bad happen.

“Did you ever end up figuring out what it was with the dying?” he asked then, slipping back into a more thoughtful expression just as quickly as he’d gone out of it and her own expression slid a little back that way, too. “How it works, I mean?”

Ali considered that a couple of seconds, just to get her thoughts and words together, as she looked back at him, fingers sliding through his hair slowly again. "Officially? Not really." Reed Richards had had all her files from Project Pegasus once. All the tests and experiments and poking and prodding. The answer might've been in there if she'd thought to ask. "But I think I've maybe got a decent theory."

From all that stuff that'd always kept happening. Or that smacked her upside the head, sometimes literally. Or that she kept running right into against her better judgement. It was a thing, there were powers, crazy stuff happened.

"No sound, or totally bottoming out with no way to recharge, makes me sick. Like being in a straight jacket, stuffed in a box with no air sick." Wishing she could die sick. Maybe left like that long enough, she actually would really die. Even just thinking about that feeling, though (and thank god she'd never had to feel it more than a time or two), made her shudder. In the Book of Ali, that was something way worse than death. Sure, it was a cliche thing to say, but also totally true. "I think it probably works the other way, too. As long as there's sound to soak up, and my powers are on, I can recover."

At least that's how it'd worked out with everything so far. If somebody tried to vaporize her or something, or slap a collar on her and take her out, well, all bets were probably off.

Eyes dropping to his chest, she brought her free hand around, laying her palm flat against it. "It's not the same as indestructible, I don't think, but-" Man, how did she ask this, or say this, and it not sound amazingly strange? "Dying is scary as hell, but that part?" she started again, lifting her eyes back to his. "Where you actually don't? It feels a little unnerving, too."

And maybe that's something he might get, too. Either way, it was something she'd like to know, if it was something he could or would be okay talking about.
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And to think he’d thought he’d had dates that had gone badly…

“What can I say?" Ali asked with a little bit of a mischievous grin of her own,"That's me. Go big or go home.” Well, running out to face a tsunami might be just about the most literal definition of that he’d ever heard of. “I set the bar majorly high.”

Simon just grinned back at her. That she did - in all sorts of ways, not just this. Then he had to smile a little more, dimples coming up to full force as she leaned in and planted a soft kiss in that very sensitive spot, just below his ear. “Not at all getting how a date with you could go anything close to bad, though,” she added, sounding not in the least bit sarcastic.

He’d just not say anything in response to that, maybe, Simon decided, looking back at her. Because he kinda liked the idea of keeping her thinking that that was the truth.

Or he wouldn’t. In fact, the resolution lasted not much more than a couple of seconds before he crumbled in the face of a temptation to tell her, “That’s probably because you haven’t been on the receiving end of Hank’s idea of a Blind Date.”

He missed the big furry genius every day, but not the ideas he’d had about what ought to make for a ‘pleasant and enjoyable evening of social intercourse of the romantic persuasion’. The mother of the boy who’d been all too excited about ‘Mr Muscles’ had been the least of it.

Well, anyway. Not to worry too much about that though, because he honestly did want to know about what she’d actually been talking about, and not because it was preferable to having to admit to some of the more embarrassing low points of his dating history (though there was maybe at least a small contribution from that). Really, though, he did just - well, he wanted to know more about Alison Blaire. About everything about her, especially the thing things that meant something to her, and… well, this obviously did.

Not that you needed a whole lot of perception or special insight to guess that dying, and not dying was a big deal for someone, you could suppose. On the other hand… this kind of thing was a little different, wasn’t it? So what he wanted to know was: had she ever figured it out? Not that it had happened, maybe he should clarify that, actually, but how it worked?

Ali didn’t answer at once, unless that utterly delicious, soft way she was running her fingers through his hair was a way to tactfully distract him away from having crossed over into things she didn’t want or wasn’t ready to talk about. He kinda had a feeling that it wasn’t that, though, from the thoughtful look in those gorgeous blue eyes, and after a few seconds, she did speak. ”Officially? Not really.” He nodded. It wasn’t exactly as if it was something you wanted to empirically test until you solved it, was it? “But I think I've maybe got a decent theory.”

“Oh?” Simon asked, in case it wasn’t clear already that she had his curiosity piqued.

“No sound, or totally bottoming out with no way to recharge, makes me sick. Like being in a straight jacket, stuffed in a box with no air sick.”

There was a little shiver, or at least the suggestion of one, that he could feel from her as she said that, and it had Simon lifting his hand up and gently brushing the hair that was starting to fall over her cheek as he held her a little closer with the other. “Mhhmm,” he murmured softly. Stuffed in a box with no air, right, he knew how that was. Or rather he remembered how that was, to be more strictly accurate about it. The worst kind of feeling in the world, or one of them.

