But When Worlds Collide

[cargojet]

CHARACTERS: Nathan Petrelli and Lauren Reed
LOCATION: Communications and Holodeck 2
WARNINGS: Dirty dirty smut. No, I'm joking.
SUMMARY: Nathan is on the fly for new recruits. He has a type, and Lauren is a hell of an actress.
NOTES: Back from hiatus. Science Fiction Double Feature is not at all a comment on Ataraxion. But man, that Janette Scott...

It was lucky, all things considered, that people hadn't expected much from communications during the genetics lab debacle; just a network that worked, information that was spotty at best cleared up from half received responses, and eventually the ability to locate missing people. Half of his people had disappeared immediately prior, the others had been missing almost from the beginning, leaving him with all but one to man the stations. Now, even his replacement second in command was gone, leaving Nathan with a remarkably talented computer repairman and a new recruit.

This month he had his fingers crossed that Tranquility Santa would bring him half a dozen eager new hackers with credentials in alien tech and rebooting ancient systems that hadn't run right in god only knew how long. The most ridiculous thing was that in terms of keeping that alien tech running, now it was Nathan who was the best the Tranquility had, and if he left - which he was discovering could happen unexpectedly at any moment - there would be nobody here with a year's experience running these precise systems. He had no doubt someone would take over. Hopefully Spock would come in and piece a few things together, though Nathan had a sneaking suspicion that Stark had had his eyes on the extra computing power and shelf space for a while now.

Okay, maybe that last bit was just paranoia.

In any case, Nathan was going to do his best to stay. Even if it meant straight up telling whoever came to him to ask that he had business to attend to right here, thank you very much, and they could take their offer to the next desperate schmuck willing to abandon their friends on the murder cruise to fend for themselves. Not that there weren't people who'd gone who would have stayed if they could. Tosh probably numbered among them. Nathan just preferred to think he had a choice, that there wasn't some ultimate length to the piece of elastic holding him there that would torque him backward at any moment, so that he could go home, become President and destroy the entire world.

It wasn't a future he was really looking forward to.

Lauren had caught him during a lull. Most of the extensive projects that Nathan had been trying to get through, had been put off until he had the manpower to handle any of it. There was no chance; not with the department down to two-maybe-three. Just keeping the thing running and cooperating with security was a twenty four hour affair.

He probably didn't look his best, either, come to think of it. His suit was patched and worn, his hair overlong, and no longer pushed back neatly. Six days of five-o-clock shadow had built up into something a little thicker, that risked a resurgence into full Robinson Crusoe if he wasn't careful. Fortunately Chuck was talkative enough that the concept of fraternizing with islanders made out of coconuts hadn't occurred to him yet, but he was sure it wouldn't be long.

Was this what a Petrelli could be reduced to? Just a year in space, that's all it would take? Thank God he hadn't qualified to be an astronaut. Too short.

Too expensive.

The sweet accent had softened him up, there was no doubt. Getting back to basics and having his ego stroked about how much he knew about the ship--well, that sure was a way to build up his morale. Besides, he might get a workmate out of it, which made it more than worth the extra effort of fetching his tie out of his pocket and turning his shirt collar down. He stepped out into the corridor, slipping his hands into his pockets, not so much wanting to put across an impression of being eager to go as simply being ready--of not being a man who wasted a single moment.

Well, that was the idea anyway.

Comments

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Settling into the fact that she had business to do was something as easy as slipping into the perfect little black dress that every woman was supposedly meant to own. Not that Lauren had hers here (and not that she owned only one), but it was the feeling that went into it -- putting on the perfect mask and knowing the rest of it would all be forced to fall into place. It would all go according to plan simply because the preliminary steps were all settled and in order, and because she knew exactly what she was doing. She'd done it far too many times, gotten it all right. This should be no different.

It wouldn't be any different.

