Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

She almost falls in the mad dash from the exports hall to wherever Mark S is taking her. She can barely keep up with him. 

They reach his destination, coming to a disorienting halt. 

Ms. Casey’s never even ran before; she can’t hear herself think over the pounding in her head. She doesn’t know where she is; she doesn’t notice the sign above the door.

“Okay. You have to go, right now. Go,” Mark commands.

“Where?” 

Why is he telling her to go instead of just taking her? He’s taken her this far.

“Come on!” he yells, no one has ever raised their voice at her before, “You gotta go right now!” he rattles her eardrums, “Go, go!”

He practically shoves her against the push bar. She’s not able to register what’s happening to her until she’s already back.

Now she is seated and strapped into a moving vehicle—it’s dark out. Out. She is outside. The…road moves below her, or she travels forward across it. She is in the front of the vehicle, a mask covers the bottom half of her face; the space behind her ears is slightly sore.

She turns to her left and is spooked to see Ms. Cobel, also masked. 

“What’s going on?” Ms. Casey asks, voice trebling.

Ms. Cobel furrows her brows and takes her eyes off of the road to regard Ms. Casey. 

“What do you mean?”

“Where am I?”

“Shit. Which one are you?”

“What?”

“Ms. Casey?”

“Yes?”

“Okay,” Cobel breaths a sigh, only half-relieved, “We can work with that.”

“We?”

They keep on driving, but Ms. Cobel doesn’t answer any further questions.

Trees whip past them, snow falls and is wiped off of the…windshield. Ms. Casey has never been in a car before, but the word comes to her with only minor difficulty. 

She’s read that someone’s outie was a skilled motor vehicle operator, but she hadn’t quite had the chance to imagine what that entailed. 

She can’t see much more of the world past the light emanating from the front of the car…the headlights...the high beams specifically. It is a few more minutes before they pull up to a building labeled “MOTEL DREAMY” in glowing red letters.

Ms. Casey only notices what she’s wearing when she gets out of the car. Her hands are immediately chilled while her core stays warm under the thick jacket and whatever is underneath that. Even her face is protected by the mask, her hot breath circulating within it. 

Falling flakes of snow settle on her dark sleeve. They accumulate slowly, she looks up to investigate their source. The sky is not what she imagined it to be: an opaque dark gray mass hovering what feels like too low to the ground. 

“Come on,” Cobel calls sternly, standing at one of the many rowed doors.

Her feet move to follow the order, but then she stops herself. Why should she? She’s outside—does she have to follow her manager’s orders? She mulls over it; yes, she does. Her outie wouldn’t, but Ms. Casey is not her outie.

She likes the snow, though. She is enjoying this experience, but Ms. Cobel’s eyes harden and she can’t will herself to disobey any longer. 

 Ms. Cobel is inserting a key into the lock and Ms. Casey can only think that she will walk through the door and get turned off again, just like when Mr. Milchick told her to go, just like when Mark did the same. 

Her presence out here seems to be an accident; someone will soon remedy that, ending her next tempting jaunt. This will probably be the last one, she can feel it. Why has she been teased so?

The door opens and it’s not dark inside, not like the hallway she’s used to. It’s glowing amber, hot air blasts her as they enter. Ms. Cobel rushes to shut the door behind them, not letting any more warmth escape into the night.

Sitting at the little desk by the wall is the unmistakable Macrodat, despite the unfamiliar wardrobe and short haircut.

“Helly R!” Ms. Casey speaks out of turn.

Helly’s eyes go wide, then dart to Ms. Cobel.

“We have a situation,” Ms. Cobel explains, “I figured we would. I thought it’d be you, honestly.”

“You’re fucking joking,” Helly stands and crosses straight to her. 

Ms. Casey’s cold hands find Helly’s before she can get past her to confer with their manager. 

“What is occurring? Why are we out here?”

Ms. Cobel finally deigns to answer, “That’s Helly’s outie, Ms. Casey. Her name is—”

“Helly will do. You can call me that, it’s fine.” 

Heat transfers between them where they are connected. Helly’s unoccupied hand reaches up to remove Ms. Casey’s face mask. Then it finds her arm to hold her still, as if a careful examination of her features will reveal who she really is, as if Helly hasn’t already been told.

“Better not to confuse her,” Helly squints. 

If anything, this will be more confusing—blurring the line between who is who—but Ms. Casey appreciates the offer extended to her. The fantasy that she is not currently alone, but with what might resemble a friend, is a generous gift from a virtual stranger. 

With Helly in the room, Ms. Casey is a little less afraid of what Ms. Cobel might do to her. 

Ms. Cobel drops a large paper bag on one of the beds.

“We got dinner.”

“I’m fine,” Helly drops her touch from Ms. Casey’s person.

“You have to drive tomorrow, Hel…ly. I’d rather you not faint behind the wheel and kill us all.”

Ms. Casey also does not want to die tomorrow, but chooses not to voice this. 

Helly returns to the desk, “I said I’m fine.”

Ms. Casey feels exposed standing alone in the middle of the room. Ms. Cobel digs through the bag and produces a wrapped item, offering it to her.

“Here, just because she’s starving herself doesn’t mean you have to.”

Ms. Casey wasn’t planning to, “Thank you.”

The piece of food is warm in her hand, unlike what she had been served at lunch during her stint in MDR, which was straight from the fridge. 

She partially unwraps it. It’s a sandwich—no, it’s a burger. She realizes she is still standing up, which is not how people usually eat. Ms. Cobel is sat on the bed and Ms. Casey doesn’t want to be anywhere near her—there’s an armchair in the corner, she takes it. 

The food is good, not everything she’d allowed herself to hope it’d be, but she doesn’t have to choke it down. A plastic water bottle is tossed her way.

“Drink,” is Ms. Cobel’s simple order. Ms. Casey follows it.

Ms. Casey is also ordered to change into night clothes and soon the “day’s” excitement is drawn to a close. There are two beds and three bodies, so Ms. Casey stands in the doorway from the bathroom waiting for one or the other of them to permit her to lie down.

To her infinite disappointment, Ms. Cobel notices her first. She cheerlessly pats the space next to her and Ms. Casey is helpless to accept her fate.