“I think it probably works the other way, too. As long as there's sound to soak up, and my powers are on, I can recover.”

Tilting his head to one side, Simon considered this for a moment, before nodding slowly. It made sense. A lot of it, really. Her powers were so clearly integrated through every part of her, and so entwined with sound, that it became another essential element to life, as much as oxygen or energy.

But there was something else here, wasn’t there? Or some other part of it that was weighing on her enough that she dropped her eyes down away from his, and brought up her hand instead, laying it gently flat over his sternum. What was it? Simon lifted his own hands around so they were cupping her shoulders gently, which was as close as he could come to a hug right now while still being able to keep his eyes on her, but it didn’t feel right to push too quickly, so he waited for her to speak.

“It’s not the same as indestructible, I don't think, but-“ she paused, but Simon nodded. No, coming back wasn’t the same as not having to. He’d experienced both often enough himself to know the difference. “Dying is scary as hell, but that part?" she started again, lifting her eyes back to his. "Where you actually don't? It feels a little unnerving, too.”

He nodded again, eyes softening then gently let his hands rub slowly up and down her upper arms, as though to warm them. Just letting her know he was here, and not going anywhere, while he gave what she was saying, and how to put words to how he thought about it, the time it deserved.

“I think, sometimes, what’s really scary is thinking - or just feeling - like you’re the only one that it happens to,” he said finally, letting one shoulder go so he could cover the delicate hand she’d placed on his chest with his own, keeping his eyes on hers all the while. Hopefully she wouldn’t need to see pupils to know that he was right here with her, thinking about it, and that he’d been there too, and that she at least had company in being unnerved.

“That it’s…” but the word he was looking for kind of failed to come there, so he shook his head, and tried again. “I don’t know. That it’s not real, and maybe you aren’t either. Or that it is really real, and it always will be, but just for you.”

Both of those things had bothered him, over the years, and he didn’t really know, if he was being honest, which one scared him more. And it had been a long time - a long, long time now - since he’d talked to anyone about any of it. Almost since Greer, at the very start of the WCA, actually.

“Sorry, Gorgeous,” Simon said a moment later, catching himself in a pause that was becoming a little too thoughtful now. “I’m being… something.” Something he didn’t exactly have the word for right now, but would mostly rather not have been, all the same.
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Okay, yeah. Hank. That did kinda explain it, didn't it?

Loved the big blue, walking, smiling, furry encyclopedia to pieces and still did and always would miss him like crazy. Would've totally trusted him with her life, her well being, and her first born, but her lovelife? Yeah, not a chance.

Ali shot a smile and a little hint of a raised eyebrow Simon's way for that, but then let it fade away again. Since, right, there was a question in there she hadn't answered yet that didn't have anything to do with Hank's questionable taste in dates - his and the ones he handed off to others (and, yeah, she guessed she fell into one've those categories, too, didn't she? But that was kinda a whole other story in itself).

So, no, she'd never officially found out what the deal was with her powers. The one that let her get up and walk away from getting herself killed. Theories, though? Those she totally had.

"Oh?" Simon asked, sounding actually interested, and she didn't have to wonder if he might just be humoring the over-tired girl he'd found napping in the hallway (because, yeah, tiredness; it made weirdness happen). All the sweet, genuine things that were the Simon she was getting to know, and absolutely wanted to know, were right there in the way he pulled her closer with a murmured little, “Mhhmm,” of understand that, just now, was about the best thing ever, fingers brushing lightly over her skin as he moved her hair back off her face. And in the way his head tilted, nodding and thinking all the (possibly non-linear, it was kinda hard to judge for sure right now) things she was spilling out in a pretty much stream of consciousness way.

And the way he waited patiently, still letting her stay close and folding her up in his arms again, while she tried to figure out what she wanted to say, and how she wanted to say it, when it was outside her own head so that it'd make any sense at all. Even if she was already practically positive he'd get that part, too.

The one where, as Ali lifted her eyes back up to his, hand resting against his chest, she knew she wasn't indestructible (though, after all the stuff the last five years, they kinda needed to maybe revise what that actually meant, cause it'd definitely changed). Not the way that word meant with him. The way that dying was pretty scary, but not dying and popping back up like one've those Whack-A-Mole things at the fair, instead? Wasn't the picnic it probably seemed like it should be.

Yeah, he definitely got that. She didn't need the way he nodded to know that. But the look in his eyes and the way his hands rubbed soothingly over her arms, that she did kinda need and very definitely wanted. Any and all contact with him was something she wanted.

Bringing her other hand around, Ali stroked the pad of her thumb along the line of his jaw, watching his face and his eyes, that thoughtful look he had going there.

