”I’m from there. Raised in Aggieland, that’s why I eliminated Bryan. Old family friends in ‘Uston an’ Austin.” Ranger said. Knowing people could be either an asset or a liability in going to Texas. Not going cost him the chance at it being an asset at the benefit of it not being a liability. Going allowed him the chance to risk it if necessary while not being a liability at first.

Noel was able to get her laptop to work. It seemed hers used facial recognition. She passed over the files and made some suggestions of a sort before asking what people normally use for passwords.

Ranger took the files and thumbed through them, he didn’t expect to see anything he would have used as a password in the files but he had nothing else to go on. ”Most people use words ‘r phrases. A few symbols an’ a capital ‘r three. I normally try f’r somthin’ memorable but long. Normally related t’ what I’m tryin’ t’ password.” Ranger said as he typed in an idea and got rejected.

"My computer doesn't even connect to the internet."

”That’s odd.” Ranger said looking up from his laptop, ”Wireless laptops ain’t new.”

Back to guessing. Ranger tried guessing based on anything he could think of. Specific dates, written out in long form. MarchSecondEighteenThirtySix, AprilTwentyFirstEighteenThirtySix, ThisIsMyLaptop, Password, Password1, RootyTootyFreshNFruity, and so on. He tried family names, statements about his past. He tried mission names. He tried information from the files. Nothing Seemed to work.

After a while Ranger heard Noel shut her laptop, "Michael, I have been searching my memories forwards and backwards and I can say with certainty that I have maybe 5 years of my own memory right now."

Five years of her own memory? By Ranger’s estimation Noel was around the same age as him which left the better part of twenty years unaccounted for. He knew she could erase memories, had she erased her own?

"And part of that memory is working for a different department than we're dealing with now. My job was to help track people, mutants especially. I need you to... check me. I need to know that the subdermal tracking chips that I've used on other people aren't now being used on you and me."

A department that tracked mutants. Ranger wouldn’t put it past the government to do that. There was a Mutant Registration Act afterall once upon a time. Not to mention political pressure was what forced the Army to convince him not to reenlist, because he was a mutant.

But that wasn’t the interesting part. At the mention of subdermal tracking chips Ranger’s eyebrows went up. He hadn’t considered that possibility. ”Right.” Ranger said taking on a professional tone. ”Anywhere in perticular yall’d stick ‘em? I’ll start there.” Ranger moved his laptop out of the way.

It likely took a fair amount of trust for Noel to ask Ranger to check her for a subdermal device. The least he could do is maintain an air of professionalism going into it. Even if he suddenly had Ticks by Brad Paisley stuck in his head. It would be a lie to say he didn’t want to see Noel with her pants off.

He stood in their private little room. There was enough space for them to both occupy it and move around enough to do a skin check, but only just. Suddenly experiencing ten years of inflation kept Ranger from splurging on a space any larger.

"How do y' only have five years? I know y' erase memories, is that not just other peoples?" Ranger asked and wondered why someone would erase their own memories even if they could? He had memories he wish he didn't have but he wouldn't get rid of them, one of the worst was... His mind ran along a memory until it hit a wall. Which was weird. He wrote it off as a brain-fart.

"We put them where we thought they'd be least able to do anything about it when by themselves. Between the shoulder blades in that spot you can't itch is a favorite." Which meant there was no way in hell she'd be able to check by herself. Noel got up to check the door of their teensy sleeping car and pulled the shade.

She trusted him, she had to remind herself. There would be reasons why beyond just being thrown together. And he'd come to trust her to the degree that he let her dip into actual classified materials in his head, if her notes were to be believed.

So she took off her shirt.

"Check the back of the arms and neck if it not near the spine." She pulled her hair out of the way and held her shirt in front of her. She was still wearing a bra. So it wasn't exactly as salacious as it felt.

He commented on her lack of memories. She hadn't had to start off that way, but she was legitimately freaking out about it.

"The cost of taking someone else's memories away is equal time so far as I can tell. Especially if I'm trying to weaponize it. All my younger years are a patchwork of other people otherwise I might not know how to read or write or speak." Or walk or use her hands... it didn't account for everything she'd lost, considering the fact that her powers were not usually permanent.

In places where it would be difficult to do anything about it themselves, like between the shoulder blades. Not where a movie would show someone getting one, but when placing them in someone and hoping to keep them unnoticed that spot seemed perfect. Ranger nodded and Noel got up to check the door and close the shade giving them as much privacy as they could get before she took off her shirt.