In the middle of the night, she has to get up to use the toilet but her wrist is violently seized.

“Where are you going!?” Ms. Cobel demands.

Helly startles awake from the barked question.

“Just the bathroom!” 

Ms. Casey trembles, clenching her muscles so that her stated purpose isn’t defeated by the scare.

Helly groans and rolls over at the pointless interruption of her sleep.

Ms. Cobel releases and Ms. Casey’s heart hammers the entire time she’s up; she can barely relax enough to relieve herself. She doesn’t sleep a wink with what she knows are Ms. Cobel’s icey blue eyes drilling another hole in the back of her skull.

Eventually, the others are asleep, leaving Ms. Casey with something adjacent to privacy. She stays awake and stares at the slatted window until light starts to break through. She slips out of bed and kneels by the low sill, peaking through the blinds to see the outside world in a literal new light.

It is still cloudy, but the snow has stopped falling. Orange rays try to break through the dense cloud cover on the horizon, beaming through naked tree branches and casting spindly shadows onto the white ground. 

When Ms. Casey blinks, an after image of the light’s shape remains. It almost hurts, but not in any way she, up until this point, has understood pain. 

She doesn’t hear anyone getting up, so Helly’s presence—suddenly right behind and towering above her—catches her by surprise. Ms. Casey restrains her reaction to nothing more than a sharp inhale before she recomposes herself.

“Good morning, Helly.”

Helly looks down at her, penetrative and flat at the same time. Ms. Casey is reminded that she does not know this woman. This is not the person who tried to kill herself, she’s the person Helly tried to kill. 

“Let’s go get breakfast,” she whispers, not bothering to lean down, forcing Ms. Casey to strain her hearing.

“What about…” she looks to the still sleeping manager. 

Helly smirks and doesn’t say anything; she dismisses Ms. Casey’s incomplete question with her expression alone. She wouldn’t mind being further away from Ms. Cobel is the thing, so Ms. Casey stands. They don boots and coats before quietly exiting the room.

Helly gives Ms. Casey a face mask; this must be how outies dress. Helly intently watches Ms. Casey struggle with the straps before they sneak out of the room.

The cold seeps through Ms. Casey’s clothes, the car’s dinky heater only barely raising the temperature. By the time it’s tolerable, they arrive.

Ms. Casey tries to open her door but it’s still locked. 

“Your name is Cynthia Penny.”

“Really?” Ms. Casey had assumed that Casey was at least one of her names, be it first or last.

“Your cover name: it’s what I have to call you in public. My cover name is Frances Castle, Cobel’s is Vivian Castle.”

“Why do we have to do that?”

Helly inhales through her nostrils, frustrated. Ms. Casey does not like to frustrate people. 

“Some people don’t approve of what we’re doing. Don’t ask what we’re doing—trust me, we’re in the right.”

Ms. Casey nods to show she accepts this answer.

“What’s my name?” Helly is not earnestly asking; it’s a test.

“Frances Castle.”

“What is yours?”

“Cynthia Penny.”

The car door unlocks. Helly exits gracefully. Ms. Casey fumbles with the handle before freeing herself. She was never like this before—something about the outie world is seriously throwing her off. 

Thus far, everything is dingy compared to the world she’s known—the breakfast spot is no different. The windows, the brick exterior, the linoleum flooring—it’s all filthy to Ms. Casey’s standards. She tracks some brown slurry in from the parking lot and accepts that she is a part of the problem. 

Helly gestures to a menu hanging above the counter, “Whad’ya want?”

There’s over a dozen options and Ms. Casey is accustomed to having none. 

Helly doesn’t skip a beat: “I’ll pick.”

It’s embarrassing how relieved she is. Well, she isn’t like Helly’s innie—she never asked to be let out, she barely considered it. Her first taste of freedom is not so enticing. 

They get to the front of the line and Ms. Casey barely registers the exchange. Green paper slips are handed over, two cups and three brown bags are received. Ms. Casey carries the bags for Helly without being asked.

On the drive back, Ms. Casey tries to appreciate the scenery. The sunrise has broken into a flat, gray-blue day, the clouds still hang suffocatingly low, the exposed ground is brown, the snow is tainted with dark speckles at its edges, everything looks dead. 

Upon their return, Ms. Cobel is already dressed and awake, packing anything not belonging to the motel into three suitcases.

Helly extends one of the cups to her, “Two cream, no sugar.”

Ms. Cobel takes it and sips before she confirms the drink’s correctness.

“Plusss,” Helly takes a bag from Ms. Casey’s hands, “a slice of banana bread, toasted. Pleased?” 

Something from before Ms. Casey arrived is dripping off of Helly’s words. 

Ms. Cobel responds, “Eternally.”

Helly only smirks before taking her own bag from Ms. Casey and seating herself at the desk again. Ms. Casey is left with what she has to assume is what was chosen for her. She goes to the chair she ate in last night and unwraps her breakfast. 

It’s a rich dark brown, nearly black in color, and slightly shiny, insofar as pastries can be shiny. It takes her a moment of focus to call the word to mind: muffin. She takes a bite: chocolate. It’s really good. She takes another bite before she’s actually completely swallowed the first. 

Ms. Casey wipes the crumbs accumulating on her face away which leaves a dark smear on her hand. She considers licking it off. Glancing up at the other two in the room, they’re not watching her, silently engrossed with their own meals. She does. 

The muffin is gone in less than a minute, all that remains is the paper liner. She wants to scrape the thin film of crumbs off of it with her teeth, but she stops herself there. She wishes she’d also gotten one of those drinks to wash her meal down—the steam emanating off of them perfumes the small room with a deep aroma that compliments the chocolate muffin. 

Ms. Casey accepts she is limited to enjoying just the smell for now. 

Helly is lugging the suitcases into the trunk of the car when Ms. Cobel walks up to the passenger seat. 

“Aht!” Helly calls out, stopping her, “Isn’t it Cynthia’s turn to shutgun?”

Cobel scoffs, “Are you being serious?”

The trunk closes with a decisive thud.

“Of course. It’s only fair.”

Ms. Cobel glares at Ms. Casey, as if she had anything to do with this standoff. She wishes to surrender—Ms. Casey does not want shotgun, it sounds pretty frightening—but she does not want to defy Helly, either.