And while the occasional snag occurred in the back of her mind, a reminder that she'd died elsewhere in the universe, a niggling feeling that if she took the wrong step everything would crumple in on itself, she forced it all back because she had to. No lingering on unnecessary thoughts if she wanted this to go well. She could use it to add extra pout, a simmering quite sadness if necessary, but even that would lead into unwanted territory. She was alive, a fact that shouldn't have to remind herself of, and using actual troubles to accentuate something she could fake as easily as all the rest was a risky maneuver.

She'd lied in her sleep, lied while fucking, lied while doing any number of things and using a crutch would only encourage her to continue doing so. This was her proving grounds, where she fought and where she won, and she was damn good at it. She didn't need the encouragement, and the act itself was almost as much of a reward as the prize. Who didn't want to watch men crumble at their feet. Who wouldn't want to twist them up only to watch them tangle themselves into knots of their own creation.

Lauren wasn't dressed to the nine's, she wasn't capable of doing so, but somehow she made casual look elegant without trying too terribly hard. Maybe it was because she forced her hair to cooperate into tumbling the way it was supposed to when woman got out of bed in commercials. Tussled but only just-so. And the turtlenecks, tailored jeans, were really all she'd been provided in her locker, among a few other odds and ends. There was no way she was wearing the jump suit unless she truly had to, and casual worked well enough for a man who would undoubtedly be looking for something other than a woman in a ironed business suit. She was here to look easy, innocent, unknowing while being just as smart as she needed to be.

Working for the NSC, after all, would earn her points when she mentioned it casually. When it became something they could share, while she managed to remain accessible. Human.

Making her way down the corridor, she tipped her head slightly as she caught sight of the Senator standing outside of the Comm's department, smiling just slightly as she looked him over. A bit scruffy, but she supposed she could forgive him that considering the circumstances. Shrugging her shoulders higher, almost tucking herself shyly away, a moment later there was no hesitation as she walked closer, holding out a hand as soon as she was in his vicinity.

"Lauren Reed. I didn't properly introduce myself before."

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Okay, so the truth was that Nathan hadn't really expected this new effort to be blonde and leggy. At least it made him confident that she was really new. A few months of this and she'd begin to look as ragged as he did. Hopefully that was some way away. She was stunning; god forbid that shine wear off too early.

Nathan's hands had been in his pockets, slobbish and relaxed, but as he snapped to attention at the sight of her, so he slipped both his hands free and clutched hers in return, giving her a bright Senator Petrelli smile, with maybe a touch more aging Italian heartthrob than State Senator.

"Nathan Petrelli; but then you already knew that. You're not quite what I expected."

Letting her hands go, he slid his own up to his chest and brushed down, as though he could erase the last twelve months of wear with his hands alone. No go. His eyes roamed down, and immediately Nathan was stepping past her. It would be much too easy to get carried away, and they were on the spaceship from hell, after all.

Dangerous things, blondes, especially where Nathan was concerned.

"I have a few programs I've worked on over the time I've been here. Scenes from home; places we can go to talk. You ever been to New York?"

He hit the button for the elevator, then turned to lean against the wall beside it.

"Or are you one of these girls who traveled the galaxy before you even set foot on board the Tranquility?"

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Maybe it was the way he stared, or maybe it was the way he stood straighter almost instantly that made Lauren think this would be far too easy. Already primed to prove himself and already interested, Lauren would only have to work so hard. It wasn't as if she'd have to make him fall as well; he could do that well enough on his own.

A small smile set across her lips, looking all too eager and practically doe-eyed towards the man before her and Lauren had already slipped into her well worn mask of the woman looking for a little extra guidance from the man who knew far too much. To man who just wanted to show it all off. Not that some men didn't give it all up when they turned to the bedroom, but before they could get there, pretending to be the defenseless one did the trick. Stroke an ego enough times and it had a habit of getting you places.

She lifted her eyebrows at the comment, but let it slide into something that could have been a joke, well aware she wasn't what most men expected to see. "You're not the first one to express that sentiment." But she said it sweetly, just enough pride and yet still sly to pass the idea that she was more than she seemed, except in all the right ways. She had to have gotten this far somewhere, right? And after Nathan was done seemingly preening himself, hoping to dust off the lingering scent of space and become something fresher, she turned and followed after, close on his heels.

