for numberthree.

[obediences]

And I’d choose you; in a hundred lifetimes, in a hundred worlds, in any version of reality, I’d find you and I’d choose you.

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[obediences]

Luther looks down at her, his own heart in his throat, swallowing the words that want to come tripping out:
I thought you'd never ask.
Yes. Always.

What does come out in the end, after a heartbeat that lasts a little too long, is wry and just a touch playful: "Yeah. I guess I could squeeze you in."

As if she wasn't the first thing he'd asked about in the letter, the first place where all his thoughts had collapsed the first moment he knew he might be in Los Angeles. The entire rest of this museum and its glitterati and cultural people-of-interest simply don't exist anymore; hadn't, since the moment they'd finally managed to gravitate back to each others' sides and strike up a conversation. He can't actually remember if there was anyone else on the shortlist Dad gave him, the contacts he was supposed to track down and chat up, but what he's already accomplished tonight will have to do.

Because nothing else matters.

He squeezes her hand again, carefully-measured this time to just be the faintest application of pressure, and then he lets Allison start steering him back through the museum. And even as they start ducking towards the exit, there's one regretful thought buzzing in his skull. He doesn't want to say it. Saying it aloud makes it painfully real, but he has to say it:

"Just so you know, uh, this is my last day in town. My flight back is in the morning."

He doesn't want to think about it, but their pool of available time together is measurable. Shrinking, like Cinderella counting down to midnight. That cup of coffee he'd wanted to get, it won't be possible tomorrow. Each minute is hopelessly precious.

[numberthree]

Luther might not remember if he has more to do, but Allison does.

She knows she should stay, wander, mingle, talk to as many people as want to talk to her, be caught in this dress, laughing and smiling, by as many cameras and journalists as are there, see the night out. That there's a sort of implied timeline of expectation. But one that no one requested, informed, or even implied once. It's not entirely like ditching, but it still snags somewhere in the box of knowing-doing what she supposed to at her level is overdoing it immaculately, too, so people can't find faults, so that she's everywhere, unavoidable, unreproachable.

But she doesn't care at all -- the whole of that idea, of the world, even the noise of the crowd not far from them, burbling along is a distance hum -- when Luther stares at her a too long, possibly suggested too much, moment, before his expression shifts, turning playful. His words make her smile a little, clouding up her chest with relief.

Luther squeezes her hand, and as much as she knows she should leave it at that, relief, her heart never did play fair where it came to Luther. Even when she doesn't want to, rejecting one set of priorities makes it so much easier to want to deny other unpleasing realities. She lets go of his hand. Casually. There are exits closer than the front, thankfully, so they won't have to press back out through the whole reception crowd, where they'd both be inevitably stopped a half dozen, dozen times first. It's out a side door and then looping back one side to where the taxi area is.

If she was feeling guilty about it, most of it vanishes at his words.
In the easy return of, "We'll just have to make the most of our time, then."

Even the exhaustion at the edge of her thoughts could be made to wait. Would. For Luther.
Who was already halfway out the door, on the night they weren't even supposed to be able to have.

[obediences]

They're stepping outside into the night air: brisker than during the daytime, but still warm and lovely even in the autumn with encroaching winter, so much warmer than it would've been back east. He wouldn't be surprised if there's already snow dusting the ground once he returns.

They're not the only people starting to leave the gala in trickles and streams, either; there's a line at the taxi stand, which they have to obediently shuffle into. Neither of them have cars of their own, nor personal drivers. (She will in a few years' time, and he would back home, but — I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto.)

So they join the queue, and Luther resists the urge to shove his hands in his pockets. The air feels fresh and freeing in his lungs, and he finds himself looking around the street and the palm trees as if he's never seen them before, drinking them in with clear eyes and a second perspective. He wonders what neighbourhood Allison lives in. Wonders what she might have in mind for tonight, now that they've ducked their other responsibilities.

"You got any recommendations to check out in the middle of the night?" Luther asks, and there's something of a laugh buried under those words. A little incredulous, a little delighted, disbelieving that they actually get to do this. Step outside the lines. Go do whatever the hell they want. He can't stop looking at her, sneaking glances to the side they shuffle forward in the line, waiting their turn. (They don't notice yet that there are too many people, and too few taxis.)