Ms. Cobel opens the back door and slides in without further argument. 

Helly walks around to the driver’s seat, “You’re welcome.”

Ms. Casey thanks her even though she’s fairly certain none of that was done for her benefit. 

The only words exchanged in the car for several hours are between the two men on the radio, blissfully ignorant of the tension thickening the air. 

They pull over at a rest stop and Ms. Casey is told to use the bathroom—not asked if she needs to. She wouldn’t have said anything if she did, seeing how this is all going over so far, so she supposes that she should be grateful they thought to give her the order.

Ms. Casey notices that they are the only ones wearing face masks, so it’s not an outie thing. It’s an on-the-run thing, because that’s what she is. What her outie is running from, she figures she’ll never know. 

The high ceilinged structure they’ve stopped at is kind of grand. She tries to appreciate that in the short time she has before they’re hitting the road again.

Several more hours pass by in the barely warm, slightly smelly, and still viciously tense car before buildings begin to get more dense and, instead of continuing down the straight and sometimes wide road, they turn onto populated side streets. 

The density thins again, smaller houses are replaced by bigger complexes, then warehouses replace them. They drive right up to one and park. Helly and Cobel are unbuckling so Ms. Casey goes to do the same, but she’s interrupted.

“Stay. We’ll be back,” Helly states evenly. Ms. Cobel nods.

They leave her in the car, disappearing under a partially raised garage door into the warehouse. No light emanates from within. Ms. Casey waits.

She can just barely hear raised voices that don’t sound like either of her traveling companions. Then, a sharp noise peals through the air—like a heavy Handbook hitting the ground—and then it happens twice more. 

Helly is scrambling out of the building. She unlocks the car, starts it, doesn’t even get buckled, and reverses the vehicle at a frightening speed out of the lot.

“Where’s Ms. Cobel?”

“She’s not coming!”

The car lurches into forward drive and Helly forces the sputtering engine to go even faster around a sharp turn.

“What happened, Helly? What’s happening?”

“Shut up!” 

She does, because Helly’s really pleading with her. 

She clings to whatever she can get a grip of and clenches her jaw shut as they rocket through the streets. Helly passes other cars, glancing into the rearview mirror with concerning frequency.

Eventually, Helly stops trembling—the speed doesn’t let up, but it’s less erratic. They drive like that for miles until it’s completely dark. They turn onto another country road, and then a dirt road, and then into the forest off of that road. Finally, the car stops. 

“We have to sleep here tonight.”

Ms. Casey doesn’t ask why, she just accepts it.

Helly climbs into the back seat and reaches over the bench into the trunk. A suitcase is unzipped and a blanket is extracted.

“C’mere,” she says without looking over to Ms. Casey.

She complies, awkwardly fitting herself through the gap between the front seats instead of getting out—she understands how much colder it will be in here if she does that. 

She manages to sit next to Helly, who immediately starts unbuttoning Ms. Casey’s jacket and then her own. Ms. Casey does not ask for an explanation—it is so truly beyond that at this point—but Helly gives her one.

“We need to share body heat.”

They both have sweaters on underneath, which they have to lose. Helly unbuttons the flannel shirt Ms. Casey wears under that but leaves it and the bra on. She doesn’t touch Ms. Casey’s bottoms or her own. Helly’s shirt doesn’t button in the front; she leaves it on. 

She then has Ms. Casey put her jacket back on and lie down on the bench, shuffling her legs between Helly’s where she kneels. Helly pulls the blanket over of them and arranges the discarded clothing in layers on top of that. She then slides her cold arms under Ms. Casey’s shirt and jacket, against her skin.

Ms. Casey lies as still as possible, though Helly’s hair tickles her neck. The weight of Helly’s body is pleasant. The warmth they both emit is effectively trapped within the mass of cloth surrounding them. 

Ms. Casey hasn’t slept the entire time she’s been activated. She’s been drowsy for hours, but now it’s irresistible. She doesn’t realize what’s happening until the morning sunlight is waking her up.

It’s not quite like crossing the threshold, but it wasn’t entirely unlike it either. She feels better than before she fell asleep. “Waking up” was the worst part of her periods of consciousness before; she always felt antsy, like she was doing something wrong before any orders had even been given.

She’s only half-awake and Helly appears to still be fully asleep, so Ms. Casey tries to fall back into the comforting darkness. She squirms a little; her right arm is numb and she’s trying to flex her fingers.

This causes Helly to shift and something hard presses into Ms. Casey’s hip. Her mind doesn’t supply what it could be and, besides, Helly is waking up.

Her eyes flutter open, a verdant green Ms. Casey has yet to experience in nature, and she actually smiles.

“Huh,” Helly removes her arms from around Ms. Casey to prop herself up, “no one killed us.”

“Was that—”

“Don’t worry about it,” she rubs Ms. Casey’s shoulder in a paternal fashion.

Helly stretches, pushing her chest forward and shoulders back in a way that Ms. Casey should have no particular reaction to, but she does. She’s aware of the knees that are on either side of her hips; that should not mean anything to her either, but it does. What, she’s not sure, but something, certainly.

Helly loses the pleasant demeanor quickly, “We need to keep on driving.”

The mountain of clothes falls to the floorboard. Helly grabs one of the sweaters—Ms. Casey is fairly certain it’s her own—and pulls it on over her head. She hands the other to Ms. Casey; she does the same.

They get out of the car this time so that they can really wake up their limbs. Ms. Casey hasn’t stood up in almost an entire day. The stretch is so necessary that it aches worse at first, but it’s not the kind of hurt that one recoils from. Ms. Casey only forces her joints to extend further and she feels the muscles and tendons loosen with her effort.

Helly is digging through the trunk, hunting for something in one of the bags.

Ms. Casey’s stomach gurgles. They’d ate a light breakfast and nothing else the day before.

“Helly R?” Ms. Casey asks trepidatiously. She pops up from the trunk, two little booklets in hand, seemingly receptive to a request, “Can we get something to eat?”

Something passes across her face, something Ms. Casey would have had to deduct points for if this were a Wellness Session.

“Uh, sure.”