Lauren wasn't going to rub herself against him and puff up her chest, but she'd do everything but. Her move wouldn't be the first -- she'd just leave herself wide open, giving him her full attention as they stood and waited.

"Not the galaxy, no. A better part of Earth, yes. I've only been to New York once, but it hardly counted when it was for work- rather like every other business trip." She lifted her attention for a moment, staring at the lift before her gaze crawled back to Nathan attached to a smile. "It's more likely that I see the inside of a conference room, maybe a hotel if i'm lucky, then the actual city i'm visiting. I've lost count of the number of places i've been to for only a few hours at a time."

She shrugged, pleasantly if anything, not entirely bothered -- she loved her job, what was there to complain about. "All in a day's work."

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Nathan considered her as they waited, still not quite able to take his eyes off the length of her body nor the way her mouth looked as she spoke. It had been what...a year? More. Too long. Easy to tell himself he could switch off because life was so much more complicated? Space, death, a handful of survivors desperately clinging to something remotely normal in a world spinning out of control...?

Maybe this was clinging to something normal? Appreciating an attractive woman probably meant he wasn't taking things seriously enough... Or maybe nothing had tried to kill him recently. That must be it. Four months without immediate risk of death - apart from a serious absence of Jenna's routine dinners - had made him soft.

His eyes flicked away again. She was looking at him with big wide eyes, and Nathan felt as self conscious for looking as her comment assured him that she was more than used to it.

There was an obvious question nestled into her words. It was sat there, willing and waiting: What is it that you do?, but Nathan didn't have it in him to say it out loud. He was sure it would taste wrong on his lips somehow, like he'd dug out someone else's trashy used up pick up lines.

Fortunately the elevator interrupted, and Nathan held the door, following her inside a moment later. At least she wasn't from Neptune, although she still might be from hundreds of years into the future. They'd know when they got up to the Holodeck.

"You must have had some base of operations; somewhere you stayed more often, or perhaps somewhere you grew up? Went to school?" There. Infinitely better, and he didn't end up sounding like a schmuck. Schmoozer, maybe, but it was a label he was learning to live with.

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Smiling and ducking her face for only a moment as she stepped inside of the lift first - 'a gentleman' her mind provided - she nestled herself in against the back wall, making herself comfortable as anyone could be inside of a lift. They always provided for an interesting measure of what anyone was prone to do in a situation made by confinement. Some people clammed up, and some people couldn't shut up, and Lauren quietly chewed on her lower lip as she waited.

Thankfully, she didn't have to wait too long.

It was a roundabout anticipated question, and it made her smile simply because it wasn't so blatant. It wasn't obvious because he was trying to be anything but, as if asking the question that would have led straight to the point was somehow the wrong path to go down.

It was always fascinating, really, beginning to pick apart men she'd set out to take down. It was all part of the puzzle.

"London." The answer is simple enough because it's one she's always prepared to give. It's not as if she has to hunt for an alias every single time; some fake name, fake background story, fake anything. The only thing that isn't real is the other persona she emulates along with the occasional twisted fact. Her background story checks, but it's everything else she has to choose carefully. "It's where I grew up, went to school, lived for a number of years. But Washington and Virginia both hold their own appeal -- much more literal bases of operation."

Lauren, however, could be as vague as she pleased. Pushing for questions to be asked instead of giving up the definitive answers all on her own. If Nathan asked the question, then he was the one that wanted to know the answer, and she curled her hair behind her ear before leaning back, her fingers curling around the railing behind her.

"London still feels most like home."

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Nathan knew that she was studying him with just as much determination, but it wasn't in him to connote that as devious behaviour. He rather thought he was attractive, even dashing, and that was even with his beard. Her attention was something he'd earned simply because he was Nathan Petrelli--they always went for the older brother in the end. Women liked him, they wanted to please him, and Nathan--well, he could work with that.