"Check the back of the arms and neck if it not near the spine."

”Will do.”

As Noel pulled her hair out of the way, Ranger moved closer so he could better see her skin. He ran one hand slowly along her back, his eyes tracking the skin it distrubed from six inches away. He was looking for something small, something that showed where the skin had been broken. Likely a syringe with a larger gauge than normal. It might still be healing some or might be a scar, Ranger has been unconscious for an unknown time so he could make no assumptions about how long ago or how recently the trackers could have been implanted.

"The cost of taking someone else's memories away is equal time so far as I can tell. Especially if I'm trying to weaponize it. All my younger years are a patchwork of other people otherwise I might not know how to read or write or speak.

Ranger stopped for a moment. That was a terribly heavy cost for a power. He had recently lost ten years and thought that was an extreme circumstance. She was missing around thirty altogether and much of it could have been simply the cost of her power.

Continuing to move his hand Ranger asked, ”How d’ y’ manage? Keep y’rself...You?”

Having found nothing, Ranger used his free hand to slide the bra straps out of the way so he could see if they were hiding anything behind them. Again he found nothing knelt down to follow down the spine. Placing a hand on her hip to keep himself stable he traced around palm sized scar on her lower back.

”I think I found it.” Ranger announced as his fingers brushed along a small pink depression hiding itself along the line of the scar. It had the right shape to be from a needle and there was a bump that he could feel but not see tucked in near it. It was a smart place. Noel wouldn’t be able to remove it herself from there and the existing scar masked it.

He checked thoroughly, running his hands across her skin and breathing in the wake of his own touch. It wasn't that he was trying to make her aware of him. It was just the nature of exposing so much skin and having it scrutinized so closely.

And the goosebumps were from the cold. It was chilly closer to the windows and there wasn't a whole lot space at all in the cabin. That was exactly why she got goosebumps. Definitely the windows.

> ”How d’ y’ manage? Keep y’rself...You?”

That was an incredibly philosophical question. How did anyone manage to stay themselves? If everyone was a sum of their experiences, what did that make Noel?

"Notes? Stubbornness? My computer is full of journal logs. You should probably read them at some point." As embarrassing as that would be, he was mentioned in a lot of them. It would probably help him. They really were partners, though there'd been a distinct lack of talk about SUPER or their supposed mission. Was it just that secret?

Noel braced herself against the bunk as he began to check lower. Why hadn't he found anything yet? She was sure it would have been near the spine. What would it mean if there was nothing?

> ”I think I found it.”

And Noel's mouth had gone dry in the meantime. The more senses that were engaged in a memory, the easier it was to remember. And Noel certainly remembered how she'd gotten that one. She'd hallucinated and suffered flu-like symptoms for more than a week after getting... stung. She couldn't remember if she managed to tag that mutant, but she certainly remembered what they looked like in her hallucinations. Black carapace and a too-wide smile.

"Can you get it out?" She was not looking forward to it, nor was she looking forward to returning the favor for the Ranger. "We really need to stop performing minor surgery on each other."

Notes and stubbornness. That sounded like hell to rely on to try and stay yourself, but doing it also showed a hell of a determination to keep track of oneself.

”Explains why the computer doesn’t connect to the Internet. Best way t’ protect the computer.” Having notes stored on a computer was a good plan, and it explained the lack of wireless. No viruses, no system updates, and if anything secure was recorded on there than there was no way to hack it without local access. ”I can read ‘em once we have time t’ just sit. An’ I’m guessin’ that means I’m mentioned in them?”

Ranger being mentioned in Noel’s journals could support the agency’s claims that they were working together. Might also support their claims that they had been working for the agency at all.

"Can you get it out?"

”Yes… But you ain’t gunna like it.”

"We really need to stop performing minor surgery on each other."

”Twice makes a tradition.” Ranger said standing up, ”It’s like it’s our own special thing.”

Ranger retrieved a first aid kit from his duffel bag. It had some of what he needed; gloves, gauze, medical tape, antibiotic ointment, and hand sanitizer. Following a quick inventory he turned to Noel, ”I need t’ go shoppin’. Be right back.”

With that said, Ranger slid out of their room. He made his way down the train collecting the few items he still needed. Whiskey and vodka from a bar cart, some orange juice, towels, rubbing alcohol, the sharpest knife he could find, and a leather strap he sliced off someones handbag.

