Michael said that she sounded like the voice of experience, and Lee nodded though she had a slight frown on her face. It was the voice of experience, she knew, but the experience of a child and a life that had never actually existed, of which she had no actual memories of.But as she had said the words, Lee had been just as certain about everything she said as she was regarding Kevin.

Then Michael was going on about how her place, an apartment above her business, had a lot of cameras, and was explaining in very vague detail, what constituted a typical week’s work for her. And asking if the kids still said ‘cheugy’. Though, there was a lot more to be mentally unpacked in what Michael had said.

”Considering by the time that I figure out what most of the slang means, it’s not used anymore according to Kevin, they probably don’t,” Lee replied.

But really, the fact that Michael was talking about those ‘activities’ so openly, Lee assumed that it had to be at least somewhat legal. Unlike any of Lee’s previous forays into similar things. Like Florida, or Romania. Hell, just about anything with the Kabal. ”Sounds pretty intense. I guess I should be glad our sparring match was just hand to hand?”

Michael went on to talk about an average day’s work and Tarin just stared back and forth between her and Lee. He had thought that the things that Lee had been involved in had been wild, that she’d experienced things in those few years of her life that most people never went through…but here was someone else saying that bullets and jumping out of planes were just business as usual.

What was it with this side of the rift? Did everyone live wild and dangerous lives or was Lee just a magnet for that kind of excitement.

Speaking of Lee, she commented that it was a good thing that they’d just fought hand to hand and Tarin shot her a bit of a look while thinking that she’d better not be getting any ideas for next time.

”What do you do?” Tarin asked

Cheugy was probably out. Made sense. Ranger wasn’t the most hip to new slang, but she did hear it from time to time. Not enough to notice when something was out. Quite the epic fail on her part. No longer would she be fly.

”Thankfully I have a youngin that works f’r me I can ask what things mean. When I think t’ ask her about the new lingo.” Everlyn wasn’t the most plugged into what the youths were up to, but she was unparalleled at sussing things out and nerve forgot anything.

Ranger smiled and nodded her head a little, had their sparring match been more than just hand-to-hand it would have been interesting. ”Probably. I’m sometimes able t’ shrug off handgun rounds. Bit unfair of a fight.” Ranger kept the smile on as she spoke. She was a one woman army but kept up a lax almost doe-de-doe appearance. It was a presentation that honestly served her better in her male form. It seemed to attract an annoying amount of attention in her female form.

Train asked what Ranger did.

”I own a PMC, private military company. We handle everything from security t’ national security. I’m not the best at runnin’ it though so I’ve found help. Now I can still get my hands dirty. Put that trainin’ Uncle Sam paid for t’ work.” Ranger said, leaving out her employment with SUPER. Not attempting to hide it, but it wasn’t relevant and sometimes saying it can spook people. Especially mutants who knew SUPER before it was cleaned up. "Maybe y've heard of us, Blackforest Tactical. We run the security for Haven. Their our biggest but not our only client."

Lee’s eyes just widened slightly when Michael said that she could, that sometimes she was able to shrug off handgun rounds.

That…That was definitely intense and far beyond what Lee would have thought possible.

That thought combined with Lee’s recent thoughts of the past caused her hand to unconsciously lift and grasp at her shirt over her heart. Despite not even knowing the number of times she had had a gun pointed at her, and despite the number of life and death situations Lee had been in, she had only been shot once.

”Definitely not a fair fight,” Lee said, her voice very quiet as her hand tightened on her shirt.

But then Tarin asked what Michael did as a business, which only made sense considering what Michael had already said with how shocked Tarin had been about everything Lee had told him about her past. And her past sounded like nothing compared to Michael’s.