It had been a while, sure, but he could work with it. Flirting used many of the same muscles as senatorial work did. Self promotion interspersed with the occasional compliment and lie? It was an art form. For now, Nathan lied to himself, too; he told himself that she was working from the same playbook, flirting just as much. Batting her eyelashes and giving all the right signs. Of course, so did hookers whose only purpose were to create video footage of him cheating on his wife. Soft tones and sweet, heartbreaking stories...

Not that there was anything sinister about this young lady. Yes, she suffered from the same trait of being blonde, young and gorgeous, but where there was a world of lies and deceit at home for Nathan to plot his way through, there was nothing here but survival. He had nothing to give her. What good was espionage, after all, on a ship where all their resources were pooled; where they had to be, or else they would never get home?

"New York's mine, thus the haunts. Grew up there, worked there, ran for Congress there. A Republican in a blue state." He smiled, pushed his hands back into his pockets. The elevators were quick, but they had to cover quite some distance.

"This ship is practically a city in its own right. We have maps back in Comms, give you an idea of how big it is, but just to imagine...upright, this place could take the Empire State Building three, maybe four times. Then it's that dense, longer than it is thick, wide as it is high, stretching out every direction from here. Not many people know that. I mean, you can get a feel for it if you get lost in the corridors, but you can get lost in a hotel's corridors. It's not easy to imagine the size just from that."

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Averting her gaze up towards the ceiling as Nathan spoke, sometimes Lauren wasn't entirely putting on a show. Her mind spun around facts -- her spacial perception was in no way flawless, but attempting to piece together vital information with regards to the infrastructure of the ship itself was still important. Needing to know more than everyone else was important, or at least managing to be one of the few that held on to it. And while she could amplify her interest into something that was a little more fascinated than business-like, it was still information she was filing away. Every little piece was worth something.

"I admit, I haven't taken the time to look at nearly as much as i'd like to, but I wasn't even aware it was that large."

Dropping her gaze back down, she only let faint worry settle across her features for another second before it faded away. Acting like a poor, pitiful lost lamb would be a bit much -- she worked for the NSC, claiming she couldn't take care of herself would be too unbelievable. But she could still express worry without throwing it so far overboard that she sunk herself along with it.

"I've really only seen the gardens and some of the more frequented areas. And i've already been told to keep from straying too far out of bounds, but really, doesn't someone need to know what's in the rest of the uncharted territory? How are we supposed to keep anyone safe when we don't even know what to expect? Not that i'm insisting I be the one to head that particular search party, but someone has to find out. There might even be something helpful out there, something that could take us back home."

If there was one thing the NSC provided for, along with an undercover job, was something that could give her lies definition. She was supposed to be in this for the good of the people and she sighed quietly, glancing towards the floor for a moment to seemingly collect herself before she once more looked up, nudging out an almost embarrassed, shamed smile for her minuscule outburst. "I'm sorry, I just don't like the idea that we're meant to wait, entirely unaware, for the next catastrophe."

In other, unspoken words: I don't feel safe.

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Nathan had to reassure her. It was in his nature to be reassuring when faced with horrors. There were places of safety, places that could be protected, where there were other people whose jobs it was to look after them--and then there were places that weren't.

"It's really not that surprising that we haven't explored it all. If you had two hundred people, and you organised them into a working force, you still couldn't search every room in Brooklyn in a year, let alone all of New York City. That's without the corridors rearranging themselves, the man eating monsters, and the usual rate of people disappearing without any explanation--never mind that anyone who gets really lost comes back messed up one way or another."

That last bit wasn't strictly out there as far as information went. It was a developing hunch, half implied by those who'd returned so far, half learned from his conversation with Jenna. Nobody came back quite the same, there was always something taken; their sanity, their freedom to eat what they pleased, their eyes - but not their sight. It didn't matter. It was as good a warning as Nathan needed not to go looking for trouble. Nothing this Forever Room, as Jenna had called it, could take from him, would be worth the trade. Information would trickle down as it always did, and Nathan would collect it, as he always did, and the only thing he'd sacrifice was time.

He slipped a hand free to place it on Lauren's shoulder.