[numberthree]

Allison's exposed skin prickles as the shift from the inside high running air conditioning to the warmth of the fall night outside the walls of the museum, and she's in the wrong clothes for this, they both are, but it'll have to do, too. There's an excited skip speed up to her pulse as the door shuts behind them. A physical sound of their escape, as she does something that would, could, might be conceived as wrong for the first time in forever that doesn't have to do with being inconvenienced or impatient.

That makes her glance over at Luther as he speaks, and feel that hum into her skin, into her bones. It feels like any number of times when they were younger, when she knew she was dragging him into something she shouldn't, but he was right there at her side, at her shoulder, in step with her, in hidden-away places, never forced or rumored or drug there against his will. It swells in her chest. Like it hasn't in two years.

It might mean nothing now (after; because)
but it's still there. For her, at least. In her.
(She wasn't the one who backed out.)

"There won't be a whole lot open, but there are places you could see or walkthrough. The Griffith's Observatory. The St. Monica pier." She's counting things even as she counting certain others out. Other museums and the downtown art walk, the bright lights and big crowds of China Town. "Though, didn't your letter just say something about coffee or something?"

She can't remember entirely, only that it was asking for her time during it in that calm, quiet, off-handed way of his. Almost like the asking for it was too big and to be done small. Like she might not want to. Reminding her of her earlier words, You thought I lied?

"There are a million pretty great coffee places if we just want to sit and talk."

[obediences]

This time, Luther can't help it. He does just blurt it out, exactly what he's thinking. "That's pretty much all I want," he says, and feels his cheeks heat in a faint blush, and he's grateful that she likely can't see it; it's dark outside and they're facing away from the brilliant lights of the museum exterior, all decked out for the grand opening.

But it's the truth. He doesn't care about landmarks, or museums, or famous restaurants, so long as Allison remains by his side. They're probably both tapped out on culture for the night, anyway.

And there's the matter of their clothes, but he's not even going to broach that as a logistical problem. There isn't time for him to go back to his hotel, and her to wherever-she-lives, and for them to meet back up again afterwards; it'd be too many precious minutes wasted, for something pointlessly aesthetic and insignificant. Because it doesn't matter. The city's just going to have to put up with them in their handsome finery.

"So, wherever you wanna go. That's fine by me."

[numberthree]

Allison finds herself staring at him what might be a few seconds too long, or too hard, after Luther's answer. Those words shoved out so fast as if they couldn't be kept in. He's got specificism down, but it's a little winding to think about there not being some other distraction in the fact of that intensity. To just be sitting somewhere, across a table, with only each other to look at.

Her life had been made of so much of that, for so much of the greater share of the decade behind her, them, and yet, still now. Now, it felt precariously like an overly large magnifying glass affixing itself above her. And yet. Did she want anything else, herself, anyway? Did she want him distracted by other things if there were so few minutes and hours until he vanished entirely from her life again?

"Coffee it is, then." Her smile is easy, as much a trade of her childhood as these last two years Hollywood. The couple in front of them starts loading into a cab, and it moves them up to the front of the line.

[obediences]

Coffee is so small, so innocuous, but he still feels his heart swell in his chest, a warmth suffusing him just at the thought of it. The possibility. They shuffle a little forward again, and he's waiting for this cab to drive off and the next one to pull up, but it lingers instead, engine running patiently.

"Where you headed?" the driver shouts through the window, and Luther looks at the open door in the back, the two people already seated in there, their heads craned to glance out at them.

"Oh no, uh, it's fine, this one's full," he says politely, demurring, trying to shy backwards like a spooked horse.

But the line is stretching behind them, and there still aren't enough taxis to ferry everyone out through the streets. A packed and crowded event, people all starting to disperse at around the same time, and flooding public transit. He's not used to sharing; not like this.

[numberthree]

Allison's hand is already on Luther's arm, as she's leaning down to look in the cab. "Don't listen to him. We're fine. We're coming." Shifts directly into a move that is partially tugging, and once her other hand finds part of his back, pushing, too.

"Luther." It's a little higher, but more directive than negating. "Get in the cab."

A look thrown over her shoulder at the shifting crowd and the steadily extending line. Some with slightly pinched, confused expression about what was happening in front of them. Her voice hitches a step under volume this time, as her mouth doesn't move as much while she smiles at those confused, suspicious expression, "We're not going to make all these nice people wait just for us."

It's logical, but even as she gets toward the words, her heart is not as calm as her words suddenly, even as she bulling straight through it, already going about leaning downward to pick up the excess fabric to the skirt of this dress, not looking at him as she pushes the words out. "Just get in. I'll sit in your lap. It's not that long or far."