“Thank you, Helly.”

She mumbles something under her breath as she goes back to the driver’s side door. 

Ms. Casey notices a small cloud forms every time she exhales. The effect hadn’t happened when she had her mask on, as she has every other time she’s been outside.

“Let’s go!”

She opens the passenger door and clambers in. They mask up and take off back down the winding roads they’d escaped through. Ms. Casey doesn’t know what they escaped, she doesn’t know if that thing got Ms. Cobel or if maybe Cobel was the thing, but she’s grateful that Helly has taken her from it. She feels it once more: secure in her presence.

They drive for a while. Ms. Casey understands they are probably a ways away from any population centers, but the roadside diner they eventually find can’t come soon enough. Helly parks the car in the back of the lot behind the building so that it isn’t visible from the street. Ms. Casey appreciates her vigilance and aversion to needless risk.

They get a booth situated very far into the back corner of the restaurant; this place doesn’t do takeout, so the pair has to have a sit down meal. Ms. Casey is excited, Helly tries to hide her nerves.

Ms. Casey gets it, but she’s also acutely aware that she’s living on literal borrowed time. She wants to experience as much of the outie world as she can before she’s shut off again. 

This time, she orders for herself. She has the time to really dig into the recesses of her mind to identify what her options are. 

She orders a breakfast platter which comes with a short stack of waffles, bacon, home fries, a slice of toast, and an egg that she orders sunny side up, which sounds very cheerful to her. Upon being prompted by the waitress, she also orders an orange juice. Helly orders a veggie omelet and a black coffee. 

Upon arrival, both meals look pretty good to Ms. Casey, she won’t lie. She begins to cut into a waffle when Helly interrupts her.

“You know…” 

“Hm?”

Helly reaches across the table and slides her a brown bottle.

“You’re supposed to add this stuff.”

“Okay,” Ms. Casey puts her fork down and grabs the condiment. It’s brown, too, and transparent. She drizzles it on her waffles and starts to put some on her bacon when Helly interrupts again.

“Just on the waffles!” Ms. Casey quickly retracts the bottle, “I mean…well I guess you can put it on whatever you want, I just don’t…suggest it.”

“Oh, thank you, Helly.” 

Ms. Casey is genuinely appreciative of the guidance. Helly makes another face but Ms. Casey is starving, she doesn’t have it in her to analyze what that’s about.

She’s immediately even more grateful to Helly; the syrup really improves the warm, crispy-on-the-outside, fluffy-on-the-inside waffles, making them sweet on top of it all. The bacon doesn’t suffer from the cross contamination—the savory-salty-sweet combo is a lot for someone with such an unrefined palate, but it’s undeniably good. The home fries are crunchy and filling—a welcome texture even if the flavor is more bland. The egg is just alright, though the toast dipped into the runny yellow part is rather novel. 

Who is she kidding? It’s all novel. Even when it isn’t great, it’s hot and fresh. She slurps her tangy juice to wash it all down while Helly daintily sips on her coffee and nibbles her omelet. 

“Cynthia,” Ms. Casey looks up from the platter at Helly, “you’ve got schmutz on your face.”

Ms. Casey grabs a napkin out of the little dispenser and wipes her mouth and chin thoroughly. She crumples the napkin and tucks it under the rim of her plate. 

Helly watches her and hums.

“What is it?”

“It’s…um…” Helly looks around. There are a few older individuals sat on the other far end of the restaurant, their waitress is smoking in the parking lot outside, and the cook—Ms. Casey presumes there is at least one—is hidden away in the kitchen.

Helly relaxes a little and leans in closer to Ms. Casey. She whispers, “Gemma does that, too, with her napkins.”

“Is that my—”

“Yes. Yes, but that’s all I can say.”

Ms. Casey smiles warmly, “Thank you, Frances.”

Helly smiles back, even lets out what might be a laugh.

“Good memory.”

Ms. Casey was never allowed to know much. She clings to every scrap of information she’s ever given. She can probably recite a fact about any patient she’d had over the almost two hundred sessions she has conducted. So, of course she remembers something as trivial as that: something she was instructed directly to retain. She feels flattered by Helly’s compliment nonetheless; they’re hard to come by where she’s from.

Ms. Casey saves her next question for when they are in the relative privacy of the moving car.

“So, are you and Gemma…friends? Is that why you were traveling together?”

She tries not to let on how much she’s been fruitlessly turning this situation around in her head. 

Helly’s mouth twitches at the corner, her eyes narrow but don’t leave the road.

“Yeah; we knew each other from Lumon. Shit went down, you know I can’t really…”

She’s lying—Ms. Casey can easily determine that. She doesn’t know why Helly is lying to her and she can’t exactly tell how comprehensive of a lie it is.

“I know. I understand I can’t know.”

“…Good. I appreciate your…understanding.”

Ms. Casey finds the pain from the offense to be but momentary. 

The sun is bright, her stomach is full, and Helly is satisfied with her. What does she really have to be upset about?

Music is playing instead of talk radio and she’s is enjoying it thoroughly. The countryside passes them by and despite the unabating winter, Ms. Casey can find some beauty in it. 

It isn’t what the paintings she used to walk past promised it would be, but for a little while it’s hers to enjoy.

Eventually they come to a stop at some sort of checkpoint. There’s a tall black fence that Ms. Casey notices from miles away and can’t see the end of in either direction. Helly turns the music down as they approach.

“We’re going to be asked some questions up here; I will do the talking where I can, but they might ask you directly. All you need to remember is that your name is Cynthia Penny, you were born on July 20th, 1973—you got that?”

“July 20th, 1973.”

“Good—you don’t have anything to declare: no drugs, no food, no money, no weapons, nothing.”

“Understood.”

Helly asks her what her fake date of birth is about a dozen more times before they reach the station. Helly rolls her window down and produces the little booklets from before. They pull their masks under their chins and the man looks at them both, at Helly noticeably longer, and then begins the dialogue they were just rehearsing. 

He doesn’t end up asking Ms. Casey anything—he seems distracted. As they leave, Helly is antsy again. Ms. Casey doesn’t pry.