"You've been to New York, but you've seen arrivals at JFK and the inside of a hotel. There's places in New York you wouldn't want to sprint through in daylight, let alone at night, surrounded by monsters, and you wouldn't want to hang around long enough to orient yourself. At least in New York the streets are numbered, so you know more or less where you are, and how far you have to go to get to safety.

"This place is like a city. It's got its no go zones, and it's got its safe places, and so long as you stay put around other people I can promise you you're gonna be fine. It's not an exact art but... Well, that's the reason why nobody goes out there trying to map the bad side of town, you know? Too busy right here, keeping people like you and me safe."

At last the lift door opened, and Nathan motioned toward the corridor.

"This is as far out as it's safe to go. There's a few rooms reclaimed beyond the holodecks, mostly where we keep equipment, chairs, etcetera, but I wouldn't go any further than that."

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The hand on her shoulder said far more than anything else when she sifted through the wash of words Nathan gushed in her direction. It wasn't a massive annoyance, no, but he was being purposefully comforting, and it was exactly what Lauren had been trying to finagle out of him. Amusingly enough it hardly took anything at all and she stood, seeping in the commentary and letting herself believe in all he had to say on the matter. As if she really did believe -- not everything took effort.

Some lies were seamless, not even thought through, simply established. It was safer to stay away, it was safer under the ruse of other people's protection.

The lift door opening saved her from having to say much of anything in response, or at least anything that might cover more of what Nathan had specifically said with regards to monsters and New York city streets. And despite the fact that she'd already heard, it still made her want to roll her eyes with irritation. Never send a man to do a woman's job, her mother would say, but Lauren offered a small nod as she followed after Nathan, her fingers trailing against the door to make sure it stayed open.

"You wouldn't, or you wouldn't want anyone else to? Or would you like to refrain from commenting on that particular question?"

Scooting up nearly alongside of him as the walked, she flashed him a smile, blatantly teasing in an attempt to drive the conversation back away from the things that went bump in the night.

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"I've only done my fair share of gallantry. I tend to try to avoid getting myself into unnecessary trouble. That's more my brother Peter's style."

He did however smile at her as though to say that any question in regard to his courage was an unnecessary one. He was quite courageous, thank you very much, but he had a shark's courage rather than anything else. He was a politician, after all.

Nathan led the short distance down the hall and ducked close to the machine to begin loading the program. It took almost a minute, but then Nathan was setting his device against it, loading in a connection straight to the machine so that he could alter the program from inside the holodeck with his own comms device. A useful trick, that one.

"This way."

He motioned inside, then stepped in--and they stepped out onto a sunny plaza, the sound of traffic and tourists chittering, the coos of pigeons that were eating crumbs thrown by bright eyed children. Four massive lions lay reclined at the foot of Nelson's column, and banner like exhibition signs at the gallery's open doors. Trafalgar Square in summer splendour.

Nathan had never been here; he'd picked out the first 'London' title on the list, and so here they were. The sunshine made her look stunning, he thought, his eyes moving back to her so that she didn't get lost in the setting.

"Is it anything like you remember?"

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She knew that smile, if only because it was one her own father had flashed now and again. Except admitting that her own father was a senator wasn't something she would be too quick to admit to, if only because she had no interest in epitomizing the daddy fetish. The woman desperate to find comfort in a man that would replace a father figure -- no thank you, she had far better interests in mind. Besides, she wanted no part of a daddy figure in the first place. Her own work with the government was an entirely different story, and one she'd give up eventually, but her father would be kept neatly out of picture.

Just like the rest of her family, despite Nathan bringing up his own brother.

Staying quiet as she followed along, when they stopped she paid far more attention to what it was that Nathan was doing than anything else, practically pushing up onto her toes to glance over his shoulder, leaning almost against his arm -- getting as close as possibly with any blatant intention. Glancing back and forth between his device and Nathan's face, intent on what he was doing, Lauren was carefully inquisitive about the entire process, as truly interested as she was practically keeping track of Nathan's every move.