“I think, sometimes, what’s really scary is thinking - or just feeling - like you’re the only one that it happens to,” he said finally, and, yeah, that. Exactly that and she nodded as his hand moved over to the one she still had resting on his chest. “That it’s…” he trailed off, shook his head like the words weren't quite working for him right now, either. She was completely content to wait however long he needed or wanted, though, as her free hand shifted down to curl over the side of is neck. “I don’t know. That it’s not real, and maybe you aren’t either. Or that it is really real, and it always will be, but just for you.”

Definitely good words and descriptions and that sounded like experience, not just...thinking something through in your head and, god, she just wanted to hug him. How easy would it be, with what he'd gone through with his powers, especially, to think that way?

"Yeah, it's got a way of kinda getting in your head and setting up camp there, whether you're okay with that or not," Ali replied softly, kinda lacing her fingers with his the best she could without disturbing anything too much. Personally, it was definitely in the 'sorta not okay with that random head squatting' category, but it at least mostly didn't pop up to poke at her. Except when it came to days like today and her guard wasn't just down it was totally bulldozed and then stuffed in a wood chipper.

Simon seemed to have kinda drifted off a little in his own thoughts, maybe, but that was definitely okay. Not like it was a bad kinda quiet, at least in her opinion.

“Sorry, Gorgeous,” Simon said a moment later, coming back out of whatever interior monologue had pulled him in. “I’m being… something.” he added and she just smiled at him. That sorta soft, very real one that'd been his for a few days now.

"Hey, if we're doing fill in the blank, I'm voting for 'awesome'," she told him before her arm snaked around his neck one more time and she did hug him close. "Because you seriously are." Pulling back a little, she added a brief kiss, too, just because, before hitting resume on the smile. "Or maybe 'amazingly patient' since big amounts of tired kills all my filters and I don't exactly have tons to start with, so there's that." And she definitely hadn't meant to shove anything else on him to have to deal with, since there was probably plenty waiting outside that door over there already.

The smile went just a little softer, fingers tracing along the nape of his neck as she turned her eyes back to his. "Or there's always 'introspective', if you want that one," she added, just a little bit of twinkle back in her eyes. "I think getting more lives than that cheat code on Super Mario pretty much means, if we have to deal with that, we're entitled now and then."
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Touching - whether it was her, or him, or both - really seemed to help with the thinking, actually. Funny how that worked sometimes.

It took him a little while all the same to muster the words for what what he thought about the point Ali had posed, but Simon got there, and he liked to think the touching helped. It definitely helped in getting out the words, to be able to say that for him, or the way he’d thought about it, the part that was really scary in the world of dying - or of not dying - was feeling like you were the only one. That feeling ran through both halves of the slightly contradictory (he could admit it) split in the thinking that could catch him out on this.

If you were alone in it, it was way too easy to think that it wasn’t real, that it couldn’t possibly happen to a real human, so in some essential way, a person who it happened to couldn’t really be real, or live. On the other hand, it was just as easy to think that if it was real, that it would be real forever, and you’d have all those lifetimes of forever stretching out ahead of you, just for you.

It got you on the swings and the round-abouts, this not-dying thing. Or at least, it got him that way, when he let himself think about it, which he tried not to - and you could say this for the last few years, it had given them all plenty of other things to occupy their heads with instead.

“Yeah, it's got a way of kinda getting in your head and setting up camp there, whether you're okay with that or not," Ali replied softly, as he felt the light pressure of her fingers, working their way in between the spaces between his till they were kinda entwined there, over his chest. Simon looked down at them, watching the interlaced pattern of slender and larger knuckles, and tried to think - or maybe not to think - about how long it had really been since he’d talked about this with anyone.

Which wasn’t really productive, or worthwhile, was it? So he snapped himself out of that, looking back at her, and apologized to the very understanding, very Gorgeous woman who was putting up with him being… well, something. Something that it would have taken having that personal screenwriter on hand to be able to articulate at the moment, it seemed.

“Hey, if we're doing fill in the blank, I'm voting for 'awesome'," she told him before her arm snaked around his neck one more time and she did hug him close. Surprised - though not in any bad kind of way at all - Simon slipped his own arm back around her and returned that hug. “Because you seriously are.”

Alright, he was maybe - no scratch that, it was a definitely - kinda smiling in spite of himself into the general vicinity of her neck, because ‘awesome’? That hadn’t been what he expected. But he liked to hear that from Alison Blaire. A lot.

Just the same way he liked her pulling back, if it meant that he could look at her again like this, and that she’d kiss him like that. Soft, but sweet, and the smile she was wearing afterward, although it still wasn’t her most brilliant, was still proof against any amount of morose thoughts.

”Or maybe 'amazingly patient' since big amounts of tired kills all my filters and I don't exactly have tons to start with, so there's that.”

