Reno was sitting somewhat dejectedly in his office when Melly found him.

 

"Hullo," she said as she came in.

 

Reno looked up.  "Any word on Tommy? I got chucked out of the Infirmary. You know Tabitha. 'Out! If you aren't here to help, get out from under our feet' or something like that anyway."

 

"He's stable. Generally Tabitha is like that when things are going well, so I'm hopeful he'll be fine," Melly replied, trying to reassure Reno.

 

"I'm not cut out for all this violence," Reno confided. "I hated the war when I was alive the first time, and I hate it now."  He sighed.

 

"Uhm, alive the first time?" she prompted softly, sitting next to him.

 

"Well, you know. When I was awakened. I should have died. I sort of think of it as having died. Don't you?'

 

"No, I never thought of it like that way, but I see your point."  She discovered that somehow she'd ended up with his hand in hers.  "Reno, honey..." her voice trailed off.  "I'm glad you hate violence, it's part of why I like you."

 

"You.. you don't think I'm... unmanly?  School was wretched. Boys are brutes, especially when they are in an all boys school and fighting for position."

 

"No, why would I?" She was genuinely puzzled. "Or is it a guy thing women don't get?"

 

He sighed, "Yes I suppose it is a guy thing. It was drilled into us, about fighting for our country, sacrifice and nobility, that sort of thing. Rush the hill despite the flying bullets and the bodies in bits near you. Gods, I'm sorry. I guess seeing Tommy rather brought it all back.  I shouldn't be saying this stuff to you."

 

"I'm glad you are.  It means I can say stuff to you."

 

He turned to look at her fully. "What kinda stuff?'

 

"Whatever kind of stuff...stuff I want to say that I don't want to say to just anyone.  Stuff that matters."

 

He frowned. "Is this girl stuff I don't understand?  Why wouldn't you want to talk about stuff that matters?  I like it when you do. I mean, you don't just talk to talk. And I like it when you get all excited. That little crease between your eyes. I like it."

 

"Reno, I'm an idiot.  There's no question about it at all.  Melly laughed, shaking her head at herself.  "It must be girl stuff...but we girls, well...or at least this girl...is pretty choosy about her confidantes."

 

"Well, yeah, me too. I mean, I'm not gonna say this stuff to guys. Well, most guys. Most girls either. Women. I mean women."

 

"It's okay," she teased gently, "I won't tell you called us girls.  "Specially since I did, too.  Tell me something, would you?"

 

"Sure. What?"

 

"What do I do to stop making you nervous?"

 

"Uhm, it's that obvious."  At her nod he added, "I ... I haven't really... I don't want to screw this up, Melly. I like you.  A lot. And I'm sortta ... I keep thinking I'm gonna say the wrong thing."

 

"Hmmm.  Well, I like you too...a lot.  It's just...I'm not very good at this, I haven't any practice and I thought maybe I was being too...forward, I guess.  I think maybe we're both trying too hard to not screw it up and forgetting to just enjoy each other."

 

He blinked as he looked at her. "You're nervous too?  Wow. I kept thinking how confident and together you were and never thought you might be worrying too. Look. I want you just to be you. Okay?"

 

'Yeah, but you too, okay?"

 

"Okay, we both make a pact to just stop being defensive and act like us. Wanna spit on it this time?"

 

"Well, maybe not spit...or rather I can think of better ways to trade spit...as it were..." she blushed a little as she trailed off.

 

"Yeah. Me too." He walked around the desk and taking her hand pulled her to her feet. "Okay, we kiss on it."

 

It wasn't the most romantic kiss in the world, but it was a start.  "So hey, wanna go to my place for dinner?  Just dinner, nothing else planned, I promise."

 

"I was hoping you hadn't forgotten.  You wanna stop upstairs for an update first?"

 

"Oh yeah, definitely."  They headed up the stairs and things looked a little less chaotic up there now. "I'm not going in, Tabitha hates me. You go find out."

 

She laughed and went in, looking around for Tabitha.  She found her coming out of what she guessed was Tommy's room and moved to intercept her.  "How is he?"

 

"Oh, it's you is it?  I suppose you're asking for the other minions.  Tell them to stop worrying, he'll live.  It'll be hours before Doni's through but she past the worst of it now."  Tabitha was brusque as she paused to answer her.  Then she smiled.  "He'll be fine, child.  Tell them he'll be fine, probably better than new."