Only a moment later, she was following after him, stepping inside beside him and... was admittedly impressed. Eyes widening, it took her a moment to get past her initial shock. It wasn't just the bright sunlight that immediately settled across her face, it was the immediacy of something so real, and yet so far away. It wasn't quite like being told that she'd died in Julian's past, but it was like walking into her own past. Truly. And while it sat oddly in the pit of her stomach - inhuman, in a way - she couldn't deny there was something comforting about it, a feeling she was quick to try and shove somewhere else as she looked back towards Nathan with a smile that seemed barely contained. She'd told him this was her home after all, and she let go of a contended sigh, as if it was only here she could let her hair down.

"It's exactly like I remember. I've returned enough times for holidays and vacations, and this.. it looks no different. Nothing's out of place- it's brilliantly real." Taking a slow turn on the spot, leaning this way and that as if to see how far this falsified world extended, her attention flew back to Nathan after only a few more moments, bright-eyed and freshly excited. "And we could go anywhere?"

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Nathan's attention could have been drawn to the environment, after all he'd never been here, but he knew that he was taking big steps toward actually impressing her. The way she smiled was such as promised that she was genuinely caught up in it all. She looked as though a wisp of wind might catch up her hair and let her loose it, lose her inhibitions and the static harshness of a woman bourne into some kind of office profession. Being home delighted her, just as his visits to New York, albeit a holographic version, delighted him.

He should bring all his dates here.

Nathan restrained himself from rolling his eyes as his own mind wandered, and instead he pushed his hands down into his pockets, looking again up at the flags lifting in the breeze. It gusted against them, as fresh and real as stepping out into the air themselves, but Nathan knew it was all an illusion, brought to life by the complicated machinery. He could even feel the warmth of the sun, often a welcome relief, considering how trapped they were up in this hideous vacuum; a reprieve.

When his eyes slid back to her, it was clear that he was already feeling better. The effect was instant. When was the last time he'd been here? Weeks ago, for sure.

"Anywhere at all. My favourite spot is a few blocks above Rockefeller, but there's everything from the Oval Office to alien sunsets in the machine, and the scope to build more if you have the talent for it."

He motioned toward the gallery.

"Shall we? You'd probably be surprised just how detailed this place is."

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Lauren wasn't supposed to be fascinated -- by the Holodeck, not by Nathan. The senator was fascinating in his own right, only because he was a game that she was still learning the rules of; he was something to be solveed. But Lauren had expected that much to be true. Just like it had been true every other time she'd been sent to reel in a man, but this was something entirely different. Technology like she'd never seen, and even if she didn't consider London to be her home, it was rather pleasant to believe, if only for a few minutes, that she wasn't in space. That reality had chosen to make sense again.

Forcefully, she settled herself somewhere between thrilled but calm, a smattering of mental focus that was meant to overlap the excitement but not entirely blur it out. She was a woman molded from grace; it was how she was supposed to behave in the first place.

"I don't think I have much of a need to see the Oval Office." She offered Nathan the cheekiest of smiles, just on the other side of prideful, as if her job had been Plan A all along, "Working for the NSC does have its benefits."

There, she'd said it, tipping her chin up just a little after she'd finished. Not too much flaunting, but just enough to seem as if she was trying to go toe-to-toe, impressing upon the point that she wasn't just a girl he could knock over and move on. She was made of something, had substance, could handle being told things he might not tell anyone else.

She offered up a nod, sidling along closer, though walking tentatively, unsure as to what the floor might actually do as they moved -- in all truth, she had no idea what the entire place was going to do, but it only added to her charm. A convenient means to have Nathan show her the way.

"I can see how accurate it all truly is. Up close and personal."

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Now that was certainly something. The NSC? Nathan had good reason to pause, looking up at her as she tilted her chin away, clearly proud of herself, defiant almost. He didn't blame her. It was definitely something, and not the work of any common little girl. Of course, he knew that she was something, even if he hadn't been sure exactly what at first. A bureaucrat's daughter, perhaps.

She impressed him, and he made sure that she knew just how much by smiling and ducking his own chin, practically obsequious.