But as the other woman explained, Lee’s head started tilting slightly, a crease forming between her brows. A Texan in New York City who ran the security for Haven. Haven’s head of security when she’d been with them was named Michael, wasn’t it? And a Texan? Though, now that Lee was thinking about Haven, Michael looked remarkably like a woman she’d met at that party Devon had thrown. And though she hadn’t met the man, hadn’t there been plans involving an ex-military Texan for certain missions in Romania? The kind of missions that sounded like they would have been right up the ‘private military’ alley, had Slate had anything along those lines actually official. But no, for deniability, Slate and them had pieced things together in smaller, completely separate groupings, and only Slate’s inner circle had even had an idea of how far ranging the plans had been.

”Michael Hunter?” Lee asked. Her head still tilted in confusion. Lee was sure she had put the pieces together properly, but this was not the face that she had known to go with that name.

Though, she had been in stranger situations.

Ranger took a hint that he had either stuck a nerve, or at least had once again offended a New Yorkers sensibilities. Lee was grasping her shirt and her voice had dropped.

Which was why she dove in with as much explanation as she had when answering Tarin. Talk of guns and being bullet resistant was more palatable when you are trained and it is directed in a productive and professional way.

What was intriguing was that Lee produced Ranger’s last name from somewhere.

”In a flesh.” Ranger said, nodding to Lee. Ranger could see she was visibly confused. ”I’ve moved in a fair number of interestin’ circles. I guess y’ heard of me somewhere? Haven?” Ranger took a guess. She remembered reading the name Lee in a file from his time at Haven before she was de-aged.

Michael, as it turned out, was able to shrug off handgun rounds sometimes. Well, Tarin supposed, sometimes was better definitely better than never when it came to struggling off bullets when you were shot…

Tarin still didn’t have a whole lot to contribute to the conversation, so he was mostly watching Lee as she spoke with Michael. He didn’t miss the way her hand crept up to her chest when they were talking about the bullets, or how her voice changed.

They weren’t standing far apart as it was, but Tarin moved just a little bit closer so that they were almost touching shoulder to shoulder.

Shrugging off bullets was nothing compared to the rest of the work Michael did, apparently. She was head of security for Haven, and while Tarin had heard of the organization, he honestly didn’t know very much about it. The whole government security and government training thing didn’t necessarily sit well with Tarin, but this absolutely wasn’t the place to talk about it.

Lee apparently knew far more about the whole Haven thing than Tarin did and he looked over at Lee as she started putting pieces together and then asked if the Michael they were talking to was Michael Hunter.

”So you two knew each other before the gym?” Tarin asked, a bit confused because Lee hadn’t mentioned knowing the person she’d sparred with.

No one said anything about her reaction to Michael apparently being able to shrug off bullets on occasion, and Michael did thankfully continue on a different subject quite quickly. But Lee did feel that Tarin had moved closer to her, almost but not quite touching, and Lee leaned against his arm slightly for a few moments as she pulled herself back together. She had needed to do a fair bit of that this conversation.

”Well, I’ve heard of you a couple places,” Lee replied. She was still confused, but hearing the confirmation that she’d put the information puzzle together correctly helped. She’d somehow ended up in Rupert’s body, and while whatever had happened with Michael had obviously lasted a lot longer, there was no way that she could say the situation was impossible.

”Haven was the most recent. It seems we’ve both moved in similar, interesting circles, though we never actually met back then.”

”So you two knew each other before the gym?”

And while they hadn’t met, Lee had seen him before, back with Haven. ”Knew of each other, apparently,” Lee said, turning to look at Tarin. ”But I didn’t realize it because he didn’t look like this at the time.

“I do have to say,” she continued, turning to look back at Michael. ”I am glad I wasn’t the one who had to figure out how to get you in and out of Romania.”

Interestingly, Lee knew of Ranger from a couple places. Haven was for sure. That left the question of where else? The Kabal was a possibility. Ranger had only interacted with Slate, but knew there were other movers and shakers.Possibly SUPER, but that didn’t make much sense. Ranger had a much better idea of what was going on and who was involved with that organization.

Meanwhile, Tarin was working to keep up with the conversation. Asking for clarity about when Lee and Ranger may have met.

