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[mnt_raph]

Raph's shoulders droop as he stands outside the front door to the Tortise.
It's been nearly two weeks since he told Abigail that he'd be right back. Boy was he mistaken. What was supposed to be a simple return to Milliways for a Security shift became...well far more than that.

Originally he stayed at Milliways out of fear of not wanting to have to explain the magic of the bar to Abigail. Of course if asked he merely said that it was because he was sure he'd change back if only he stuck around for Mike's B Birthday. When that day came and went he started to grow...shall we say a bit concerned.

A bit quickly turned to a whole lot concerned the morning he woke up in Mike's spare bedroom to find that his brother attempting to wrap him head to toe in tinfoil, muttingering something about carbonite and the bounty Jabba had promised in exchange for his safe delivery. Things only got exponentially worse from there.

Raph cringes as he recollects just how bad "worse" actually was.
In the end it wasn't fear of Abigail that kept Raph away, but rather fear of what would happen to Mike if he didn't stay.
Thankfully Leo showed up.

"...never thought I'd be thinkin' that again, that's for damn sure," he mutters to himself, pushing the front door open.

Comments

[mnt_raph]

He buries his face in his hands, then mutters something about really gotta stop saying that. never turns out right.

"Look," he says when he looks up again. "I ain't got no brother Raph, 'cause I am Raph."

[becareful_boyo]

There's another long pause, followed by her laughter.

"Oh, yes. Course y'are." She leans forward, eyes drifting up. "Silly of me t'forget the feel of that lovely thick hair of yours slidin' between my fingers."

Take that, Brother-of-Raph -- he who thinks he can come here and mock her!

"Raph. Nice wig," says Thomas, moving past them with four tankards per hand.

Abigail swings around to watch her brother, then swings back to Raph. Astounded.

[mnt_raph]

Later on Raph will be disturbed by the fact that it was Thomas that recognized him, and not Abigail. But right now? Right now he's just smug.

"Thomas," he greets his near-brother-in-law with a nod. "Why's it always gotta be 'bout the hair?"

[becareful_boyo]

Thomas didn't get a good look at him. Raph's on his favorite stool, talking to Abigail on a busy night when she's got people to help... Assumptions were made.

Abigail looks unsettled. No one else would know to say that, in precisely that put upon tone. Moving fast enough to do Raph proud, she pushes forward off the table and gives his hair a good tug.

It stays on.

"Goddess," she mumbles, close to his (different) face. She spends a moment searching his eyes, before indulging in a fail proof test: a kiss.

Then:

"Where have you been?"

It seems the easiest question to ask first.

[mnt_raph]

Any protests at the hairpulling fall down dead after that kiss.

"Milliways. Kinda got stuck. Circumstances beyond my control, I swear. Wanted to wait 'til this, you know...wore off. But didn't want you to worry."

[becareful_boyo]

Breathing hard and shaky, Abigail focuses on his eyes. Those haven't changed, and she should have seen it earlier; but it's only now, after she's certain that it's him, that she allows herself to admit just how terrified she'd been that Raph was gone. And she wouldn't have said goodbye. Not properly. Part of her had shut down while the rest operated by rote and sheer force of will, waiting for the news she didn't want to hear.

She shakes her head once, trying to clear and reorder her thoughts. He's fine. Well, even. He's younger.

"I thought you were a brother," she says, "come to tell me you'd died."

[mnt_raph]

Raph slips an arm around her waist.

"Even if I'd died I wouldn't send one of my brothers to see you. They'd probably just fuck it up. I'd come back and tell you my damn self. That's a promise."

It's the kind of promise that only a regular at Milliways can make.

"I'm fine, Abs. Really. It's okay. You know, if you don't count my trip into the fountain o' youth."

[becareful_boyo]

"And did you bring some back for me?" she asks, sending him a rueful smile. "People'll start to talk."

Not that she cares. Abigail is annoyed at herself for being blinded by her worry; he's so Raph, even with the hair and body and youth.

And body.

She holds on to him, feeling the differences, the way her arm fits neatly around his waist where it was a stretch before, and frowns again. Well. This is all very odd, isn't it?

"Who's the witch that did this to you?"

[mnt_raph]

"An' here I thought no one in here was hangin' on my every word?" He smirks in that lopsided way of his.

It's odd, how different and yet oh so similar his looks are. His eyes are the same, as are his laugh lines. The nose is oversized, a sign that it hasn't yet been broken, and rebroken, and broken again. And while he's the same size, he's hardly the same shape. Age, recovery, and a few years at the bottom of a bottle gave him a far more turtle'shaped physique than he started with.

Well, not originally started with.

"No witch. The uh...Bar herself kind of...well, she likes to play pranks, an' apparently thinks this one is a riot."

[becareful_boyo]

"Oh." Another frown. "She's got a strange sense of what's funny," asserts the woman who found hitting him over the head with a stool hilarious.

There's no hope for it; she has to keep touching him. First his nose, then his smooth cheek. And so on.

"Your arms!" she gasps at last.

[mnt_raph]

"Preachin' to the choir there," he sighs as he rests his forehead on her shoulder.

Truly it is a short-lived rest.