They drive for several more hours, stopping once at a gas station to fill the tank with fuel and themselves with whatever prepackaged food is available in the adjoining convenience store. Ms. Casey is a little transfixed by the loud blinking lottery machine.

Helly just shakes her head and Ms. Casey tears herself away.

With wrappers accumulating in the door pockets, Ms. Casey is wondering if they’ll sleep in here again. Her neck is sore, but she’d endure it again easily for another day like this one—she’s alive and relatively unstressed. 

The idea of being that close with Helly again—pressed together and cozied up—she has to cast it off. Maybe it was just that the stuffy car managed to surpass her first experience with a real bed in comfort.

She should not be so relieved at Ms. Cobel’s absence; she could be in trouble or hurt or dead, but Ms. Casey has been all of those things before at her orders; she can only worry so much over her ex-manager when she’s finally living a real life, even if only an excerpt of one.

Eight hours had been her previous record, now she was almost to seventy. She must be the luckiest innie in the world.

“What are you smiling about?” Helly asks.

“I’m just happy to be here.”

“Aww,” Helly puts a hand to her heart; she’s teasing, but it’s all in good fun.

In fact, Ms. Casey feels privileged to be in on a joke, even if it’s ever so slightly at her expense.

Their destination for the night is eventually reached: another motel with a blinking sign and a crumbling front office. Helly tells her to pick out one of the takeout menus in the big display while she pays for their room in cash.

A bright red brochure catches her eye, so she brings it to Helly. 

“Sure,” Helly confirms, a slight quake in her voice.

“Should I pick something else?”

“Nah, it’ll be good.”

There’s something right below the surface that Ms. Casey can’t quite access. She just doesn’t know enough about this Helly. Maybe she’s humoring her, maybe she hates this kind of food but doesn’t want to say it, but she just takes the menu and starts reading over it on their walk to their room. 

“I don’t know what I like,” Ms. Casey frets.

Helly reassures her, “Just look at the pictures, whatever looks good.”

The problem is it all looks good, but she makes her selection. Helly warns her it will be spicy, but she hasn’t actually gotten to try anything spicy yet, so it only entices her more.

They’re settling in the room, Ms. Casey finally has a chance to root through her—and Ms. Cobel’s—bag and see what she’s working with, when Helly punches the golden numbers into the bedside phone to call the restaurant.

The order is made and Helly pulls out her sleep clothes.

“Don’t we have to go get it?” Ms. Casey asks.

“No, they’ll bring it to us.”

“Wow.”

“Are you just so happy to be here?”

“Yes!”

Helly laughs and Ms. Casey feels permissed to laugh with her as she walks away to go change. Ms. Casey pulls her own pajamas out, too. She hears the shower start running and thinks about how she’ll take one next and then get changed into clean clothes and underwear. 

She had taken for granted how there was never a thin layer of sweat and grime on her down on the severed floor. All of the little bodily needs are new and unpleasant, but their amelioration is almost transcendently pleasurable. 

It’s not long before Helly returns, her hair dripping wet, darkening the top of her shirt.

“Turn it three quarters of the way, that will be a good temperature.”

“Okay.”

“Do you know how like, shampoo and conditioner work?” Ms. Casey thinks for a second, a second too long for Helly, “Shampoo first and then condition; then you have to let it sit for a few minutes.”

“Okay, thank you.”

“No problem, Casey.”

Ms. Casey might’ve deduced what to do from the instructions written on the bottles—which she reads as she waits for the conditioner to set—but it is appreciated nonetheless. Helly really is nice to look out for her like that. 

All of the tiny, accumulated discomforts are washed down the drain. They’re invisible, but Ms. Casey feels them leave her body. 

She rubs soap into her pits, the creases of her groin and butt, under her breasts, all over. The suds carry away the last of the nasty stuff and leave her with something else—a little heat at her extremities and in her belly. It goes away quickly, but she can’t be fooled—it was there.

She shuts the water off and gets dressed. She rejoins Helly and there is food spread out on one of the beds. Helly’s already sipping some yellow soup from a styrofoam container and sitting by the headboard.

Ms. Casey climbs onto the other end of the bed and starts to pull her meal out. She instinctively goes for the set of wooden chopsticks at the bottom of the paper bag. She breaks them apart and runs the ends against each other a few times absentmindedly. She sees Helly notice her compulsive action.

There is a plastic bowl with beef and veggies coated in a shiny sauce and a little paper carton of white rice. 

Ms. Casey digs in, combining bites of plain, fluffy rice with spicy, sticky stir fry. She eats slowly, savoring each bite. The spice is no issue for her, it makes the dish all the more intense, which is all the better to her. It’s more pain in a way she hasn’t conceived of before; it’s a good burn. She’s not even halfway through when Helly puts her empty soup cup down and just watches her eat.

“Is that all you have?”

Helly shrugs.

“Have some of mine,” Ms. Casey offers.

She shakes her head.

“Really?”

Helly doesn’t reply, not even non-verbally.

Ms. Casey goes as far as to start removing chunks of food from her bowl and putting in Helly’s empty one.

Helly leans back, “Seriously, Casey, drop it.”

“No,” Ms. Casey is suddenly impassioned, “You should eat some more; it’s not good to be hungry and you must be starv—”

“How the fuck would you know?”

Ms. Casey goes stock still. She’s sitting cross-legged in pajamas eating outie food—nothing about this resembles the place she’s lived the first one hundred and nine hours of her life—but all those old anxieties come rushing back. 

Helly sees her demeanor shift. For a moment, she hardens further and Ms. Casey fully anticipates some kind of punishment to fall on her; even without disciplinary infrastructure like the Break Room, there has to be something in return for her impertinence. Then Helly deflates, she sinks further back onto the bed.

“Whatever.”

Ms. Casey lets out the breath she was holding and her hands start trembling. She tries to conceal it as she puts her food away. She’s lost her appetite. 

There’s a minifridge for her to store the leftovers in. She turns out the lights and climbs into the opposite bed. The sheets are a little scratchy, the mattress lumpy, she has trouble appreciating that it’s an entire bed to herself. She’s uncomfortable, but she sleeps.

Something happens while she’s asleep—it feels so real. Mark S is looming over her, she’s cold, there’s water in her eyes, she hurts. 