When Lee mentioned Ranger didn’t look like she looked, Ranger smiled and nodded once. Ranger not looking in any way how Lee remembered would make sense. It was still newish to Ranger herself.

The comment Lee made when she turned back to Ranger was quite the bombshell of a connection.

”Insertion an’ egress from a non-permissive environment was my bread an’ butter in the service.” Ranger said, confirming to Lee that Ranger was the Michael Hunter she thought she was. ”I was paid t’ give deniability. What’s interestin’ is that y’ knew I was there at all.”

Then Ranger turned to Tarin, ”An’ so we’re all on the same page, we’ve met before, Tarin. Sort of.” Ranger waggled a hand, ”Central park, psychic drag Bananarama tribute band, crazy guy with glowing orbs placing bets… I was the jogger that stepped in at the start.”

Tarin continued to watch back and forth as Lee and Michael talked about how they knew one another and the multiple ways that they’d encountered each other over the years without actually meeting.

Michael had been in Romania, where Lee had been shot and she was happy that she hadn’t been responsible for Michael’s extraction there? Michael was shocked that Lee knew he had been there?

Lee had shared a lot about what she’d done when she’d worked with the group in both Colombia
and Romania, but maybe she’s held a bit back? Michael had been there to provide deniability?

Then Michael was talking to Tarin again, apparently Michael had been the jogger that had gotten involved in that fight…God, that seemed an eternity ago.

”I lost my favorite coat that day.” Tarin said, thinking back and shaking his head.

”There was this guy that started an all out brawl in the park. Had all sorts of people…including me, acting totally wild. Then there were guns…it was a whole thing. I managed to get out of his range and kind of just left…” he said by way of explanation to Lee.

”It was before we met up…drew a lot of attention.”

Lee nodded. Michael Hunter, as with a number of other people, had been paid by Slate and otherwise had no contact with the rest of the Kabal or the Labs unless absolutely necessary in order to provide plausible deniability in case they had been caught. And not all of those people had had Michael’s skill set. There had been many different things that had needed to be done in Romania that Slate, herself, the inner circle, or the Kabal in general couldn’t be linked to. But the ends justified the means and those things had needed to be done.

Understandably, Michael was surprised that she had known he was there in the first place. ”I knew most of the people who went,” she said, a detail she hadn’t even expanded on for Tarin when they’d talked about Romania. ”At least as a name on a list.”


And apparently Michael and Tarin had met before that day. Kind of. At a brawl in the park with psychics and glowing orbs and guns? Lee just looked at Tarin with wide eyes for a moment. ”Listen to those words the two of you just said to explain that again,” Lee said to Tarin. ”Then try telling me that of the two of us, I’m the only one who’s had ridiculously unbelievable things happen to them.”

Lee shook her head. There really was no limit on the out of control events in this city, was there? ”And trying to avoid things like that and repeats of ‘adventures’ with Slate is why I left Haven when Kevin’s father disappeared six years ago.”

Ranger nodded. A name on a list. That left Ranger to recategorize Lee in her mind. Lee wasn’t just a person who was at Haven and she wasn’t just someone associated with the Kabal. Strong chance she was Inner Circle.

”If y’ knew about me y’ must’ve had some stroke.” Ranger cut herself off from asking anymore about it. Sure Kabal wasn’t around anymore, but loose lips sink ships… or in this case get people tried at Nuremberg for utilizing the Geneva Suggestions.

Tarin clearly was reminiscing about that wonderful day at the park. He lost his favorite coat. The man then explained to Lee a brief version of events. Lee pointed out that the words used to describe the event were crazy.

”If we’re havin’ a weird off, I might be a good contender.” Ranger joked, ”After the Kabal, I tried t’ keep away from crazy. It kept followin’ me. Haven brought me in t’ fill a need. Still piecin’’ a lot of the time there t’gether, but there was a lot there but my time since has been wilder than I could’ve imagined.” Ranger shook her head, she could elaborate but moved on to what Lee had said that caught her attention. ”Six years ago… When the rip closed?”