 

"Thanks Tabitha.  Is there anything you need?"

 

"If you keep 'em out of here until  morning that'll be plenty," she replied moving on.

 

Melly gave Reno Tabitha's exact words, and even managed to reproduce the intonation pretty well too.

 

"Oh good. Lemme contact Jordon."  Reno checked out for a few seconds while he relayed the news to Jordon who was busy with Cassidy trying to get things organized.  When he checked back in Reno explained,  "I feel kinda guilty.  Feel like I ought to be busy too, but Marc... Well, he told me to just get lost for the night."

 

'So, let's get lost for the night.  Stephen'll come up for air tomorrow and I'll probably be really busy so...let's just enjoy the evening."

 

Reno grinned. "Yeah."  They both zapped out to his place.  They landed by his front door. "I'm not ... It's not finished yet, okay? I'm doing it myself instead of asking Jordon to do it. It's been a long time, okay, never, since I had a place that was mine. I usually just, you know, stayed somewhere."

 

He opened the door and led her in. There wasn't much furniture. A comfortable overstuffed couch,  wall units that were still mostly bare. Boxes of things still on the floor in front of them. A stack of pictures leaned against one wall. The kitchen though was arranged and there was a small dining room table. There was a small room off the living room that was dominated by a baby grand piano.

 

"Want something to drink?  Wine? Beer?  Something stronger?  I thought I'd make Kotopoulo Lemonato.  Greek. It's sort of lemon chicken on noodly things. it's pretty simple and doesn't take forever."

 

"It sounds fabulous!  And I think a glass of wine."  She looked around.  "What may I do to help?"

 

"Well, you can slice the carrots and onion while I get the chicken and lemon ready, how's that?  And, I'll pour us some wine."

 

"Just point me to the cutting board and I'm your girl."    He did.

 

They chatted about nothing of consequence as they got the simple ingredients together, and when it was simmering in the pot they took their wine and went out on the patio deck that was all Reno's.

 

"Beautiful night. Especially with Tommy going to be all right and no one else too badly hurt. It could have really been awful."

 

"Yeah, I know."  She sipped her wine and watched the night for a moment.  "All I can think about is what's happening, what's been happening and it's the last thing I want to talk about right now.  So tell me instead about the piano."

 

"The piano... Marc gave it to me when he found out I play. I went to Julliard for two wonderful years. And then the war intervened. World War 1.  My folks were in England, diplomatic corps. I felt like I wanted to do something, even though the US wasn't in on things yet so I went to England and signed up. Anyway, well, what with being awakened and all, I just well, I didn't play for a long long time. Then I finally had to. You know, maybe it's like you with puzzles. Music is like a puzzle for me. How to put notes together and make them touch someone. I don't mean write music, although I've tried some of that, but just playing. I can get lost in the music. Best drug I ever tried."

 

"Exactly, puzzles are exactly like that," she exclaimed. "Most people don't get it.  Solving them, it's like learning another language, the one of the person who made them, a way to get to know them and how they think.  And with music, classical music, what I love about it is that it's almost like that but with feelings."  She hesitated and then, "I'd guess people are always asking you to play, and I'd love to hear you sometime, when you want to play...not just because I've asked."

 

"Sure. Not tonight. I'm kinda ... I'm not in that place right now. Maybe next time, if I don't poison you tonight." But he was smiling.

 

"Good, it'll be better if it's when you want to."  She smiled up at him, her face alight.

 

"Come on, dinner ought to be about ready. You can set the table while I get it ready to serve."  Within a few minutes they were sitting on the patio in the moonlight, a couple of candles lit, with glasses of wine and dinner.

 

Reno hesitated a moment, then held up his glass. "A toast. To friendships."

 

"To friendships and the joys of good food and not being nervous" she said, clinking his glass.  After a minute she grinned at him, "If this is poison, this is how I want to die."

 

Reno grinned. "Glad you like it. Now tell me something about you.  It's all been about me."

 

"Oh gosh.  Lemme think.  Well, I'm a girl, I read way too much, I grew up in Chicago, my favorite color's green and I got this way 'cause I tripped over a trowel."

 

"Uhm? Tell me more! There's gotta be a story there."