“No,” Simon disagreed, contradicting that idea without the slightest hesitation. “There’s not ‘that’ at all. You are wonderful.” It didn’t take any patience to sit with her, and listen to her, and find out more about who she was, and how she felt about… anything she wanted to talk about. Who wouldn’t want to do that, with someone as smart and kind and possessed of the kind of smile she had?

“Or there's always 'introspective', if you want that one," she added, just a little bit of twinkle back in her eyes, which in a way Simon couldn’t quite describe seemed to be catching. Enough to feel his own kick toward just a little hint of dimple again. “I think getting more lives than that cheat code on Super Mario pretty much means, if we have to deal with that, we're entitled now and then."

Oh no way - and she knew about that cheat code?

“I’ll take that over ‘gloomishly mopish’, any day,” Simon replied, smiling back in a way that if it still wasn’t really back to 100% Williams Special, was a whole lot more than he would have expected to have been able to get back to this quickly, then leaning in for another little drive by of a kiss. “And any time you need to let those filters go hang for a while, Gorgeous, you let me know, and I’ll be there,” he added after that. “We’ll call it part of being in the Order of Those Who Kicked the Turtle.”
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One part of that was absolutely right. Simon? He was definitely something.

Totally sweet, absolutely amazing man who made all this processing and absorbing easier just by being close by. Right here where she could touch him and talk to him and feel comfortable doing that. Kinda hoped that would work the same way for him, too.

If they were filling in the blank, though, there was one particular word that she'd totally vote for in that slot. And that word would be awesome. She'd punctuate that with the best hug she could manage right now. Because he was awesome, among a whole list of excellent adjectives, and as she'd pointed out before it was something he should definitely know and be told on a regular basis.

That got her a hug in return, warm and definitely more than a little welcome. Then there was that smile again as she eased back and kissed him (since how could she not kiss him every chance she got?). Maybe added 'amazingly patient' to that multiple choice list for being that way when he was dealing with her and her random hallway napping and her massively tired and general lack of filters that was even worse than normal.

Others had definitely tried to weather overtired, lack of any personal censoring at all Ali and many had fallen under the challenge. Ask just about anyone that knew her.

“No,” Simon disagreed, contradicting that idea without the slightest hesitation and her eyebrows lifted up just a little, but she was still totally smiling. Definitely a seriously amazing, one-of-a-kind guy. “There’s not ‘that’ at all. You are wonderful.”

The smile she was wearing went all kinds of soft again. Utterly exceptional and she...

Yeah, just kinda..seriously loved him. It was what it was, still sorta scared the hell outta her a little, but even she knew it'd be beyond even her personal definition of nuts to kamikaze surprise somebody with something like that after three days, an actual war, a lotta sleep deprivation, and a ton of stuff that needed to be dealt with

So, still enough filters left to manage not to blurt that right out (willpower, every once in a while she still managed to have some). Instead, Ali threw out option number three in the fill in multiple choice. There was always introspective. Since getting more lives than that weird Super Mario cheat where you trapped a turtle on the steps and kicked the hell outta him for five minutes or so to get a ton of do overs should mean, if they had to deal with all that on a real life level (and especially without adorable mushrooms and fun little Koopas to bounce around), they should be totally entitled to introspective once in a while.

And there came a hint of those killer dimples again. Really, be still her heart. Even feeling like a worn out glow stick, still not at all immune to that.

“I’ll take that over ‘gloomishly mopish’, any day,” Simon replied, smiling back in a way that might not hit 'full on stun power' any more than her own did right now but that was still completely genuine. That there was a kiss to go with it that reminded her all over again how much she really liked doing that was a spectacular bonus. Though she was not buying the gloomy mopish thing from him. At all. “And any time you need to let those filters go hang for a while, Gorgeous, you let me know, and I’ll be there,” he added after that. “We’ll call it part of being in the Order of Those Who Kicked the Turtle.”

Squeezing his fingers a little with hers that were still kinda tangled with them, Ali smiled a little wider. "Seriously, I do like how you think a lot," she informed him. Sure, she'd told him that before, but it hadn't stopped being true and, in her considered opinion, appreciation was something there could never be too much of. "We could have club jackets, it could be a thing." Or, okay, maybe not, but extra excuses for fashion could never be bad, either.

"You know that works both ways, too, though. Right?" she asked a little more seriously, eyes on his again. Not the jackets, but- "I'm here, I'll definitely be here, or wherever you need me, if you wanna talk." And she'd definitely like to be able to do that for him. "It's not moping or gloomy to need to get stuff out now and then. Get another perspective on all the crap that sorta builds if we let it. And it'd never be any kinda imposition to listen."

Or, really, to do anything at all with him. He was sweet and kind and fun and had a heart as big as all outdoors, not to mention the most gorgeous man she'd ever seen, but that was actually kinda a bonus to all the rest. Why wouldn't she want to spend time with him?