[obediences]

Luther is forced to cram himself into the last spare spot in the cab, and he's already so damned tall that his legs are pressing against the back of the passenger seat. And then Allison's clambering in after him, drowning in armfuls of red fabric overflowing and tugging it in after her, conscientious to not get caught in the door as it slams shut. Her weight settles in his lap, and his hands float awkwardly for a second, trying not to touch her at all — but as the cab lurches into motion, his arm has to act as seat belt, winding around her to keep her from sliding into their fellow passenger.

It should be easy. It should be nothing. So many people do this every single day and it's nothing. But just like other things he hasn't been able to take for granted ('dear Luther' written on a piece of paper, Luther second-guessing, re-reading it), he finds that he's entirely unable to be nonchalant about this. Every part where their bodies are touching, where her thighs are warm against his through the fabric, his hand warm and heavy against her hip, anchoring her in place so she doesn't fall. The other two people are talking to each other, but he can't pay attention to a single word through the roaring in his ears. When the car speeds up as the light turns green, the velocity pushes her gently back into him. It's nothing. Just the faintest pressure. It's the worst. He is going to die.

His other hand is pressed against the door, somewhere above handfuls of endless fabric, and he's beyond thankful that it's a voluminous gown and not some kind of little black dress; it separates them a little. Not that it helps too much: their bodies are still too close, crammed into each other, limbs wound into each other. Tongue stuck in his throat and he can't think of small-talk to cover this moment, but he eventually forces out a pertinent question:

"Where are we headed?"

His voice rumbles through his chest, into her back, his breath against the nape of her neck and that exposed expanse of bare shoulders.

[numberthree]

She's not thinking about it. She's not thinking about it. She's not thinking about it.

She's not thinking about it when she's gathering her skirts. She's not thinking about it when she's considering just how to Tetris herself into the cab, with her skirts in hand, around Luther's far too tall for the world, or the cab, body. She's not thinking about it when she finally gets her feet, then her legs, and all of the fabric, between his legs and out of the door. She's not thinking about it when Luther is rigid stillness beneath her, and she's not going to look back.

Just forward, as she leans forward to give the cabby the name of a location and the cross-streets, even though he probably doesn't need it. Which happens right before the cab takes off and all of her fabric, silky and slick moves, sends her lurching into what probably was going to be a disastrous landslide into the people next to them, before Luther's hands were suddenly on her, pulling her back, in one place. On his lap. On. He's.

Allison swallows through the spike of surprising warmth in the top of her cheeks, as other warmth, Luther's hands, Luther's arm sliding like a bar around her waist, suddenly permeates this incredibly too thin fabric, and it's all too much like it isn't there under those fingers, gripping her hip just a little too hard. Making sure she can't suddenly go face-planting into any other people or the passenger seat in front of her on his watch.

Before everything goes suddenly haywire as Luther starts talking.

She's mortified and horrified when her first reaction is overwhelmingly instantaneous. Her eyelids half-closing against her will, in surprised shock, something else entirely, as a shiver that might be goosebumps on her bare shoulders, travels lightning-fast, clenching her stomach, and not stopping there, when the center of her body throbs in the worst way—muscles fluttering in a disastrous little heated spasm between her legs.

And her face has gone as hot as if she'd been slapped suddenly.
She can't even tell if it's more shame or. Or. Or.

(She's wrong. She can't not pay attention. This was the worst idea.

She survived Dr. Terminal and the Murder Magician and her father and Hollywood, but she's going to die right here. On Luther's lap. In the tight curl of his arm against her stomach, hand curled the whole span of her hip. The careless, unaffected closeness of his mouth all but touching her bare skin. That doesn't even have a liar's millimeter scrap of silk or velvet between them. Like it's all nothing. Like she is.)

Allison has to swallow twice before she can even force her throat to give her the voice no one has been allowed to silence since the moment she walked down those stairs and away from her father for good.

"Coffee." Is stupid. But the only thing she can grab first. Hard. She has to do better. She has to. She licks her lips, even though her jaw can't unclench any further than that. She forces out words, even as she has to raise a hand and catch it on the shoulder of the seat in front of her as the cab swerves right hard, sliding through traffic. "A place not far from one of my work outlets."

Though it'll be after wherever these people are going first.
Not that she can say that. She might want to get out with them.

[obediences]

"Okay. Uh. Good."