 

"Well it wasn't the trowel, itself, you understand.  It was what it started that did it." She took a bite and chewed for a minute.  "I'd just finished my defense and was accepted for some post doc work...so in between I flew home for a couple of weeks and my dad was working in the garden and I tripped and broke my arm."

 

"Okay, and then?" Reno encouraged.

 

Well, it meant that I couldn't leave when I planned which also meant that I lost the post doc slot and ended up with another one through Hebrew University with the team that was just starting work on the Hazor site...pre-Cananite and older...anyway so I was in Israel when the Six-Day War broke out and the rest is history, as they say.  I got pulled out from under what remained of a building and never finished my post doc work.  Instead, I got a lot more interested in symbology and cross-cultural mythology."

 

"Do you miss it? I mean the life you had to leave behind? I get kinda bitter sometimes, having never had a chance to... But then I'd probably have died for good in France if I didn't have the gene or whatever it is that Awakens us, so it's kind of irrational. Still... "

 

She considered it for a moment and nodded, sipping her wine.  "I'm one of the lucky ones in some ways, I guess.  Most of the other parts of the life I had, I just continued...the academic work.  But I miss the people I had to leave, my family and my friends.  I get lonely for them and I get angry that I don't know them and they don't know me anymore...and even more for what they must have gone through when I disappeared and then they were told I was dead."

 

"Yeah, its tough when its still recent. I was kind of lucky about the family. My folks were diplomats so I got put in boarding schools. I only saw them periodically. Only child, no close family otherwise so.. I didn't even have many friends. I was pretty much a loner. Oh, I had some buddies but no one who'd miss me too bad. Even so for the first while, when my parents were still alive like you I'd miss them. I guess everyone does."

 

"You know," he added, after they were both quiet for awhile, "its great that you are able to do what you love still. And I'm pretty grateful to Marc for getting me out of the rut I was in. I like working for him, well, except when he's yelling at me about selling myself short sometimes.  He forgets he's kinda intimidating."

 

"I imagine," she observed dryly, "working for Marc is pretty invigorating regardless.  Why does he think you sell yourself short?"

 

"You know how Stephen tells Tommy what he wants?  I wish. Marc kinda gives me a broad brush outline and I have to figure out what to do with it. He says I'm good at it but half the time I'm terrified I've guessed wrong. When I tell him that he says just use my intuition that its good and it works. Intuition.... Hell it's pure terror half the time.  Although I do have to admit he's never acted like some of the Council members used to if I did something that didn't work out so well. He just backs up and we try something else.

 

"Stephen seems pretty easy going. I mean he's got as many irons in the proverbial fire as Marc does, and is probably as secretive, but he's clear on what he wants and expects."

 

"You think?  With this stuff, yeah, he's clear, but on the ongoing stuff or the times when he just gets some sort of flash about something...it's more like "Yo Melly...go poke around and tell me what you find."  She laughed.  "Plus he forgets that somebody might have other things going on...when I first started working for him, on Home, he was just like...oh I know you can do it.  Gotta run, talk to you later."

 

"I guess that's what happens when you work for men like that," she observed. "The better they are themselves the better they expect others to be."

 

"Yeah, you're right. So... You run a spy agency in your spare time too, eh? Did you step on my foot on purpose?"

 

She almost choked on her wine.  "No," she said, when she could talk again.  "I knew kind of who you were but no, I didn't...on the other hand, I'm glad now I did otherwise...well I suppose we'd have gotten to know each other, but still..."

 

"It would have been okay if you had," he explained quietly. "I just ... wondered. I've done a lot of stuff that really creeps me out now, knowing that Margaret and Maya were... uhm... But honest, I never knew about Doni or the attacks on the Ops Teams. Well, I knew about them, I mean, but I wasn't, thank God, involved.  But it wouldn't have surprised me if other folks thought I might be. I'm not proud of what I did. Hated it at the time. I know, easy to say after the fact, but, well, I worked for the Council so didn't have a lot of choice on things..."  his voice died away and he wasn't looking at her.

 

She reached across the table and touched his hand.  "Reno, honey...It's okay."

 

He finally looked up and met her eyes. "You don't like, wonder? I mean, if I... I'll show you if you want. I mean show you I didn't know."

 

"I don't wonder, there's nothing to wonder about., she said, holding his eyes with hers.  "I just know you didn't because you couldn't."  Her voice made it clear she hadn't the slightest doubt of it.

 

He managed a smile. "Thanks, Melly. Uhm... really."