There were apparently a lot of details that had to do with her world-hopping that Lee had neglected to mention.

It wasn’t that Tarin was upset about it, it wasn’t like he had a right to any details about things that she had done in the past. It was just…surprising to find out that there was a lot more to the story…while on a run…in Central Park.

Lee had a predictable reaction to brawl that Tarin had found himself a part of shortly before….everything had happened and they had reconnected.

”It was super weird…and I left. Without my coat.” Tarin pointed out again, ”I can give you all the gory details later if you want, it’s not all that exciting.” he said.

As for weird, Michael seemed to think that he had the market cornered. Tarin wasn’t sure, but he figured that Lee could probably give him a run for his money.

Michael brought up the rift closing and Tarin nodded his head even though that part of the conversation wasn’t directed at him.

Six years. A different world.

Lee shook her head when Tarin commented that he could give her more details later. ”No thanks,” she told Tarin as she looked up at him, still shaking her head. ”I definitely do not need gory details about another brawl.”

Michael made a comment about being a contender in a ‘weird off’, and considering the fact that she was now in a completely different body than when Lee had known about them in the past, it was completely possible. Lee really didn’t want to get into all of that in the middle of the park, though, as a lot of the ‘weird’ was as painful or more so than waking up again in her body in Romania had been.

”Yeah, he didn’t show up to get Kevin a couple days after it closed, so I can only hope that he went over for some reason and got stuck,” Lee replied. The only other options that Lee had been able to come up with were much less pleasant, though just as likely since Rupert had disappeared around the same time.

”Everything with Blaine and him disappearing shortly before didn’t help, but I had to make sure that I was and would be there for Kevin after his father disappeared.”

Tarin mentioned his coat again. Clearly it mattered.

”I can buy y’ a new one. I feel like I escalated that crazy.” Ranger offered.

Ranger nodded to Tarin. Of the possible reasons to not show up to pick up Kevin, getting stuck on the other side of the rip wasn’t the worst. Hermione was wrong, death was worse than expelled (from reality).

”Makes sense. If I lost Noel, I’d probably rework my life t’ make sure I was there f’r Emma. Hell, I kind of do already. Noel is off workin’ more than I am now. Curse ‘f bein’ the boss I guess… The work I do helps make everythin’ safer f’r Emma so it’s still worth the time away I still take.”

‘Every bullet firedd at me is one Emma never has to worry about.’ Ranger thought to herself.

Lee didn’t want the details about the brawl? Tarin found that interesting considering the fact that she seemed to want to know everything else.

Lee didn’t argue about the weird off and Tarin leaned against her slightly again. Most of the weird Lee had experienced had come at massive physical and mental cost to her. It was honestly impressive that Michael was able to talk about things so nonchalantly.

As for the coat, Tarin waved off Michael’s offer. ”I don’t think anyone had a choice in whether or not they escalated that crazy.” he said, shaking his head at how the whole thing had gone down. ”By the time I figured out what was happening there were spirits everywhere and I was three feet away from the guy. That crazy kid wasn’t helping matters either…”

Man that had been a wild outing.

They were talking about the rift again and Tarin had to take a moment to appreciate how absolutely horrific it would have been to have gone over to the other side to visit, only to have the rift close. Tarin had planned his move here, though now that he thought about it, he wasn’t sure what he’d have done if the other Tarin had still been here. It would have been weird, with the two of them trying to fill the same spiritual niche in the city. Tarin glanced at Lee, who knew what would have happened there either.

The conversation moved on. Tarin knew this part from Lee, but hearing it echoed from Michael made him think about how wildly being connected to other people could change your perspective and your priorities.

Michael pointed out that she was making the world safer for her kid and Tarin nodded, ”And things are getting better.” he said.

”I’m from the other side.”