His own words are clipped, strangled, forced out between his lips as he tries not to notice or think too much about the long line of his thigh between her legs. Luther's having to draw on iron control and discipline and that tightness in his jaw, trying desperately not to focus on the weight of her, or the way the swerve of traffic throws her even harder against him and he has to swallow against that tantalising pressure. As she squirms to readjust her position, and the movement presses her into him, and everything in him narrows down to the heat of that contact. Oh god. This is the worst.

(Don't. He can't. Not now. Not now when she's planted right on top of him.)

More critical questions which need answers and which he finds himself considering in a blind distracted panic: why doesn't she have a coat or a shawl or something. He can't stop looking at the curve of her shoulder so close to his mouth, right beneath his chin. He can smell Allison's shampoo, the cool crispness of spearmint and aloe vera with a subtle touch of honey, suddenly overwhelming when his face is almost pressed into her hair, jaw tucked against her neck.

He has never thought about Allison Hargreeves' shampoo before. It has never been relevant before. Now it's suddenly all he can think about.

He's also never had anyone in his lap before, let alone her, so this is a unique kind of hell and getting worse. It's like the worst kind of endurance test he never had to go through at the Academy, exercising a particular kind of willpower. There's not enough room for either of them to wear a seatbelt, so he has to keep hanging on. His fingers feel like they're burning where they're fanned against her stomach.

She said it wasn't a long trip, which is the only lifeline he has to cling to, even as he's trying to stare out the window and count the minutes and pretend he's watching the lights and streets of Los Angeles passing by, while he notices not a thing.

[numberthree]

Why didn't she think about this when she was hurrying him?

When all she was focused on was 'not being that person.' The asshole who makes the whole line wait so that they can get in a cab by themselves. Refusing to get in the ones before them with anyone else in them. Refusing to let anyone else get in with them even if the cab line was basically a mile long. It was all dumb.

But so was thinking her reputation or decency was of higher importance than not being settled directly on Luther, held to Luther, by Luther. Because he had no choice in the matter. The way this dress hugs her body perfectly, hiding nothing, but also gives her no distract from any slightest pressure continually pressing through it. Every nerve in her body had to be screaming at this point; every muscle poised between fight, flight, and freeze in the perfect agreement of all three.

In the way Allison Hargreeves never ever reacted to a threat.
But nothing else in the whole god damn fucking universe was Luther Hargreeves.

With his hands on her. Were this cab and this dress constantly sliding her in little jots forward and back on his lap. Was the way his breath kept tickling the hairs on the back of her neck or her shoulder anytime he breathed out. Was the bump of her hair or her head into his face at the sudden fast stops. Was the faintest awareness of one of the people to their side whispering something that sounded like mumbled mumble Hargreeves mumble and not having the vaguest clue which one of them that might have been.

Or if her brain was just melting and reaching for anything.
She was such an idiot—more than anyone else on the planet tonight.

Allison clenches her teeth, trying to find anything to distract herself that isn't letting her gaze slide sharp to the people next to her, either. She doesn't want to give any of the three of them a sign of how hard she feels rattled. Like parts of her might vibrate off, or burn away under Luther's touch.

(How long had she wanted Luther to just reach out and touch her? How many days, weeks, months, years? Shoulders, and thighs, and arms, next to each other, but also never any closer, and not in anything like this. And not. She'd never wanted anything about Luther to be against his will.

It was why it was never him. Never. Never. Never.
Not except in training when she was told she had to.

Not even that day when he said no and made her leave alone.)

Allison tried to make her ears stop ringing, stop feeling hot, pushed a question out that she hoped didn't come out high pitch, and too fast, the first even vaguely logical, non-related, sounding question her brain could put together: "What did you do before coming to the museum?"

[obediences]

Luther's still aware of the other people in the cab, in a distant sort of way, but he can't bring himself to glance over at them and puncture this illusion. If he just pretends that they're the only two people here, it's like the rest of the world fades away, and the only thing that matters — the only thing he notices — is Allison in his arms, the warmth of her voice, and what he could imagine is her pulse pounding in the inches between their bodies. And his mouth is close enough to her ear that when he answers, it's for her ears alone.

Her question is another lifeline; it's something for him to distract himself with and hang onto, to think about and try to set his words down in an orderly line to answer her.

"Some of it, you're not cleared to know." A touch of dry humour, the truth but also teasing. His thumb absentmindedly traces the arch of her ribs in the fitted bodice, before he remembers and makes himself stop. This. They don't do this. He's never had this, as much as he'd wanted it, dreamt of it for the better part of a decade, hardly dared consider he might, someday, be able to touch her.