Settling her head over against his shoulder again, she closed her eyes briefly, fingers of her free hand stroking along his neck again. Man, so would take no time at all to just drift off like this.

"Oh, hey," she spoke up again quietly, remembering that, before she totally conked out, there was something they probably needed to go over. "Any clue why Puck left us like...half a million Post-its about Terry?" And what she could possibly be up to, since she'd looked pretty passed out and hovered over last time she'd seen the other woman. "Should I maybe find somebody to give him a break, before he goes into meltdown? Or, you know, we end up with him and Anaconda making their own porn down there or something?"

Cause right now, she was totally pretending that might not have already happened. At least 'til she was awake enough again to deal with the possibility they had a new Resistance Porn channel.

Julian would be so amazingly pissed it wasn't gay porn.
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Hey, she needed someone to talk to, he was here. Or there. Wherever she was, really, that was the thing. Filters or not filters, he had ears that he’d only be too happy to put at her service. They’d call it an Order. The Order of the Turtle Kickers.

Yeah, there was a little more smile there, wasn’t there, along with that finger squeeze? ”Seriously, I do like how you think a lot," she informed him. Well, that was only entirely mutual. But then Simon was pretty sure she knew that by now. “We could have club jackets, it could be a thing.”

See? He really, actually, loved the way she thought. Although, as he paused to envision that as an idea, there was a minor - tiny, really, all things considered - little hitch that flagged up that he probably was kinda honor-bound to point out, wasn’t he?

“Well,” he started, lifting one corner of his lips up a little, “here’s where I should admit that Jan’s banned me from jackets unless she’s signed off on them first.” Which he still thought was a complete overreaction to a perfectly valid resurrection of a really unfairly denigrated piece of 80s fashion, but Wasp had got far too many people on her side for backup, so he’d had to promise. Oh yeah, and it hadn’t just been the jacket, had it? “Also turtlenecks,” Simon had to admit, with just a trace of faux-sadness, “as appropriate as they’d be here…”

Who didn’t need a little punning in their lives, every now and again? It wouldn’t be as if…

“You know that works both ways, too, though. Right?" [Ali] asked a little more seriously, breaking into a train of thought that probably had run off any kind of sensible rails, but not immediately furnishing him with the sign posts that would have led him back to the new one that she’d picked up.

“Huh?” Simon asked, a little apologetically, because she had a look and a tone that said she was in earnest about something, and he didn’t think it was still turtlenecks.

“I’m here, I'll definitely be here, or wherever you need me, if you wanna talk.”

Enlightenment dawned. A little, at least. “Ohhh,” he breathed out, meeting her eyes with a surprise that was kinda quickly being supplanted by a smile. She wanted to hear him talk - about this? She wanted to hear him talk about this. She was volunteering to be around for that. And not in the way that people said that, because they’d been taught that reciprocity was polite, either - he’d seen enough of that where he grew up to know the difference.

“It’s not moping or gloomy to need to get stuff out now and then. Get another perspective on all the crap that sorta builds if we let it. And it'd never be any kinda imposition to listen.”

She… actually meant it, didn’t she? And to think he’d already thought she was just about the most amazing person he’d ever met. There just kept on being more. “I think I’d like that,” Simon told her, smiling a little more as he kept looking at her. “A lot.” She was pretty good at this, wasn’t she? He already felt like he felt better.

Though… yeah, she was kind of snuggling down in against the shoulder again there, wasn’t she? And definitely in a way that was shaded toward the ‘I really need a pillow to pass out on and you’re right here’ end of the spectrum, even if her fingertips were still skipping over his neck in a soft, familiar way. Smiling again, though more softly now, Simon lifted his own free hand, and brushed the hair back away from her temple all over again, smoothing the soft pink strands so they fell neatly back behind her ear. Really, truly, gorgeous, inside and out.

“Oh, hey," she spoke up again quietly, but doing pretty well for someone he would have been willing to place bets on being about to drift off a second before that. “Any clue why Puck left us like...half a million Post-its about Terry?”

Despite himself, Simon couldn’t quite hold back a grimace. Or grimacette - half a grimace, travel-size. Or… yeah, Puck-size. Okay, memo to self about never saying that out loud.

Right.

“This is not just since the ‘thing’ last night?” he asked, frowning slightly. The thing with that phonecall, that would definitely have been an interruption, if they weren’t both way too excellent to let something like a surprise check in from flustered Canadian minions about randomness going down in Times Square throw them off their game. Yeah, probably not, he was betting. There was optimism, and then there was what a little experience taught you was wishful thinking. “Man,” Simon continued, frown turning a little bit thoughtful, “I was kinda counting on her family having kept her quiet and resting through to a little later than this, after that thing in the Debriefing room.”

