"We survive this."
"Tell me I'm more than what he made me."
"You're everything." His voice rough with emotion I'd never heard from him before. "You're vengeance and mercy and terrible beauty. You're the reason I remember how to feel anything beyond mission parameters. You're the most human person I know, and that includes all your inhuman edges."
I was crying again. Or still. Time had gone strange, elastic. The clock on the nightstand said we had two hours until we needed to move, but it felt like seconds. Felt like years.
"I don't want to be strong anymore," I admitted. "Just for a little while. Can I just... not be strong?"
"Yeah." He shifted us carefully, lying back with me still on top of him. "You don't have to be anything right now. Just be here. Just breathe."
So I did. Lay on his chest and listened to his heartbeat—steady, certain, alive. Felt his hands in my hair, not pulling or directing, just touching. Gentle contact with no expectation or demand.
"After," I said eventually. "After we kill him. What happens to us?"
"Whatever we want."
"That simple?"
"That simple." He paused. "What do you want?"
I thought about it. Really thought about it for the first time. What did Bunny want when she wasn't hunting, wasn't surviving, wasn't running from or toward something?
"Quiet," I said finally. "Somewhere quiet where I can figure out who I am without him. Maybe..." I trailed off, embarrassed by the domesticity of my thoughts.
"Maybe what?"
"Maybe a house. Nothing fancy. Just... walls that are mine. A bed no one's ever been chained to. Kitchen where food isn't a reward for obedience." I pressed my face against his chest, hiding. "Stupid, right? Killer playing house."
"Not stupid." His hands kept their steady rhythm in my hair. "Sounds perfect. I'm good with tools. Could fix up something cheap, make it ours."
Ours. The word sent warmth through me that had nothing to do with arousal and everything to do with hope.
"What about you?" I asked. "What does Nathan Cross want when the mission's over?"
He was quiet long enough that I looked up, finding his face thoughtful in the growing light.
"Never thought about it," he admitted. "Been mission-focused so long I forgot there could be an after." His hand cupped my cheek. "But now... yeah. House sounds good. Quiet sounds better. You sound best."
"Even if I'm never normal? Never fixed?"
"Who the fuck wants normal?" His thumb traced my lips. "I want you. Damaged and dangerous and mine. We'll figure out the rest as we go."
I kissed him. I couldn't not kiss him after that. Sealing promises we might not survive to keep.
When we broke apart, the sky outside was lightening. Grey dawn creeping across the parking lot, counting down to the confrontation. My body responded with fresh tremors, conditioning recognizing the timeline.
"I should get ready," I said, not moving.
"Few more minutes."
"He's waiting."
"Let him wait."
But we both knew I couldn't. The compulsion to move, to hunt, to end this was getting stronger. Part programming—even now, I responded to Gabriel's schedules—and part survival. The longer we waited, the more time my conditioning had to fully activate.
"Help me," I said, sitting up. "Help me remember who I am now. Before we go. Before I see him."