"There wasn't really any time for sightseeing." The trip and itinerary had been pared down to the bare necessities, cut to the bone, with no extra time in the city. If he'd known he was still going to cross paths with Allison, he'd have fought harder to make it a longer jaunt, a proper week-long stay on the west coast before his duties at the mansion inevitably called him back.

"I got in yesterday, and got to check out Grand Central Market for dinner, and had some really good ramen. And then today has mostly been meetings with Dad's contacts, before the museum opening. It's been pretty boring. I wanted to go to the Last Bookstore, but there wasn't time."

He's regretting not fighting for that week now, for so many reasons.

Mainly this one reason.

[numberthree]

Allison is positive she has to be a hallucinating -- is wide-awake, full-on body-hallucination out of nowhere, without torture first, a thing? Is it the sleep deprivation and an overactive imagination? -- because one of Luther's fingers slides in a quick stroke, back and forth, back and forth, over the center of her dress, the rise of her rib cage, and it feels like she's going to fall out of her body, like she's losing having the faintest clue what's happening.

Especially when her heart had leapfrogged confusedly sideways at the touch that started and then stopped immediately, only for him to start talking right next to her ear again, and she swears something between her head and her heart and her lungs is going to actually strangle itself soon. She's so stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. She knows better than this.

She needs Luther to stop touching her.

(She wants him to have not stopped that soft glide over her middle, too.
She's never considered throwing herself out of a moving vehicle before. But suddenly.)

"This is you guys." A voice suddenly cuts in, before Allison can even pretend to come up with breathing, no less words to answer the ones Luther has, again, so easily produced. Like talking is somehow normal. Teasing her with her clearance level (ex-superhero, only superstar wannabe now), and then answering in spite of it. But instead of replying to his answer, Allison is looking at the two people grabbing their bags and only making that vaguest of eye contact of people who don't know each other just sharing space for five minutes to get home. Or to wherever.

There might be something a little manic about her consideration of the other two-thirds of the bucket seat they are currently taking up and the fact she plans to get there, even if she has to fall face-first into it shortly. If only to plaster herself to the piece of the car furthest from Luther's hands. Arms. Mouth. Chest. Stomach. Lap. Legs. Every single part of him touching her too much; and not nearly enough.

[obediences]

There's the brief gust of fresh night air, the slam of the door, the car rocking on its axle, and then they're both looking at the suddenly freed-up space beside them. Running the mental calculation, and knowing what they need to do. That there's no reason to be on top of each other anymore, squeezed in too-tight and too-close, with her hips against his, and his hands on her thighs, and her bare shoulders against the solid wall of his chest, and they don't have an excuse anymore, and so he should let her go.

And there's that moment's hesitation, of both of them waiting just a little too long, before he feels Allison start to shift. She starts the careful, gentle slide over to the other side of the taxi, and it feels like climbing a mountain; like she's swimming through molasses to get away, and he regretfully lets his hands slip off her again. Instead, he ducks down to bundle up the excess fabric from the dress, and holds it up for her while she readjusts her position, so she doesn't step on it while crossing over.

Almost immediately, Luther already misses the warmth and weight and closeness (is it already over? when the hell is he going to be able to touch her again?), even as it's something of— a relief, a reprieve. At least this way, he can remember how to breathe again, when he's not being dizzied and knocked over by mint and aloe vera and honey.

He smooths down the fabric of his trousers; still feels like his entire body is pins-and-needles where she'd been sitting on him, not from any actual weight, but just from the mere proximity. Like Allison's a magnet and he's set of metal ball bearings, scattered and loose and being drawn right into her. The cab driver's double-checking the intersection for their next stop with Allison again, and Luther can't actually remember what he was saying a moment ago. Something about bookshops. Right. There was a bookshop he'd meant to go to.

It doesn't matter. Nothing actually matters except that his heart is pounding a little too heavy in his throat and his palms feel sweaty and, jesus christ, a simple ride in the backseat shouldn't ruin him like this. Shouldn't throw the entire world askew, reminding him in one collapsing fell swoop everything he'd loved and missed and wanted about Allison Hargreeves.

[numberthree]

One of the few things she can keep in her head when Luther releases her at the same time as she's trying to make anything like a graceful shift to the other seat in this dress is being torn between wanting to push too fast and hard for as far over into the seat against the door as she can get and not looking like she's actually running from anything. Allison Hargreeve does not run. From anything.