Probably something he should have checked on earlier, like he’d meant to, given that she’d been… hurt, or whatever that had been that had somehow eluded Topaz, on his mission. Hmmm…

“Should I maybe find somebody to give him a break, before he goes into meltdown? Or, you know, we end up with him and Anaconda making their own porn down there or something?”

Was it really just him who thought that would be the most adorable thing ever, though? Really? Alright, not the point. “Well, you’ve found me,” Simon pointed out, running his hand down from her shoulder, and cocking his head so that he could look at her just a little hint-fully. “I think maybe you should find that bed and a little room music, and see if you can’t recharge a little before charging into the fetish wrangling.” Definitely no need to run herself (or even Puck) any more ragged when she was looking only a few minutes at most off another hallway sleeping event. “Sound like an okay deal?”

He didn’t know that he could promise miracles or all possible fires out while she got herself back up to fully amped, but spelling Eugene for keeping the PR watchfires burning, he definitely could manage.
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Jackets. They could totally have club jackets. It could be a whole thing and, hey, when was it bad to add a little fashion into the mix?

There was maybe a little pause for thought there by Simon. But if he wasn't a fan of jackets (though Ali thought she remembered he seemed to be at one point), she was totally clothing article flexible.

“Well,” he started, lifting one corner of his lips up a little, in a way that had her curiosity piqued all over again, “here’s where I should admit that Jan’s banned me from jackets unless she’s signed off on them first.” It was the Wasp, she was all about the fashion, so Ali could kinda see that. Even if it was a little bit of an unexpected Avengers dress code clause or something. “Also turtlenecks,” Simon had to admit, with just a trace of faux-sadness, “as appropriate as they’d be here…”

Annd he had her grinning again, since they would be totally and completely appropriate. He was absolutely right there.

"Pfft, we could totally come up with something that'd pass Janet Van Dyne muster." Confidence in that, she had it. No problem. Then, with a little bit of a mischievous look (sure, not her best one right now, but the former singer thought it'd do for now), she leaned in and planted a soft, brief kiss on his neck. "As awesome as the turtlenecks would be, I've kinda gotta agree with that one, though."

Because then it wouldn't be nearly as easy to do that. Sometimes fashion just had to make the sacrifice for a good cause. And Simon? He was, without any doubt at all, a very good cause.

Which is why that worked both ways. That thing they'd been talking about before the jackets and the turtlenecks tangent. Though, yeah, okay. She was tired and kinda looping around randomly, so that sorta confusedly apologetic, “Huh?” was totally deserved. Oops.

Okay, a little clarity would be good. Being there, it was something that she wanted to do for him, too. If he wanted or needed to talk or just...anything at all.

That was clear enough that his follow up was an, “Ohhh,” of understanding, and what looked like some surprise showing there in his eyes and expression. Well, she'd work on getting that surprise taken care of. Just give her a little more time.

And, seriously, it wasn't anything close to moping or gloomy to need to get all the stuff out once in a while. Life (especially their kinda lives) tended to stuff it in their heads constantly. Sometimes, another perspective was good and it'd never, ever be an imposition to be there and to listen.

That smile? The way it went a little wider, was really all she needed, but this was Simon. So there were words to go along with it. “I think I’d like that,” Simon told her as she smiled right back. “A lot.”

"Mmmm...me, too," she murmured back, head pillowed on his shoulder and eyes slipping shut. Gentle fingers brushed her temple and her smile softened. This was amazingly nice. Definitely something she could get used to. It helped all the tired, tangled up things in her head settle down to something manageable.

Which kinda let something pop into her head she probably needed to focus on a little before she was totally down for the count. Did he have any kind of clue why their favorite mini-person had left them a Post-it avalanche about Terry, of all people? Who, last she'd seen, was being hovered over by her dad and assorted semi-super-villains and kinda down for the count looking in her own right.

“This is not just since the ‘thing’ last night?” he asked, as Ali opened her eyes again and shook her head. Yeah, the weird Time's Square stuff that Puck'd needed input on. While they were in the middle of things you didn't usually put on pause to field questions. But, hey, what could she say? Multitasking, they were exceedingly excellent at it.

"I wish, but I'm thinking not," she told him, with a kinda apologetic wrinkle of her nose, since that didn't require tons of moving and she was comfy. Much as she tended to like Terry and think she was doing pretty damned good so far - there were definitely things Terry was kinda a natural at - she and Simon both had had to run some general interference on some really...overly-enthusiastic ideas a couple've times.

Give Ter a little time, a little more experience, though, and she'd totally get the hang of it. Hopefully.

“I was kinda counting on her family having kept her quiet and resting through to a little later than this, after that thing in the Debriefing room.”