He returned to the room with his haul all wrapped up in the towels ten minutes later. He laid out a couple towels on one of the bunks for Noel to lay on. Hopefully it would catch any stray blood.

”This’ll hurt. There’s liquor t’ help. An’ I know y’ don’t do drinkin’ so I grabbed orange juice. Maybe a screwdriver’ll be a bit more palatable.” He gestured to the drinks laying on another towel as he took to disinfecting his hands and the knife blade.

Having a computer that did not connect to the internet did not feel like it was a Noel idea. File tampering was of course a thing, it just happened to be a thing that she never really thought too hard about.

She opened her mouth to protest about not liking it, but missed her moment. Noel figured she would prefer her movements not be tracked more than she wanted bodily comfort. But the Ranger was on a mission and he hadn't said no. In fact, they were apparently making a tradition of it. She shut her mouth and waited while he went "shopping." She also put her shirt back on. No sense in leaving it off when the site was so easily accessed by just moving said shirt up.

Noel wedged herself into the blind corner of the bunk and read more journal entries while he was gone, this time starting at the beginning. It didn't go back as far as she needed to fill all the gaps in her memory, but it seemed to go back to about when the beginning of their Mission timeline started.

As much as she told herself she would keep reading to distract herself, she was too curious to see what the Ranger brought back. He went about setting things up, even going as far as getting some OJ to make the alcohol go down easier.

"I usually don't drink because it's a matter of control. Pain also erodes control. It's not impossible, but there's no point in making conditions perfect for an accident." Shoot. She should have thought of that earlier. He was already disinfecting his hands. Noel abandoned her laptop and inspected the pseudo-medical spread.

"If you want me to check you, we might want do that first." What? It wasn't like she was afraid. It was the practical choice and had nothing to do with nerves.

It wasn’t a taste issue, but control. That was a super good point that Ranger hadn’t considered. And now he was very much considering that it and pain affected her control of a power that erased memories. He slowed down on disinfecting his hands as he followed the rote mental process of a threat assessment.

”Y’r call.” Ranger said mentally working to balance risk with preventing the worst of the pain. His ten year older self had managed to work with Noel without worrying about her power, he decided to hold to that as best he could. ”We could blindfold an’ earplug y’ to hel-... “ Ranger stopped having an idea. ”Ice. Use it t’ numb the site.” He offered it as another option.

Like he said, it was her call though.

"If you want me to check you, we might want do that first.”

Ranger looked at his hands for a moment. He knew he would have to disinfect them again because they should see if he had one before they began. Get all the backroom surgery done at once. ”Yeah. Good idea.”

After putting the disinfecting solution away, Ranger started unbuttoning his shirt. Noel’s was on her back so his was likely somewhere there too. His only good scar to try and use to mask it was on anterior which was less than ideal. When he slid it off and tossed it to the side he couldn’t help but flex a little for Noel. He wasn’t as buff as he was in the pictures in the files but he was still in a good fighting shape.

He turned his back to Noel so she could look it over while he looked at where his arms felt like the agency had stabbed him. ”Have at it.”

Noel snorted softly at the flex and made her way over. She'd been feeling hesitant to touch him knowing on paper what she'd read, but shenanigans put her back at ease and back in the moment. He hadn't read it… yet. For now, this was just Michael Blackforest Ninja Tomahawking Hunter, ballroom dancing badass. Noel was okay with that guy.

"Why ear plugs?" The blindfold she could understand, she would submit to that if she had to, but what did he think she did with her ears, exactly?

She started at his neck, combing carefully through his neck hair line and stopping for moles. Noel knew all the tricks. She didn't touch lightly, she wasn't in it to tickle him and she wanted to be thorough-- stretching skin and walking her fingers over the texture of his skin inch by inch. There wasn't a lot of places to hide on this broad back. 

The lower she got, the dryer her mouth.

"Maybe you don't have one…?" She would honestly rather go under the knife now. Noel felt along his belt line, but it wasn't there, either.

"Off." She tugged at a belt loop. Yeah.  It looked like they were doing this.

"Why ear plugs?"

It was the less obvious of Ranger’s recommendations. It was the precaution that was taken from a NASA level of overengineered caution. ”Imagine I’m cuttin’ through the skin right when someone walks by the door an’ drops a lie on the level of, ‘I’m not cheatin’ on y’ with y’r sister,’ ‘r, ’Enron is goin’ great, keep investin’.’.” Can’t move in reaction to an awful taste from a megalie if you can’t hear the lie.