(Except.)

Even if her nervous system, still all green lights and lightning, strung high on the too-tight awareness of the breath that had just been on her neck and shoulder, the hands that lingered before letting her go, legs and chest, pressing her everywhere else, left the strangest hot sear in her skin. Too awake, too aware, too many things she wasn't supposed to be feeling, too much like it was still happening.

Even when she was only saying, "Thanks," and rearranging the excess fabric of this dress into the actual foot space, she had between not having two pairs of legs or Luther's height to take into account for any longer. Everything is still a buzz at too high a key in her skin, in her head, her teeth. Like it won't stop. Like if the passing streetlamps, singing in briefly through the windows in patterned every few seconds, focused on her too long pink-red would show straight through the color of her skin somehow.

Everything still felt warm, which made the whole idea of coffee suddenly seem deeply ludicrous, like the last thing she wanted was to be even further overheated by her own idiocy. She'd rather almost anything else. Something else like. Allison's head titled as the idea struck her. Lips pressing. She knows it's frustration and guilt (and two-three things she doesn't want to name but can't ignore), but it's maybe not a terrible idea either?

She doesn't ask. How often did she ever? Her brow furrowed in thought when it struck, and less than fifteen seconds later, she was leaning forward, slipping toward the front of her seat and leaning into the center console area, addressing the driver. "I've changed my mind. Can you take us to the intersection of--" Allison described the location with a few other notable landmarks but not the chosen change.

He pointed out it was the opposite direction, but Allison could pay for it, and that was all that really mattered.

[obediences]

Luther tilts his head and watches Allison lean forward (caught and entranced by the twist of her bare shoulder, the line of her arm as she leans it against the chair; the sloping curve of her spine and the dip at the small of her back).

"What's up?" he asks. There would ordinarily be a prickle of concern at the back of his neck, maybe, except there's no urgency to the way Allison reroutes them. There's just the matter-of-fact, straightforward way she takes charge and takes them elsewhere. Number One wasn't ever actually Number One in practice; even her abilities aside, she could steer him so effortlessly with a word, with a touch, a mere hint of what she wanted, and he'd move mountains to give it to her.

His foot is jittering against the floor of the taxi, bouncing with nervous energy, which he finally notices and then forces himself to be still again. Hands against his knees, spine straight with rigid posture. She's over on the other side of the seat now, there might as well be a wall between them, but the cab still feels too small and cramped and close. Luther considers opening the window for a gulp of some fresh air; his cheeks still heated slightly in a lingering blush, and so he makes himself look away, back out to the street and the passing lights. That dress is a problem. Everything about her is a problem. (The best kind of problem to have.)

[numberthree]

When Allison looks back from the driver, sliding back on the seat, her answer is, perhaps, a little more artfully vague and imperious than it needs to be; and maybe she tells herself it's because she's tense and irritated. "Consider it a surprise."

It's not irriration. That's not the name for this feeling. The static crackle in her skin that feels like it's not calming, but only humming louder, and slightly stronger in its contrast, without further contact. But she doesn't want to name it. Like somehow, she's just going to willfully ignore that doing that for a decade didn't smother it either.

That there's nothing smothered at all by his two years' absence.
Even 'absence' feels too kind of a word at the edge of this electricity.

It's almost like she doesn't want to be (kind), because everything already always is. The whole world bows toward him as it is. The light passing the windows, while he's looking out it -- seeing, she can't quite even guess, he'd never dreamed of coming here, and she'd had all her dreams already in her eyes when she got here two years ago, but she can't think of that -- as the light, coming and going, continues to paint into far too clear relief the edge of his profile.

Strong jaw, and forehead, and the broad shoulders, nowhere near able to be concealed even in his well-cut professional appearances suit. All catching in the passing streams of white-gold light. The way his head tilts, so goddamn familiarly as his gaze catches on whatever it is in passing, out his window, and his head turns even minutely to let him watch that thing until it's gone, again, too. She hates how much it aches. (She's glad it's not all gone.)

And she hates that some part of her desperately wants him to say something again, anything. That even irritated -- even whatever this is; that it's not; because it never can be -- it's still all the minutes slipping by that she'll never get back. Like she's losing words to silence and the clock. And when had she ever cared if he was the one talking, even if it felt like she couldn't hold her own temper or reactions in?

"So." Allison prompts, ever petulant against desperation when she could act rather than react, than plead. Or whine. Even with herself. "These clandestine meetings of yours. Were they boring? Interesting? Is the world ending, and you're just not going to tell me now, because I'm simply one of the little people now?"

