You Might Need Some Serious Counselling

I really feel bad for Emma, at times :( She's so easily shaken, when it comes to emotional/relationship stuff. She tries her best, but her closest friends are just not the right ones to help in these matters. 

***

There was an urgent knock on the door that took them both by surprise. Audrye's curls tickled his cheek as she turned her head towards the door. Nigel wished that he could hold on to her a while longer, but didn't give it much of a chance. Not with a knock like that.

"Open the hell up, V! Now!" a woman shouted through the door while still banging the woodwork.

Audrye slipped away from his lap, where she had been sitting, legs parted. He let his hands slide off her clothes, surrendering to the needs of the soldier. Readjusting her skirt on her way, Audrye opened the door for a bruised woman who dragged in a beat-up man behind her.



"Help Foxtrot", Emma ordered the healer. The soldier herself stumbled over to the kitchen counter, leaning on it for support. Audrye carefully turned the thief over, revealing his blood-covered face. Grimacing at the sight, she placed her hands on his skin. Matt moaned at the pain of her touch. So he was still alive under all that, good.

As light blue shimmer started to glow under her hands, Nigel turned his attention to Emma. She was barely standing. Apparently carrying the thief to safety had drained her adrenalin. He got up from the couch and approached the cupboard now assigned as a liquor cabinet.

"So it didn't go well, then?"

He received a tired grin as a first reply. Then she managed a shrug and a wave of hand to belittle the damage they had received.

"Oh, it went well, all right. At the risk of sounding very clichéd, you should see the other guys." She then became more serious as she continued: "We did meet more... opposition than expected, though."

Weston-Pryce had really stepped up after the change in management. Just as lord Zaphikel had suggested, he had taken a more proactive stance to being a White Knight. He had arranged for everyone to keep a closer eye on suspicious events and actively seek them out themselves. And while the man himself was busy being a copper, Emma and Matt had taken the role of clean-up. They had found news of underground fight-clubs, where people ended up with not just broken jaws, but cracked skulls, with brains squishing out. The soldier and the thief had gone there today to root out the Crusher cultists from the regular people who just liked to get their teeth smashed in.

Emma gladly took the glass of cognac offered to her. On the floor, Matt was feeling his nose, which no longer was crooked to the side, while Audrye was dealing with his other wounds.

"You have internal bleeding, Matty. Stay still!" she commanded him.

"Ungh", the man moaned in reply. His eyes drifted towards Emma.

"You'll need some better medicine than that, Uniform", he wheezed.

"I'm fine. We'll take care of you first."

Matt leaved it at that.

"Sorry for interrupting your intimate moment though", he said to his hosts.

"What... What are you talking about?" Nigel stammered, looking revealingly flustered.

"Wipe off the lip gloss, nerd, strawberry is not your colour."

Nigel's hand darted to his lips, feeling the sticky substance on them. Wiping it off on the back of his hand, he tried to conceal his embarrassment by ducking his head into the fridge, getting a drink for himself as well.

Matt screamed in pain as Audrye had dug her fingers inside him, through a wound on his side. Her face was stern, keeping him steady with her other hand, although Nigel could see sweat forming on her forehead.

Emma quickly knelt beside them, worry over the thief written plainly on her face.

"Hold him down. This won't take much longer", Audrye instructed her and she obeyed.

"Something else I could do?" Emma asked, agitated. Matt managed to pry one of his eyes open to look at her.

"You could kiss me better", he sneered. Emma frowned, not agreeing with his sense of humour.

"Then give me something else to think about instead of Ads prodding inside me," he grunted.

"Well... I... I've been thinking of getting a new tattoo", Emma tried to say conversationally.

"Really now? Something particular?"

"You could call it that. Hell, Foxtrot, all tattoos are particular!" She couldn't keep the grin from her face though. A very sweet grin, the type she reserved only for one person. This wasn't missed by the thief.

"Let me guess... Ungh!" he was interrupted by Audrye twisting at his wound, "A heart with a 'Daniel' on it?"

Emma rolled her eyes.

"I'm not that tacky."