Noel checked his skin with no less attention to detail than he had checked her. As she moved to his lower back Ranger thought it would be odd for his to be there. Noel’s was easily hidden, his wouldn’t be. She kept looking, kept finding nothing. Eventually there was a tug on Ranger’s belt loop.

“Off."

Ranger undid his belt and dropped trou, revealing his silky ranger panties. At least buy me dinner first. Two quick motions and he had his boots kicked off so he could step out of his pants. ”Already gettin’ me out of my pants.” Ranger joked looking back at Noel over his shoulder.

He knew she could taste lies, so naturally he dropped a few whoppers to illustrate his point.

Rancid meat and bananas cooked in window cleaner, if she had to guess that exact flavor profile. Noel abandoned the search and stumbled over to grab the orange juice before the taste gathering in her mouth forced her to throw up.

"Gross." Gross was an understatement. She wished she could spit out the OJ too as it was a strong flavor, but not quite strong enough to completely win. With no other options it went down the hatch. She shuddered and screwed the lid back on with deliberate slowness. "Odds are low, but I guess I take your point."

And of course the Ranger dropped his pants.

She'd asked him to and, as they were checking skin, she'd expected to get nothing but butt. It was a blessing and a curse that he kept the manties on.

It could be in the legs. Odds were low, but… "We're covering all edge cases today. Apparently."

The OJ went back to hanging out with the minibar offerings, and Noel skipped to the bottom edge of his last bit of clothing. Noel checked one leg, front and back. And the other just the same. The feet were really too bony, but she checked those too, even going as far as to tug his foot up and check the softer pads and calluses.

Nothing.

Fate was cruel. He was either untagged and that felt like it might mean something, or there was a very little bit of skin that she still had to check. Skin they both may have been trying to pretend did not exist.

She didn't ask, she just went for it like ripping off a bandaid. Manties down.

And there it was, plain as day. Plain ass day? A chuckle got out before she had a chance to stop it and it grew out of control unit there was even a snort.

"They got you-" she poked the tiny inflamed spot and tried to get the giggling under control.

Noel searched his now exposed legs and found nothing. She checked his feet, including almost throwing him off balance as she suddenly pulled is foot into the air so she could check the bottom of it. Thankfully the wall was close or else the only thing to grab onto for support would have been Noel’s head.

Clearly there wasn’t a tracker in his foot because next thing Ranger knew it went from zero to breezy as Noel ripped his ranger panties down. Ranger had thought that this might happen. He hadn’t expected Noel to just strip him down herself so suddenly. ”I think this means y’ owe me dinner.” He said as he put his hands on his hips. The point was to inspect his skin so covering up anything was counterproductive.

As it turned out, Noel didn’t need an eyeful of more than his naked posterior.

“They got you-" She said as she poked at his butt, giggling uncontrollably.

Ranger couldn’t help but laugh a little too. ”Of course that’s where it is… Good thing I’m not plannin’ t’ sit down f’r a long period uh time in the near future. Like on some kind uh train.” After a sigh Ranger asked, ”Who’s up first?”

She owed him dinner. That was for sure.

"You first. Deeeefinitely you first." She pat him on the elbow and motioned to the towel he'd set up for her. Why was this so funny? She wasn't entirely sure, but it was. It totally, definitely was. Noel picked up the knife and twisted it until the overhead light glinted. "Let me just get that pain out of your-"

Someone jiggled the door and Noel dashed to catch it before it became too terribly open. She stuffed her face in the open inch to block the view and salvage Ranger's virtue, knife at the ready just out of view. But it was just a wrong room. The guy's arms were full of breakfast burritos and packages and iced coffees and he just hadn't been able to see properly with all that crap. No harm. No foul. Noel locked the door this time and whuffed out a sigh of relief. Not an Enron lie in sight.

"Now... where were we."

Noel spun the knife expertly and turned to see where the Ranger had gone to. Oh wait. Disinfectant.

Noel elected to be the first to play doctor. With emphasis. While laughing. She directed him toward the towel he had laid out earlier.

"Delayin' the inevitable?" Ranger asked as he grabbed the bottle of whiskey and moved to lay on the towel.

The knife was in Noel's hand when someone was at the door. Ranger used the opportunity to upend the bottle and down enough to maybe help with any pain but not so much that it would negatively impact his ability to remove the tracker from Noel as neatly as possible.

It wasn't the smoothest of whiskies and drew a gutteral, "Eyahhh." He returned the stopper and set the bottle aside before laying face down on the towel.