[obediences]

It's not quite irritation, but neither of them have the vocabulary for it either. It's restlessness, a nagging ache of wanting something and not having it. Not getting it. An itch he can't scratch, and with that clock still ticking down over their heads.

When she starts talking again, though, the corner of Luther's mouth twitches into a smile even as he's looking away from her, out the window. She can see that twist of amusement on his face before he even turns to meet her eye again. There's that warm, teasing, fond note in Allison's voice, which he can't ever get enough of. She never, ever sounds like that in the interviews or the press junkets. If only he could just record that sound and have it with him forever.

"If the world is ending, you'd be one of the first people I'd tell," he says, and that statement sits somewhere between a tongue-in-cheek joke and the truth. If the world was ending, he'd need to get the Academy back together.

(And just savour as much time with her as he can have, before it all ends.)

"But they were pretty boring, though. It's mostly just business negotiations and new invention patents. Some space things, though, which is more interesting, but which I can talk about less." He's just looking at her now, his arm propped against the door.

A contemplative look in his eyes, before he winds up admitting: "You could never be one of the little people, though. Even if you took off the uniform."

[numberthree]

"Flatterer."

She says it with all the coolness of what this city has made of her in that way, the way everyone compliments everything. She heard enough of it during her little private tour and any number of her hello's right behind them. Words that mean absolutely everything and absolutely nothing, that are the pride and price of the handshakes of business in this world.

And yet. There's a part of it that lingers. That doesn't let her look away from Luther, and the light-shadow-light shadow plays on the side of his face, and those eyes she's known in even pitch darkness since childhood. That wants it to be true. To believe. Wholeheartedly. Simply because Luther said it.

Because Luther never lies.

(He changes his mind. But he didn't lie. Once upon a time. )

"None of it important enough he thought he should go to himself?"

It's more than a little dismissive. She doesn't try to make it not be. Allison has never much been a fan of the man calling himself their father, and the last thing she'd ever want to even imply for a second is that she'd rather have looked up and found his cold, hard, scrutinizing gaze across the reception fall, but she doesn't like the idea of Luther playing lackey for him still either.

[obediences]

"Not really. He was going to schedule the appointments on the east coast, for when they happened to be passing through town, but if I was going to be out here anyway then it just saved some time."

They rarely have to name the actual specter between them. He and him. They both know exactly which bogeyman they're referring to. Sir Reginald Hargreeves, the Monocle, father, dad, sir. All that complicated Gordian knot that Luther still hasn't been able to hack his way out of.

"How, uh," he starts now, picking his way through the conversation and trying to find some way to redirect Allison's laser attention back onto herself, because he's realising that he squirms under her crosshairs these days, too-aware of the particular ghost haunting them and not wanting him to cast a long shadow over this precious, rare conversation:

"How's the new season going? For your show. It must be good, considering your— good news."

(Luther's not an expert at Hollywood but he is, at least, smart enough to not name outright what she'd whispered to him earlier. The cab driver's still there, could theoretically sell the scoop somewhere.)

[numberthree]

It's all patented excuses for their father. The kind Luthor had been defending for longer than she could even remember where started. She didn't know what it was the tied Luther to him stronger than anything else on this planet, but it was there. It had always been there. Maybe it always would be, since he was still out there doing the job without any of them.

Out here doing the job even their father deemed below him, but not Luther.

It's easier that Luther throws her an absolutely buntable question to follow on it. She could. But she doesn't. Though maybe in only the way he'd get. If he still did. How much could change -- be lost, be replaced, be forgotten -- in somewhere over two years?

"Exhausting--" Allison says, but there's a curl to her mouth was so much less rarely seen when she was younger. When she left someone twice her size on the ground, or frozen them in place and could slide circles around them uncaringly pleased. The smile that was more shark than girl, the one who hungered for a challenge always five times bigger than herself and refused to let anyone tell her no. "--But, yeah, in the good way."

She wouldn't still be standing, upright, out tonight, in this dress, in this cab, if it wasn't true. If it weren't worth it to her, she would have just gone to sleep and made excuses in the morning. She has that to thank for even a few seconds of Luther miraculously, accidentally, stepped into her life and night, too. "The whole next half of the season is full of unexpected twists and some pretty big reveals."