“Oh, Baby,” he pulls her head against him and from there she can see the blood painting her thighs and making tendrils on the tiles.

“No,” she breathes out—what is she denying?

The embrace grows tighter, the pain cinches in her stomach, and something soft slips out of her. She’s awake and the pain, the blood, and Mark are all gone in an instant, replaced with nothing more than a dry, scratchy throat. 

It’s barely brighter than when she first laid down. She looks over and sees the other bed is empty. She gets up and the bathroom is empty, too. Ms. Casey worries that Helly has simply abandoned her here out of displeasure—she’s momentarily comforted when she reminds herself that Helly said she was friends with Gemma, but she quickly recalls that Helly was definitely lying about that, and she’s back to rightfully fearing the worst.

She’s kept her head down this entire time, she hasn’t asked invasive questions, she was just trying to help. 

Ms. Casey is standing by the shower, not quite sure why it’s filling her with such sorrow, when she hears the door open. Helly’s back. Ms. Casey has to wipe the tears out of her eyes before she comes out to face her.

A frosted pastry in a plastic wrapper is held in one hand, a canned beverage in the other. 

“Vending machine is all I could manage today.”

Ms. Casey thinks of the ones on the severed floor that she never was permitted to use. None of them had anything that resembled this. Ms. Casey takes her saccharine breakfast without complaints; she doesn’t offer any of it to Helly, as much as it pains her.

The can hisses as it’s opened, Helly only takes a sip before it’s tucked into the center console cup holder. They’re dressed and their bags are in the trunk as they embark on another day of driving. 

It’s always mostly quiet between them, today it’s silent. It isn’t until they stop for the restroom and an approximation of lunch that Ms. Casey gets any further explanation on what the plan is.

“We have to meet up with some people tonight. Irving B will be there.”

The Macrodat that bonded with the O&D chief—he was nice.

“His outie, I mean.”

“I see.”

Maybe he’ll be nice, too. Based on the outie fact sheet she’d read, he should be. 

It’s dark again by the time they park in an inconspicuous lot and walk into a small downtown area. There are a lot more people out and about than Ms. Casey is used to, Helly holds her hand to keep them from being separated.

They’re about to dip into an alleyway when someone screams at them from across the street. The word is harsh to her ears, but Ms. Casey can’t immediately grasp what the man means by it.

She’s watching him for only a moment—and he’s watching back—before Helly hastens around the corner, knocking aggressively on the door with her free hand.

“Why did he—” Ms. Casey starts to ask.

The door opens; it’s a young woman Ms. Casey’s never seen before. She kind of reminds her of Mark S, in an odd way. She’s sterner than he ever was.

“Where’s Harmony?” the woman demands.

“Compromised.”

“Oh, fuck off. So you don’t—”

“I don’t have it, but I’ve got her,” Helly gestures to Ms. Casey, “If I was working against you, you know exactly where she’d be.”

The woman cuts her eyes at Ms. Casey, “Take your mask off.”

Ms. Casey looks to Helly for permission—more accurately, confirmation that this will be safe. Helly nods. Ms. Casey loops a finger into the elastic behind her ear and lets it hang limply beside her cheek.

The woman steps aside to let Helly drag Ms. Casey into the dark entryway. They descend a flight of stairs into a basement. It’s not horribly appointed nor is it terribly dark—it actually reminds Ms. Casey of her old office with it’s wooden paneling and appealing atmosphere. 

There are several people sort of hovering at the edges of the room watching them both enter. At a central desk is Irving B’s outie. 

“Hello Gemma—”

Helly interrupts him, “Casey, actually.”

“What?”

“Yeah, they woke her up about halfway through the drive.”

There’s a hubbub amongst the observers and the woman pipes up from behind them, “Well, that changes the fucking story, doesn’t it?”

“Would’ve been a lot easier for me to take this version of her back, especially once Harmony was gone. Do you have any idea what I’m giving up to make this happen?”

“Oh, poor fucking Hel—”

“Kilmer,” Irving says softly, silencing the room.

He keeps on talking but something brushes up against Ms. Casey’s leg. She looks down to see a gray-snouted dog looking back up at her. She spotted a few deer on their long drive up, but this is the first animal she’s been up close with out here.

She presents it with her hand and it sniffs her. It bumps against her fingers and she can feel that its nose is cold and wet. She puts her palm to the top of its head and strokes in the direction its fur lies. It presses a little closer and she continues to pet it.

She wants to bend down to be on its level, but she’s not forgotten that there are a half-dozen eyes still trained on her. They know she’s an innie—have they ever met someone like her before? In all likelihood, no. 

Ms. Cobel—or Harmony, she supposes—didn’t seem wildly shocked when she arrived, so she likely isn’t the first innie to breach the surface. Maybe she’s the first one to pet a dog, though. It’s fur is a lot softer than the goats she was once permitted to touch—the pride and joy of Lorne and her Nurturers. 

She recalls the one who excelled at stargazing—it’s been too overcast for her to see much of anything at night. What a shame. 

“C’mon, Casey,” Helly’s hand is on her shoulder, steering her away, back up the stairs. 

The dog whines a little as they part. She watches it walk up to Irving’s desk before she has to turn and see where she’s stepping. Helly’s hand slips off of her as they exit the building, she doesn’t guide her back to the car as she had guided her here.

The streets are more desolate now, so there’s not really any need, but Ms. Casey still feels bereft. They’re at the car when someone approaches them. Helly puts herself between Ms. Casey and the man before he even speaks. The parking lot is empty, other than the three of them.

“Can I fucking help you?”

“I think you fucking can, dyke.”

It’s the same man from before using the same word. Ms. Casey feels unnerved even though she still doesn’t understand him.

He takes another step forward and Helly opens the right side of her coat. He immediately stops and starts backing away.

“That’s great—I’m feeling real fuckin’ helpful tonight, man. I’d love to. Just say the word.”

“Jesus, since when—”

Helly’s hand goes to her hip, he stumbles away even faster.

“Just get the fuck away from us. Now,” Helly commands, shockingly calm.

With a swiftness, he obeys. Helly pulls her jacket back around her and unlocks the car. Ms. Casey can’t get in and lock her door fast enough.