"You're going to get a tattoo for Danny?" Audrye looked up from her work, squeeing at the prospect of romantic things to happen. She would be the type to think of tattoos as romantic gestures, after all. Nigel sighed. He felt the probability of himself being dragged to sit under the needles again rising.

"Addy! Concentrate!" Matt groaned, snapping her attention back to the bleeding man.

"Describe it to me", the thief then asked Emma. The moment of hesitation on her part let Nigel interrupt them.

"Do we really need to discuss this right now? We should just patch you up as quickly as possible. We don't want Emma to look like a victim of domestic violence, now do we?"

"It's not that bad, is it?" the soldier asked with a worried expression, touching her face with her gloved hand and then wincing at the shock of pain.

"You're going to have a black eye if we don't get that taken care of", Nigel stated bluntly.

"It does feel sore..." she mumbled, frowning.

"All right, Matty, how're you feeling?" Audrye asked the man laying on the carpet. She wiped her forehead with the back of her hand, leaving a smear of fresh blood on it. Red drops were dripping from her fingertips.

"Like hell!" exclaimed the thief, trying to lift himself up.

"No, actually, I feel great", he then continued, sounding too amazed at his healed condition. Nigel shook his head. Why did Audrye's abilities remain so unappreciated among the London Knights? As if doubting whether she had finished the job properly, Matt went through his body, seeking out any missed wounds or broken bones. After a satisfied inspection, the man jumped up, rejuvenated. Quite literally.

"Oh, Ems, we need to do something about you too. Can't have Danny seeing you like this!" Audrye now turned her attention to the soldier.

"Yeah, he'll ground you", Matt smirked, "keep you as a house-wife."

Emma stuck her tongue out to the man.

"No he won't. D knows that this is dangerous work and I have his confidence to do it right", she argued. Nigel had to agree with her. Weston-Pryce didn't have any trouble sending her on these missions as he shouldn't have. She had good merits as a mercenary and she had lived through them. Not unscathed, but breathing and functional.

"I'm not going to turn down healing", Emma continued, "but A, please go wash your hands before you come near me though. I don't want Foxy's insides all over me."

Audrye seemed to notice the blood just now. Nodding in agreement, she swooshed away to clean herself up.

"I'm not carrying any diseases, if that's what you're worried", Matt said, sounding insulted.

"With your lifestyle, one can't be too careful", Emma rubbed it in, but her lopsided grin gave away that she wasn't serious, "Have you ever even gotten tested, Foxy?"

"Oh, I'm bosom buddies with the nurse at the local health care centre", Matt replied arrogantly, "And who knows what exotic bugs you've gotten on your travels, Uni!"

"Me... I'm clean", she said boldly, "We both got tested when we switched from rubber to pills."

Matt chuckled.

"So he trusts you to not get shot in action, but not to keep safe in the sack?"

"It's common sense, Foxtrot!" the woman sighed, giving him a gentle punch to the arm.

"And what about you, hacker-boy?" the thief started, looking at Nigel, but then grinning devilishly, "Never mind, I don't think you'd have this issue..."

Nigel felt like growling to the other man, but kept his cool, if only barely. Apparently his lack of sense of humour in this subject was not lost on the thief, since he quickly turned his gaze back on Emma.

"So, Uniform, tell me about this tattoo you're getting."

Enthusiasm shone on her face, even under the bruises.

"I'm thinking of a text, plain but elegant", she explained, "I've thought it over and I'm going to go with 'Mon Chevalier Blanc', in white letters."

Nigel went through his limited French vocabulary in his head. Matt just stared at the woman.

"It's 'My White Knight'", Nigel finally translated to him, "Right?" He confirmed from Emma, who nodded.

"I know what it means", the thief said, irritated. Now there were two people looking at him with a quizzical look.

"Don't you think... that it's a bit too much?" he ventured.

"What do you mean?" Emma asked him, not understanding his point.

"That's... that's pretty deep, ain't it? I mean, a heart with a name is something you get on a whim and regret later. But that's no joke. You're being serious about him", Matt wondered. Nigel looked at the dazed man in amazement. How could this come as a surprise to him? Emma was just as baffled.