Nodding, and fingers still doing that idle, at this point unconscious, stroking thing along the warm skin of his neck, Ali frowned a little herself. "Yeah, no real clue how she managed to get past those three." Juggernaut, sure. Not that hard. Sean would be a little tougher. Black Tom? There was a guy who didn't miss anything ever.

Or maybe make that four, if you counted the little day-glo kid that'd completely inexplicably attached herself to Cain. But she didn't seem like a pushover, either. Sooooo, maybe her last act before unconsciousness should be to find somebody to give Puck an intermission. Before had a total meltdown or decided to maybe relive stress by starting the Puck and Anaconda Resistance Porn channel. 'Cause that'd just end up making Jules sulk, too, and add yet another problem to the list: No Gay Porn.

“Well, you’ve found me,” Simon pointed out and that seriously called for the best grin she still had left to give as his hand left that nice, warm trail over her arm and his head tilted to one side.

"Yes, I did," Ali interjected. It was an utterly necessary interjection. "And I'm calling finders keepers." Okay, right, talking about possible Puck meltdown. And not ignoring the hint Simon was working his way up to that she knew was probably coming, judging by that look.

“I think maybe you should find that bed and a little room music, and see if you can’t recharge a little before charging into the fetish wrangling.” Yeah, he wasn't wrong about that. Totally willing to admit it, she did know her own limits. She just didn't always like them. “Sound like an okay deal?”

"Sounds like a great deal for me," she replied, palm curling over the back of his neck, brows lifting just a little, "Not such a great one for you." He'd had tons of Terry wrangling already today. And he had a team to watch over and a ton of other stuff on his plate. "Plus," she added faux-thoughtfully, but still with a smile, "it also kinda means I've gotta move. And let you go. Those? Not so great."

But, had to happen didn't it? And she couldn't do much of anybody any good until there was rest and recharging and this was just a little borrowed time. They'd borrow a little more later. Definitely.
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Ohh… she meant that she’d be there, listening, if he ever wanted to talk? He had not seen that one coming, which quite possibly made him all kinds of an idiot, but here he was, getting up to speed, and he…

…well, actually, he’d like that. He really did think he’d like that a lot.

“Mmmm…me, too," [Ali] murmured back, but she was fading out here a little now, wasn’t she, tucking her head away against his shoulder like that, but that was more than okay with Simon too. He’d just yielded to the temptation to touch her hair again (it didn’t just smell good, it felt fantastic too), and was ready to let her drift off entirely, if that was what she needed, when she roused again and put up a question about… Puck?

Puck, and Post-its and Terry, which didn’t really ring a bell - or rather it did kinda ring a bell, but hadn’t that been the one that had been jangling last night? That he did remember (like he could forget any part of that night), but this… okay, he’d had to ask, just in case, but that little wrinkle of Ali’s nose, while utterly adorable, was kind of telling him the answer was no even before she let on that no, she didn’t think so, wish it like they both might.

This was new then. Which, man, definitely kinda meant he probably should have pushed up checking on the Irish girl (and Risque too) a little further up his schedule. But he’d been kinda counting on her family being set on keeping her quiet and resting till a while later in the afternoon, if he was being honest.

Definitely a little bit worrying - though probably not really as worrying as it might have been, had he not had Ali and her amazingly soft, gentle fingers, moving gently over his neck like that. “Yeah, no real clue how she managed to get past those three,” she agreed, with something of a frown, as Simon nodded thoughtfully. Yeah, with everything they’d gone through, looking for her, and then having to look for her all over again this week, you’d have thought as family they’d hardly have dared to let her out of their sight, wouldn’t you?

But then, maybe it was on of those times when you so desperately needed to know that someone you cared about was alright, and happy, that you couldn’t bring yourself to do anything but grant their every single wish. That, Simon had to admit, he might kinda understand too.

Ali though, was back on to the major important point here, which was that flurry of Post-Its, and what it might be saying about Puck’s current state of mind, and she floated the idea of finding someone to give him some slack, before he snapped, or - using the facilities to star in his own pornos?

There was an image.

But not to worry - or not to worry too much, partly because he was pretty sure there was an upper limit to his attainable worry levels with Ali curled up on him like this - because that was probably a task she could check off her to-do list already. She had, after all, already found him.

“Yes, I did,” the pink-haired woman declared, in a way that had Simon grinning all over again. “And I'm calling finders keepers.”

Oh, he liked that a lot too. He really, absolutely did. But while he was more than entirely okay with that idea, there was still that other thing here, wasn’t there? That thing where maybe instead, she could treat him as her minion to wrangle Puck, or Terry, or whatever confabulation of causes was producing an algal bloom of Post-Its, while she got on with recharging with some bed and some music, so she could take back over again without succumbing to another hallway nap. Or (possibly worse), a nap in their soundstage setup while Puck went ahead with Anaconda anyway. Did that sound like an okay deal, though?