“What was that?”

“He’s just some hick asshole, Casey—far below our notice.”

“No, why did…He was going to hurt us—why did he just leave?”

Helly starts the car and smirks, which feels totally inappropriate for the situation at hand. 

“He knows what’s good for him.”

“Would you please just answer my question?” it comes out more aggressively than she means it to, which isn’t particularly aggressive at all, but still surprises them both. 

Helly stops smiling and glances over at her. She shifts gears and they leave the lot.

“I threatened him. I have a gun on me—I’m surprised you haven’t noticed.”

She had noticed something on Helly’s hip that one time in the car, but she’d have never guessed that was what it was.

“Why…” then Ms. Casey recognizes that she’s asking a dumb question. 

They can’t even show their faces in public, they can’t stay in one place for more than a night at a time—something happened to Cobel and it almost happened to all three of them. They’re on the run, that means someone is giving chase.

Ms. Casey watches her side view mirror the entire way to the next motel, which isn’t far at all. Helly tells Ms. Casey to pick out another menu—another red one, more russet, is chosen.

They get changed into their night clothes and Helly shows Ms. Casey the gun. It’s small with a sleek clip that lets it tuck into her waistband. She leaves it on the bedside table—Ms. Casey swears she didn’t do that before. 

“Shit, they deliver wine. Is that legal? We should get a bottle.”

“Okay.”

“Red or white?”

“You know I have no idea.”

“You seem like a red wine kind of girl.”

She does, or Gemma did?

Helly’s food this time is more substantial—a salad with big chunks of tomato and white cheese and a dark drizzle. She also has at least one piece of the garlic bread that comes with Ms. Casey’s pasta. They eat over the little table in the corner of the room. The wine is split between them in the provided red plastic cups.

Helly bumps hers into Ms. Casey’s and declares, “To our last day.”

“What?”

Helly’s already sipping and has to swallow before she can answer.

“Were you not listening when we were at the field office?”

“…No. There was a dog.”

Ms. Casey braces for a reprimand but Helly just smiles. 

“You’re going with them up North. I’ve got to go back down to Kier.”

Ms. Casey thought Kier was dead. She doesn’t understand.

“What’s wrong?” Helly asks, laced with both genuine concern and genuine annoyance.

“I don’t know,” she takes a sip of the wine—it’s bitter, but she finds herself prepared for that bitterness, “What if I don’t want to go with them?”

“Why wouldn’t you? They have a dog.”

“Helly, I’m not a child. I’ve never met those people and they didn’t seem very happy to meet me.”

“Casey, it’s not like that.”

“They want me because Gemma knows something—doesn’t she? I don’t know what she knows—they’re going to find a way to turn me off. I think you can understand why I don’t want that.”

“I…” Helly can’t look her in the eyes. 

Ms. Casey has to stand and pace, as if she can reveal an escape route by wearing a hole in the threadbare carpet.

“Before I met you, this version of you, I had existed for a combined one hundred and nine hours split mostly over dual half hour sessions. I’ve doubled that time out here, with you.”

Helly stands, she approaches Ms. Casey with her hands at her side.

Ms. Casey goes on, “You don’t know what the severed floor is like—that’s not your fault, but you have no idea. These days on the road have been the best hours of my life. I never knew to hope for something like this! I can’t just let it go because of whatever is going on with those people or with Lumon. You’re the only person who really knows me, Helly—you’re the only one who can do this for me—they wont!”

Helly has closed the distance between them. Without thinking, Ms. Casey’s hands are on her thinly clad shoulders.

“Helly, please, don’t make me go back there. If you do—you just can’t! They’re going to—”

She is silenced by Helly’s lips against hers. Ms. Casey gasps and in turn her mouth is filled with Helly’s tongue. They stagger backwards, parting for half-seconds at a time before Helly seals her back up again—Ms. Casey is held firmly by a hand around her neck, keeping her where she’s wanted. 

Ms. Casey can feel that she knows how to reciprocate, but she doesn’t—she hasn’t gotten her answer. She breaks away, purposefully.

“Helly—!”

“My name is Helena.”

She kisses Ms. Casey again, then presses her lips to her chin, to her neck.

“Helena,” she speaks the half-familiar name, her hands clench at the tee shirt material, “what are you doing?”

“I’ll protect you. I’ll do it,” she promises against her skin.

Ms. Casey starts to tremble. She’s safe, finally safe. She’s caught on to the deal.

“And I just have to—”

“Nothing, you don’t have to do anything. Just take it and tell me when to stop.”

Helena buries herself back into Ms. Casey’s neck and she can’t imagine why she’d want her to stop. This feels good, even as teeth scrape her skin. She recognizes the frisson inside of her—it was there in the shower and in the back seat when their bodies were pressed together. 

Helena’s hands go under her shirt and it’s the same as it was before but vertical.

“Tell me to stop.”

Ms. Casey doesn’t. She pulls her shirt all the way over her head. Helena’s head dips lower to her chest, her hand fondles over her sports bra.

“Just tell me to stop.”

Ms. Casey shakes her head. She hooks her thumbs into her pajama pants and slips them down her legs. She doesn’t know a lot, but this is immediately clear in her head, each next step comes easily.

“Christ, Casey, stop me.”

“I don’t want to.”

Helena steps on Ms. Casey’s crumpled pants to give her the leverage to step out of them. They back up onto the bed, Ms. Casey sits and Helena plants a knee between her legs. There’s just enough pressure for Ms. Casey to know she wants more of it.

She pushes her hips forward as Helena tilts her face up to kiss her again. Fingers wind through her scalp and add more delicious pressure. She kisses back, running her tongue against Helena’s teeth—she doesn’t bite, but Ms. Casey almost wishes she would.

Helena’s knee is retracted and Ms. Casey whines into the kiss. Helena’s hands are around her, under her, pushing her further up the bed. 

Helena pulls away to say, “Get on your hands and knees, please.”

Ms. Casey complies, peaking backwards once she’s in position.

“Thank you,” Helena says as she pulls Ms. Casey’s panties down and off.

Her leg slots back between Ms. Casey’s and this time it’s easier to push herself firmly against it. Helena’s hands have a firm hold on her hips and she encourages her to move them up and down. 