"Of course I'm serious!" she snorted, "I wouldn't be playing around for this long. I took him to meet my mother, we even got a dog, for fuck's sake. Well, not literally, that'd have been a weird compensation..."

"Yeah, you got yourselves a furry baby, but what does that really say? You haven't known him for that a long time, fucked him for even less. Has he ever given you a sign of commitment?"

"Of course he has!" now she sounded genuinely hurt, "He... That time..."

Her voice trailed off as she searched her memories for something concrete to grasp. Nigel felt sorry for her. Matt was looking more and more triumphant.

"D said that he loves me", she finally said defensibly.

"I tell that to every other girl I sleep with. The other half are sluts who don't need that lie", the thief shrugged.

"He... He didn't turn away from me once he knew, about my arm. And he has supported me ever since." Insecurity was seeping through her voice.

"Does he know?" Nigel asked out of curiosity. Now if she had really told him, that'd be certainly something. "Not just about the arm. It really doesn't take that much to accept a cyborg limb, Emma. But about how you got it?"

"Didn't you and Queenie get it for her?" Matt asked, puzzled, "Why's that so important?"

Emma shook her head vigorously to Nigel, trying to stop him from saying it. Nigel ignored it. He didn't really get why the thief was so adamant about this tattoo being something so special, but he wanted her to really think it through, rather than regret it later.

"You haven't said anything about it, to anyone, have you?" he asked quietly. Emma bit her lip. That was enough for an answer.

"It was something very traumatic for her", Nigel explained to Matt, in a lecturing tone, "If she really trusted him, she should have been able to tell him about it."

"It's not about trust!" Emma was frustrated with the two ganging up on her.

"I... I just... I can't talk about it! I... feel sick even thinking about it..." She was indeed holding in a gagging reflex.

"All right, Uniform", Matt consoled her, "We'll leave it at that. I'll be ready to hear the story, though, when you're ready."

Emma gave him a look of both gratitude and tears.

"But just how serious are you with Danny-boy? Are you going to, what, marry him? Have real babies?"

"Don't be daft..." she replied weakly.

"No proposals in sight, then? Bummer, I was looking forward to nail some bridesmaids. No, I take that back! Your bridesmaid choices would have been limited to Ads, Ali and Willoby here, so... No, sorry, Nigel's not my type and I'd get myself killed for either of the other two."

"Give her a break, will you", Nigel snapped at him. The thief was upsetting Emma, in alarming amounts. She was looking at her feet, shaking her head slightly.

"It's not like I could ever wear an engagement ring, anyway", she said quietly, silencing the men with her sorrowful tone, "I'd pretty much short-circuit myself, or something. And a baby... I don't think I'd be able to have one..."

She looked up, locking eyes with Matt. He looked trapped by her stare, only now realizing how much he had hurt her by his words.

"But a tattoo, it'd be something I can get. I could carry it with me, reminding me of these days, even if it falls apart with D."

Matt looked too scared to say anything.

"Then you should get it. For yourself", Nigel suggested gently.

"I dunno if it's a good idea any more", she replied, sighing, "I don't know if I can go through with it."

"Yes you can!" Matt tried to redeem himself, "I'll go with you! For moral support, you know."

He seemed eager to lift her spirits and got a weak grin as thanks. But in the end, Matt Quill was not one to support relationship commitments.

"But maybe just get 'Chevalier Blanc'? You are a White Knight, after all, no point in declaring him yours if he hasn't given you permission to it. 'White Knight' in French will scream 'Daniel' enough as it is."

"Maybe you're right..." she admitted.

"Good grief blood is difficult to wash off!" Audrye exclaimed cheerfully as she returned, all freshened up. It was a welcome distraction for all three of them.

"Now let's pretty you up for Danny, eh, Ems?" she smiled kindly.

After the two had left, while calling to the Mexican for tips on a good tattoo place, Nigel surprised Audrye by wrapping his arms around her, pulling her close.

"I'm yours, you know", he said to her baffled face. She quickly recovered though.

"Of course you are, silly! You else would you belong to?" she snickered. He smiled to her, hugging her tightly. Who else indeed?