“Sounds like a great deal for me," she replied, palm curling over the back of his neck, brows lifting just a little, "Not such a great one for you.”

In answer, Simon only smiled back. “Ahh, you’ll make it up to me,” he pointed out, leaning down so that his head was resting against hers for a moment. He was pretty confident of that happening, and entirely confident that if she did, he’d enjoy every last moment of it “I have very particular requirements in returned favors, you know,” he added, as a whisper. Just because he could.

“Plus,” she added faux-thoughtfully, but still with a smile, "it also kinda means I've gotta move. And let you go. Those? Not so great.”

“Mmhhmm, true,” Simon agreed, lifting his head up again as if to consider that. “That is a serious drawback in this plan.” Letting her go definitely was nowhere near making a list of things he wanted to be doing right now. But as far as moving went, now that he came to think of it… and coming to think of it, he went right on an acted, carefully cradling her so she wouldn’t get jarred, then getting smoothly back up to his feet. “Maybe I should just carry you around as I check on things,” he suggested, once standing. “How about that?”
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Not that the world, or at least the country at large, might not appreciate a good porn channel, after five years or so of complete suck. But something told Ali, no matter how much the idea might be worth pondering at some point in the future, now was probably not the time.

Also? Puck was a totally awesome minion type person, they didn't want him going into some kinda Terry-induced overload (though, seriously, she really had thought the other woman would be conked out, or forcibly resting, way longer) and exploding or running amok in a non-porn way.

But there was Simon totally to the rescue and, why yes, she had found him (well, actually, he'd kinda found her, out in the hall, but that was just details and they weren't allowed to ruin her flow, here). And now she was calling finders keepers. Definitely a thing Ali thought Simon might like to know, Puck and PR and possible unexpected porn not withstanding.

Dibbs, she was calling them.

That was, in the former singer's considered opinion, an even better deal than the other one tall, dark, handsome and amazingly thoughtful was offering. The one where he relieved Puck for a while to avoid possible explosions or miniature, overly stretchy, fluky smut in the name of stress relief.

It was something she'd mentioned a hundred times at least, but one more time wouldn't hurt, Ali didn't think. Because Simon? Really was a complete and utter sweetheart. And that sounded like an awesome deal for her, but probably not such a great one for him. There was a ton more on his plate already.

All that was pretty effectively dismissed by the utterly heart stopping, butterfly-in-the-stomach making smiles that came her way, though. “Ahh, you’ll make it up to me,” he pointed out, leaning down so that his head was resting against hers for a moment and he was totally and completely, one hundred percent right. So amazingly right. “I have very particular requirements in returned favors, you know,” he added, as a whisper that sent a little shiver right through her and had her own smile going all speculative.

Mmmm...so very definitely loved how he thought.

Giving him a little squeeze, Ali whispered right back, "And I will absolutely have a blast meeting every single one've those." Didn't even need to have any favors that actually needed returning, even, to get her on board for that. Tiny pause for some faux-thought and a soft kiss there, right under his ear. "Maybe even finding some all new ones to add, too."

Grinning softly, she threw in a few hummed bars of 'Kiss You All Over'.

Thoughts for later - not that much later, though, with any luck - when she wouldn't fall accidentally nod off in the middle've things or something. Since that'd be way more than a shame. But, hey, there was kind of a drawback for her, here, in that plan. It meant she had to both move and let him go.

Neither of those were things she liked the sound of at all, even knowing they had to happen.

“Mmhhmm, true,” Simon agreed, lifting his head up again as if to consider that. “That is a serious drawback in this plan.”

"Mmm-hmmm, definitely the downside," she agreed, nodding her head and eyes drifting back toward closed again. Pretty sure the moving that came next was Simon standing them up again and so Ali wrapped her arms around his neck. No worries at all that he'd drop her, it was just a nice position to be in.

“Maybe I should just carry you around as I check on things,” he suggested, once standing. “How about that?”

Eyes mostly opening again, Ali looked up at him and smiled. Then raised up enough to kiss him. How could she not after something that sweet?

"Tempting," she replied, fingers of one hand reaching up to comb lightly through his hair. No doubt at all he could manage that as long as he wanted with zero problems. Physically, anyway. "Really, amazingly tempting. You have no clue how much, Handsome." So tempting and resisting temptation washard. Buuuuut...

"I mean, right now? I'd totally sleep through it," No doubt at all there, either, "but I'm guessing logistics might get a little awkward for you after a while."

Lump of sleeping Ali to constantly shift around? Yeah, didn't think there'd be any graceful way around that. Still, though? Definitely tempting.
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