"Now... where were we."

Ranger propped his head up on his hands to look at Noel, "In a hillbilly fantasy. Neked an' playin' with knives while drinkin'."

"Not only am I delaying the inevitable, I'm enjoying it." He was a good little patient and had waited for her. She fumbled the knife when he tossed out the hillbilly bit. She had to set it aside anyway to disinfect so she tried to make that fumble look at least a little intentional. No one got stabbed, anyway, so it was fine.

Noel imitated the Ranger in cleaning her hands.

"I don't remember ever taking one of these out, but it's not deep. It shouldn't take but a second." Which were, of course, famous last words.

Noel started by kneeling next to the buttocks in question. Gloves on, towel at the ready. She gave him a slice and... nada. Maybe she'd been a bit too hesitant. She put a hand on his goosebump-covered skin and tried harder. And even harder.

"Are you... knife-proof?" She was joking because that was ridiculous. Nobody was knife-proof. That didn't even make sense. Maybe it wasn't sharp? Noel started to test it against her glove, but thought better and sliced cleanly through a bit of towel. Uh. "Is there a safety on the knife?" By now the Ranger was positively turning blue. They kept the train a comfortable temperature to someone who was used to paying for their own heat, which was to say that in the north east, in winter, a poor little Texas lad was out of his element.

Ice? Did ice and numbing make sense? It was some kind of defense, right? Noel wracked her brain for a moment as the train bumped along. The vodka bottle that had been securely away from the edge had enough and danced its way off, bouncing off of Noel's shoulder and went right for Ranger's face. She dropped the knife and caught the little glass bottle on the bounce.

After more than a few apologies, she noticed a tiny little cut on Ranger's side where she'd dropped the knife. The heck...?

"Are you... allergic to glass?" Or maybe she had to hit him in the face, and then cut him. She reached for the medical kit and grabbed a bandaid for the tiny little slice she'd managed in totally the wrong place.

"Did you say your chest was sore earlier? Like, maybe you got hit?" She had seen the tiny little needle puncture left in his arm by the anesthetic. Maybe there was some truth to the punch first, puncture after theory.

"I... I think I need to hit you."

Ranger rolled his eyes. Was it Ranger laying around naked she enjoyed about the delay, Ranger freezing his bare ass off, some other aspect of the situation, or a mix of all of the above? Either way, he was freezing.Not that he’d admit to it though.

"I don't remember ever taking one of these out, but it's not deep. It shouldn't take but a second." Noel said as she sterilized her hands.

”Do y’ have any experience diggin’ things out of people?”[/i] Ranger asked. Sure, she might not have dug out a tracker but sometimes bullets or shrapnel find their way into your comrades and you have to get it out.

Everything sterilized, Noel knelt down beside him. Ranger grabbed the leather strap and put it in his mouth. He expected a making a slow and controlled slice into his rear would be painful. He gave Noel a thumbs up and braced himself.

Ranger felt the cold steel slide across his skin. Noel was clearly pushing, Ranger could feel the pressure. Did she have the blade upside down? Noel did it again, and again. Each time she pressed harder. She was more likely to bruise his butt with the knife than slice it at that rate.

"Are you... knife-proof?" Noel asked.

”Y’ saw me do surgery from a sword injury.” Ranger said.

"Is there a safety on the knife?"

”I’m not even sure how that’d work. An’ I checked, it was sharp when I grabbed it.”

It was at that point that the train lurched and the vodka bottle went flying. It struck Noel before flying at Ranger’s face. It bounced off Ranger’s face, Noel caught it on the bounce, and the knife she dropped drew a short line down his side. It wasn’t bad, just enough to draw blood.

The bottle hurt. It hit with enough force that he was sure it would have damaged his skull where it hit near the eye socket. He had heard of people having pieces break off there with less trauma. He touched the spot and the bone wasn’t even sore.

"Are you... allergic to glass?" Noel asked.

”Can someone be allergic t’ glass? ” Ranger answered, breathing heavier. He was suddenly feeling as if he had just finished a light workout.

"Did you say your chest was sore earlier? Like, maybe you got hit?"

”Yess…” Ranger drug out the word as he side eyed Noel. He had a feeling she was going to start hitting him.

"I... I think I need to hit you."

”Just… Not my head.”

Ten years into the future, or ten years lost. He was only sometimes cut by knives. Nothing made sense. Why did he feel like that if he wrote a book about his time in New York he would title it, “Nothing Made Sense.”