"Huh? Oh...yeah. It's uh...like I got reset, or something. Shoulder's back. Tattoo's gone." He starts to laugh. "Should've seen me even tryin' to find somethin'd that I'd fit into that didn't look like me wearin' someone elses clothes."

As are most of his more notable scars. Not the silver one though, there's no amount of magic that'll get rid of that one. Though...not it looks remarkably more like a bite mark. A human bite mark, from a not-so-big human.

[becareful_boyo]

"Like new, are you?"

There's a very different gleam in her eyes, now. She pulls on the collar of his shirt, exposing his shoulder. It too gets a kiss, and she smiles.

"I'll have t'have a look."

Someone nearby snickers and makes a rude gesture. She makes an equally rude gesture back.

[mnt_raph]

"You might just at that," he says with a happy sigh. To Raph, she's never more beautiful as when she's telling somewhere where to go, and how to get there.

"So you ain't mad no more, right? Got that whole my takin' a dirt nap thing outta your system?"

[becareful_boyo]

Abigail appears to be considering her answer, and as she does, she gently curls her fingers into his hair -- surprisingly soft and attractively messy -- and makes a pleased sound.

"You're not dead, so I don't have to kill you."

This is what passes for logic in her mind at the moment.

More seriously, as if it's difficult to admit: "It's been harder than I would've thought. Coming back."

[mnt_raph]

That little shiver right there? That was all in Abigail's imagination. Totally not the result of her hand winding through his hair. Just...for the record.

"From Milliways? Not always, but sometimes. Mikey's birthday snuck up on me, and then he got sick..."

[becareful_boyo]

"Not that."

Her smile is audible. That shiver definitely was not her imagination, so she leaves her hand where it is and to what it's still doing.

She could get used to the hair.

"I meant comin' back here and carryin' on servin' ale and grub like nothing happened."

[mnt_raph]

Yeah...this reaction might just have been one of the reasons he took to shaving it all off. Well...that and the receding hairline.

"Oh. That. Yeah."
It's possible that someone is having a hard time concentrating.
Please stand by.

[becareful_boyo]

"Between you tellin' me of the end of the universe and whole worlds existin' elsewhere, and eatin' my supper with the queen, and fightin' beasts with spider bodies and knives for feathers, my mind is full of what's happened, what's happenin' now and what'll happen tomorrow."

Abigail is fully aware she's the only participant in this conversation. Still, it does her good to voice these thoughts aloud, if quietly and near Raph's ear.

"I'm not sayin' I want different for my life than this. But you're the only other person here who knows what I've seen now, and when you're gone..."

One shoulder lifts in a shrug.

"I'm not the same anymore."

[mnt_raph]

His hand finds her free one, and he gives it a reassuring squeeze.
He may not be verbal, but he's not totally out of it.

[becareful_boyo]

Abigail sighs and nods to herself, tossing a warning glare at a patron attempting to relieve himself in a pot by the fireplace. The man rights his clothing, hurries off. She's said her piece and falls quiet, her hand in Raph's hair still, short fingernails brushing his scalp.






"This'll be a handy trick to know," she laughs.

[mnt_raph]

"...tell no one." He eventually manages in a voice just above a whisper.

Eventually, when he can stand it no more, he moves away. One good full body shudder later, and he looks up at her. Familiar brown eyes in a not so familiar face.

"Guess I'll just have to try hard not to be away then, huh?"

[becareful_boyo]

Who would she tell? Thomas is unlikely to want to stroke Raph's hair, and if he did, well, Abigail would have a few choice words for him, anyway.

She rolls her eyes at Raph.

"Words like those're just courtin' trouble with the gods, and you know it. I'll settle for havin' you alive and well." Smirking, she reaches for the spoon and samples the stew, a vision of nonchalance. "So, boyo... Does this youthful appearance of yours come with a younger man's stamina?"

Innocent blink.

[mnt_raph]

Oh. That right there? That's the textbook definition of NOT FAIR. He was already swallowing hard watching her take a bite out of his meal. The question punctuated by the innocent blink?

That's just down right evil, is what that is.

"Excuse me for a second?"

With no more warning than that, Raph shifts his weight on the stool so as to stand on the seat. He places his index finger and thumb in his mouth, and with a whistle that comes standard with every native New Yorker, he gains the attention of everyone in the room.

"FIRE! Everyone out! Move it! NOW!"

[becareful_boyo]

The room quiets quickly, and several jumpy individuals follow orders. A whistle like that can't be ignored, and the people who haven't already figured out Raph's identity look at him with new, grudging respect.

But they also keep drinking, albeit quietly. Waiting to see what happens next.

Abigail starts to grin, then laugh, until she sways to her feet and adds her own voice to the cause.

"You heard the man. That ale'll burst into flames afore you do. Go on, now. Out, and there'll be a drink on the house for everyone here on the morrow."

Thomas can kill her later. Much later.

[mnt_raph]

As far as Raph is concerned Thomas can kill them both, if he wants. So long as the killing doesn't happen until the far side of later.

"It'll be real hard to cash in on those free rounds if you've gotta hobble back on busted legs, is all I'm sayin'. Now get."