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[expatriates]

username: LATRODECTUS

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[gutpunching]

[From the society that brought you "Superman" and "Batman." Not much of a creative mecca for monikers.

His hands have shifted to clenched at his sides. Jaw tight, posture squared up like he's braced for a fight, and it eases only by inches at the choke in her voice and the late answer to his question and the fact that he doesn't get any one of the dozen canned do-gooder answers that he half-expects.]

So much for cooperation, I guess.

[He backsteps, spreading his hands at the wreckage of the saloon they're standing under. Conscripted into service on some alien world for the will of some opaque organization they never asked to back. From the moment his head broke above the waters of the Lazarus Pit he's been fighting to make sense of being alive again. And it was awful, a whole lot of hard truths and shattered foundations, but never without direction for long. Goals to work toward, plans to make. Scores to settle. Here, he's been cut off at the pass, a few universes away from Gotham and largely removed from every hard line goal that's kept him grounded since.

Helps to keep busy. Interdimensional timekeeping organizations to nose in on, genocidal goddesses to put a bullet in, arsonists to chase down. But give him some idle hands and hell if he's the guy to talk to about fitting in. Barking up the wrong tree for that one, too.]

Maybe you'll have some better luck fitting in around here. Me? I'm going to go ask our friends some questions before the trail gets colder.

[It's no invitation. He's not going to tell her not to come, either.]

[expatriates]

[ She hesitates. She can't articulate to herself why—in part, she supposes, because it would mean slinking after him to admit that she's looking for it again, even if she's lost it. Following him like a stray.

Or worse, because she simply doesn't know where else to go, and she's accepted that she won't necessarily fit in with the Audentes any better than he has. She's come from too different a place from most of them, Koltira excepted. But she rallies to pursue him within a few seconds, decision firmly made. ]

Wouldn't want you to get yourself killed. A guy like you, out here all by your lonesome?

[ Her tone adopts a saccharine level of concern. Patronizing, in a smug way that mocks a sentiment she's doubtlessly heard in more genuine contexts. Rather than trail him, she starts a few paces ahead, keeping the lead for no reason other than the fact that she can. ]

[gutpunching]

[He watches her pass him a second longer than necessary, then picks a steady pace up behind her rather than trying to overtake her for the lead, back out into the badlands and away from the town proper. Watching her back like he's not sure if he wants to be vindicated or surprised or suspect of the way she follows up her talk of fitting in with choosing to join him in the noble pursuit of tracking down bandits to shake down for information. (Despite being the one to reach out to her about the arson in the first place. She's hard to get a handle on—he knows just enough about her to respect her and just enough to be wary of her. He likes her just as much as he chafes twice-shy and teeth bared against the ways in which she is trying to reach out.)]

Gosh, Nat, I didn't know you cared.

[He knows bullshit when he hears it, but they're too soon off the heels of a touchy topic for him to recover the quick quippy cadence she would earn on a good day. The sarcasm, however, is back. It cuts a little too harsh on the edges even as he rises to the bait and beats the mocking back at her.]