[obediences]

"And which I, obviously, don't have clearance to hear about either." His arm's still propped against the window, knuckles now resting against his chin, hiding a half-smile behind his hand as he looks at her. Security permissions and clearance levels and need-to-know bases. Luther has his trade secrets these days, and so does she. In a way.

"Guess I'll just have to find out the old-fashioned way of watching week-to-week like everybody else, huh?"

As he does. Has done. He really wasn't kidding about being her biggest fan, about catching all the episodes when he could, whenever he didn't happen to be out-of-town on a mission (and even then, Pogo was sometimes able to videotape the evening's episode for him on scratchy grainy VHS). Once Allison's career finally hits the movies, he and Pogo will inevitably be renting those videos, too, making popcorn and watching them in the basement.

The car lurches, bumps slightly against the curb, and cruises to a halt. "We're here," the driver says, craning again to look back at his passengers.

And Luther's still shooting Allison an inquiring, puzzled look, because they haven't stopped in front of a coffee shop (and the storefront she actually wants is still around the corner). Where's 'here'? he mouths.

[numberthree]

It's still strange to hear him say that. She knows he did earlier, but it's still strange to hear. To picture Luther watching her on tv every week, on the television she willed into existence when she was too young to really be letting herself get away with things anymore and already obstinately doing it anyway. It's still incredibly strange to picture him watching her. Like that was just a normal occurrence.

Not that the irony doesn't strike her that she catches him on the news.
She can't see her show mattering to things he and her father consider to most.

But the arrival distracts from the thought, from the response she'd been pulling together in her head, and shifts him to the soundless question she wouldn't even need to read his lips to know. They like to control things, to plan, to have their fingers on all chances and avenues, Reginald Hargreeves children. Which makes it pert that Allison throws him a smile that is all winning delight about denying him any of it, and, instead, turning her attention to the driver and paying.

Ruffling up under all the fabric of the skirt portion of this dress again and finding the garter thigh band with the pocket that has her ID, her credit card, and a little cash only: the last of which she hands off to the driver. Before her hand is already on the door, smirk still on her lips: "You'll just have to come along and see."

For all the vague bravado, it's not all that impressive, and actually, before they turn the corner to where Lick Ice Cream is, she wonders if it's actually beyond the pale of childish. The wrong choice. Utterly. Made in the heat of a frustrated moment. Well and truly passed, with the back seat's safe space turned into a few feet on the sidewalk, back in the still-humid but slowly cooling night air, where they're just too people who used to know each other walking down this street.

"Ta-da," she says as they round the corner, even though she doubts if he'll remember, and there's a little uncertainty in her imperious showy tone. Just at the edges of her mouth and her eyes. Wanting him not to see suddenly stupidly turned juvenile standing there in this beautiful dress, having left the fanciest public party of the night likely and the relative safety of everyday coffee shops, for an ice cream store of all things.

[obediences]

Luther unfolds himself from the taxi (absentmindedly patting his pockets, checking he still has his own wallet too), stretching his legs as he walks down the pavement, and then he's looking at the shop. All brightly-lit neon in the window, diner-style counters and bright fire-engine-red stools. "Oh wow," he says, marveling. Hands shoved in pockets and his shoulders sloped, head tilted backwards as he takes in the store. It's such a normal everyday thing, but instantly he knows what this means. Because as if, Allison. As if he could ever forget.

They both stand out horrifically, now that they're far away from the gala — other people on the street are sneaking glances at the fashionable pair, particularly the gorgeous woman in her overwrought ballgown. (Gorgeous and vaguely familiar too, in that Los Angeles way that all supporting actresses and faces in commercials are.) They look like two people who swanned out of a fairytale and found themselves downtown, Cinderella and her prince, both with a hankering for dessert.

"I can't even remember the last time I—" Luther starts, and then cuts himself off sharply, because of course he can remember. Both of them can. It would've been the last time the Academy was a twosome; the pair of them being rewarded with ice cream at the tail end of a job well-done, both acutely aware that they were probably too old for ice cream anyway, a little embarrassed by it, but enjoying it anyway because it was one of the only treats they were ever allowed. Luther's sweet tooth had been born from it. It was one of his few indulgences.

And it had been a bonding activity. Ever since the Academy had dwindled to just Number One, there just hadn't seemed like much point.

"My diet's been really boring lately. I can't tell you how much I've missed ice cream." He sounds wistful as he looks at the glowing neon, before he tilts his head and shoots her a sidelong look for a moment.

And in that moment, it's entirely possible — and more than likely — that Luther means he's missed more than ice cream.