Ms. Casey lets her head and chest sink into the bed—the new angle gives the most sensitive part of her more friction with Helena’s sweat pants. She keens at the sensation, so overwhelming and powerful, moreso than any other she’s experienced yet. 

“Shhh,” Helena pats her hip, “thin walls, Casey.”

She takes a deep breath in and lets it out, only half-voiced. Helena kisses between her shoulders. 

“No one else needs to hear you—just me.”

Ms. Casey realizes that she agrees—she sometimes forgets that there’s a world outside of the bubble her and Helena inhabit for most hours of the day. 

They work together to keep the pressure and the friction up. Ms. Casey feels the coil in her belly tightening, but it won’t snap.

“Helena,” Ms. Casey whispers, “I need more.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes, please.”

“Okay,” Helena lilts to the shell of her ear. 

Her hands move up to snake around Ms. Casey’s midsection. She pulls Ms. Casey upright and she sits down until they’re back-to-front and Ms. Casey is straddling her, legs wide and open to either side.

Helena’s hands steady her for an excruciating duration of time before one trails down from her ribcage to her exposed, almost stinging lips. Helena’s neck is craning over Ms. Casey’s shoulder to try and watch what she’s doing to her—they’re both watching.

Helena’s index and middle fingers slide over her entrance and gently rub up and down. Ms. Casey clenches her teeth and tries not to buck into the contact, knowing her balance is slightly precarious. 

She writhes, feeling Helena’s shirt shift against her back and her lips press into her shoulder. 

Ms. Casey can’t form the words in her head fast enough to process what’s happening to her—she can’t dig up the vocabulary to describe the sensitive bud or what it’s called when it’s squeezed between two fingers—she doesn’t know what parts of this have names and which don’t.

Helena’s movements stay consistent, they don’t waver haphazardly. She’s just working out the kinks where she finds them, a hand still firmly against Ms. Casey’s torso.

Ms. Casey is getting there, the tension is cresting, she’s almost got it—her breath hiccups, tears flow, it’s almost perfect, but Helena stills.

“Casey—”

“I didn’t tell you to stop!” she barks out—she feels Helena jump a little, but she goes back to her work. 

Ms. Casey has to stifle a scream as her orgasm is revived and Helena chuckles into her neck.

“I was just worried.”

Ms. Casey lets out a sob when it finally happens, and it keeps on happening because Helena’s not stopping. Her steadying arm wraps all the way around Ms. Casey’s waist and holds her firmly in place. Ms. Casey grabs the arm to ground herself. She turns her head to press her face into Helena’s hair. 

She inhales, trying to identify a piece of Helena through her scent, but they’ve been using the same motel shower products, sleeping on the same sheets, and moving through the same air; they’re the same.

The climax rolls through her, eventually waning.

“Tell me to stop,” Helena mutters. 

Ms. Casey doesn’t want it to be over, but pleasure is bordering on pain. It’s not until that tangent line is crossed and Ms. Casey is instinctively trying to move away from Helena’s hand, despite being caged in by her body, that she can bring herself to speak.

She can hardly get the words out, her nose is a stuffy from her tears.

“St-stop.”

Instantly, she does. They’re still pressed together, both of Helena’s arms now hugging Ms. Casey close to her. Helena lifts her head to kiss Ms. Casey’s face—she smiles and tears pool in the creases. 

“You’re salted—delicious.”

Ms. Casey laughs wetly and sniffles. Her heart is still beating wildly, the sensation of her climax still draining from her nerves. The comedown only wrecks her more. She’s shivering. Helena lowers her until they’re…spooning, that’s the word. Her brain is finally catching up with her body. Helena’s front is still fast against Ms. Casey’s back. 

Ms. Casey wants to roll over and face her; she tries to, but Helena keeps her where she is. 

“Stop,” Helena sounds suddenly pained.

Ms. Casey supposes she can only play by the established rules. She doesn’t try to turn over again. She lays still when Helena extricates herself to pull the covers up and over them, she only adjusts herself to give Helena better access when her hand rediscovers her breast—this time dipping below the fabric and pinching—and she doesn’t budge when Helena starts touching herself: doing what she did to Ms. Casey and panting into her ear. 

She’s cursing, saying the words Ms. Casey couldn’t retrieve earlier, as she reaches her own conclusion. Helena doesn’t cry like she did, but without looking Ms. Casey can tell she doesn’t smile either. 

In the morning they pack up their things and head in the opposite direction of the field office. Helena throws the phone she’s been carrying out the window as she makes a turn down another long country road. Trees are replaced with reaped fields. The sky, still gray, expands across Ms. Casey’s field of vision.

They skip breakfast—they need the head start before the field office catches on. Ms. Casey’s stomach grumbles, but she doesn’t voice a complaint. She understands. 

She’s reminiscing on their night, closing her eyes and trying to relive it, when she’s thrown forward violently. The seatbelt digs into the meat of her shoulder and her eyes snap open.

There’s a doe mere feet from the front of the car. It’s frozen enough that it forced Helena to break that hard, but it’s gone so quickly that Ms. Casey doesn’t get a solid look at it.

Helena is the one trembling now, “Fuck…scared the shit out of me.”

Ms. Casey tries to respond but she’s as frozen as the deer. The moment stretches even though she knows it’s only a moment. She swears she hears tires squealing and someone screaming, but nothing is there—it’s a phantom. The road moves under them again. 

Ms. Casey wants to go back to her quiet, fond remembrance, but instead of Helena’s lips on her shoulder she feels Mark S’s hand pushing her out the door. She looks across the cabin at Helena, just to check that she’s still there.

She is. They’re both here, in this moment. The next could be another story. Another moment passes and it’s still them. Each one ticks by without escaping Ms. Casey’s notice. It will always be thus—she’ll never take a second of existence for granted. 

Part of her worries that someone like that isn’t really made for indulgence. She was created for a purpose—this is so far beyond it. Then, Helena turns the music up on the center console.

It’s something jaunty with almost flutey vocals. Ms. Casey doesn’t hear the lyrics, just the tune, and she watches the hairs on her arm stand up. She sways and bops subtly to the song. She loves it.`