 

She squeezed his hand and gave him a minute.  When he didn't say anything she changed the subject.  "I heard that Cal's determined to get Marc to talk to him about all that stuff in Ocala.  It's like Cal's found a new god and is ready worship him just so he can check it out."

 

Reno, thankful for the change of topic, managed a grin. "You've gotta see that place. It's ... I've only been there once and didn't have much of a chance to look around, but most of that stuff isn't like anything we're used to. He won't say much about where he got it, but ... it isn't like alien technology. Which makes it even more interesting. I can understand why Cal is chomping at the bit. Which makes me really wonder why he said anything about it. Maybe he wanted Stephen to know he's fully invested in all of this. But then with them trying to say Marc was behind some of this stuff.  I don't believe it Melly. I just don't."

 

"I think," she said slowly, feeling her way through it, "that there is some part of this we're missing, something we should see and don't.  But I also think that to conclude on what we do know that Marc's involved is illogical.  The pattern's too contradictory and random."

 

"What do you mean, the pattern's too random?" he asked, interested.

 

"Well, look at it this way...if Marc's involved then he's involved in trying to kill Stephen.  So ask yourself...why would Marc pick Malta or even the front lawn of the house?  And, why would Marc try to kidnap or kill Dinah?  Why would he risk his life to get Doni back?  Why did Marc put himself in Stephen's hands after Malta by coming here and staying?  However you answer those questions, there's no way to fit all of the answers into the same solution, they don't fit.

 

Second, if Marc's trying to kill Stephen to take over the Listeners, why do it this way?  If things had gone like they were it's my guess Stephen wouldn't have survived much longer, effectively anyway, without Doni...certainly he wouldn't have maintained a hold on the politics.  And finally, what ever scenario you devise that answers all those questions also has to answer why attack the teams...what possible gain is there in that if you're Marc?"

 

Reno poured them wine and gave it all some thought. "But that guy was totally convinced it was Marc, so someone is hiding his or her identity and pretending to use Marc's. Which, I guess, would give him maybe more authority to do this stuff, if he has them convinced these actions are being ordered by the head of the Council?  But then, that means someone besides Margaret and Maya. I thought, you know, the attack when we got back might have been planned before we got Margaret and Maya, but if there is someone else..."

 

"The question I keep asking is what is it about Doni being back that necessitates a response like the attack on the teams, if that's what's driving it?  The other question I keep asking is if that's not why, then what other part of the picture changed sufficiently to evoke such a response?"  She sipped her wine and considered the puzzle.  "I think what we have is like two mixed up jig saw puzzles and the only to figure them out is going to be to sort the pieces out first.  I think there's another agenda and I am wondering if Margaret and Maya were the end of their part of it."

 

"Well, Doni returning has fully engaged Stephen now. I know Marc, when he began to get involved, recognized how weak Stephen had become. I mean, he was deep in mourning and not paying near enough attention to the politics.  That's why Marc began to work toward gaining control of the Council. He recognized how important the Listeners are, so surely others did too. And getting control of them would be a major strategy for any side. I don't think Marc thought of Stephen as an ally until that Council meeting. When Stephen kind of spoke up for the first time in a long time.

 

"So, it wouldn't surprise me if there were a couple of agendas, since Marc had his own for so  long. But who else might be involved, I dunno. It was all Bella, Margaret and Maya for so long..."

"I dunno either, Reno, but I'm thinking Charlie Palmer deserves a medal for coming along at just the right time."  She raised her glass, "To Charlie Palmer, the man who lit the match that started the fire."

 

Reno grinned. "To Charlie Palmer."  They finished the wine and then Reno said, "Hey it's kinda late. Shall I take you home?"

 

"Gosh, I didn't realize...I don't want to keep you up.  You want me to help you clean up first?"

 

"Nah, I can handle it."

 

"If you're sure," she said.

 

"I'm sure."

 

"You wanna ride home?"

 

"Nah, I can handle it," she repeated with a grin.

 

He walked her out to the door, and they stood there for a moment. Then he kissed her. This time...this time they weren't trading spit.

 

This time she quivered and moved deeper into his arms.   When he lifted his head her eyes were like violet stars, her cheeks slightly flushed.

 

"Good night, Mellisande Stewart," he said with a somewhat husky voice.

 

"Good night," she whispered and was gone.