Nathan pushed his hands a little deeper into his pockets, far too tempted to take her by the arm as they walked across the square, as though he could claim her--as though he had the right. The looming lions overlooked the corners of the plaza, and they strolled out across it and then across the paved road to the steps on the other side. Leading the way up, Nathan held the door open for her, though he looked her in the eye at last as she stepped inside.

"I'd say that working for the NSC has more benefits than just visiting the Oval Office." A pause, and he stepped into the gallery behind her. There was a vast foyer, and the gallery began in two directions, its walls a soft, undistracting cream, each picture tastefully lit. Down through a number of the rectangular rooms, a larger image invited the viewer down toward it.

"Did Caffrey happen to mention what work I did for the US Government, while he was snubbing my being a Senator? No, of course not." A smile, and Nathan nodded down the corridor. "I'd been Head of Homeland Security for a few months, under special orders from the President himself."

He pulled his hand from his pocket to rub the back of his neck. "What sort of work did you do with the NSC, specifically?"

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Somehow, fantastically enough, this was going far better than even she had planned for. It was as if everything was slipping directly into place, perfectly setting the scene for abusing power and then trying to worm her way underneath both Nathan himself (or perhaps on top in that case) as well as the information he might have just waiting at his fingertips. Nathan seemed all too impressed by her job and that unto itself meant something. It made her that much more alluring without striking too powerful of a chord and if she played it just right, it wouldn't make her domineering so much as simply impressive. It was an automatic enhancement when she didn't even look her best.

Strolling along, Lauren remained quiet, admiring the scenery and trying to ignore the way it all rumbled like home beneath her feet. Her feelings on that particular matter had to be tucked neatly under her control, so when Nathan finally opened the door for her and flashed her an entirely invested look, she could offer him a quiet little smile, almost tucked away but obvious in her eyes before she forced herself to look away first, pulling that much more of a forced shy smile.

Inside, her attention was immediately driven upwards, even as Nathan spoke, admiring the gallery's surrounding walls, the frames settled neatly on the walls. It was a sight she'd seen any number of times, but she could still pretend to drift into it, as if the walls were singing a lullaby. Holding on to the atmospheric feel of it all until the properly timed moment, she whirled her attention back around at the mention of Nathan's working for Homeland Security. Eyes widened, she gave obvious pause. Nathan was bragging - blatantly - but she could play the impressed role far to easily. Anyone under special orders by the president was obviously important, and if she pretended it wrapped her around Nathan's finger, that was all that mattered.

"Caffrey didn't mention that part of it, no. That's hardly just being a Senator, never mind any snubbing. But of course, why point something out when it only turns you into a hypocrite. He just didn't want to make himself sound the fool." Voice almost breathy -- awe tinged her tone, until she glanced away, biting at her lower lip. It was all a tease, really, as if she wanted to kiss him simply because he was just that good already, and she took a few slow steps away, heading towards a piece of art before he shot her another question.

Smiling easily, she tucked her hair behind her ear, standing on edge as she turned back, waiting for Nathan to work his way closer on his own terms. "I'm the liaison for the CIA. I try to split my time equally between both agencies, but sometimes there just aren't enough hours in the day. But I do love my job, I wouldn't trade it for anything."

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It was an incredibly useful job, and Nathan could see that it would serve him too, if he could at least convince Lauren to hover on his periphery. She didn't have to join Comms, but he could imagine her being useful doing the same job for him as she had done at home. Liaison. Interdepartmental cooperation was a dream; Nathan would kill for it to be a reality.

He flushed immediately at the way she looked at him, in awe of his accomplishments. It was a flush of desire, yes, but perhaps embarrassment too, recognising that he had sounded like he was bragging and humiliated that he had stooped so far to impress her.

Okay, maybe not humiliated. He'd take a certain amount of embarrassment, prostrate himself to the right people, and kiss as many babes and babies as necessary to achieve his ends.

When she moved away, he didn't hesitate for more than a heartbeat before following after her, bumping his left shoulder against her right as he stood much too close. She was drawing him in, but he was more aware of himself than he was of her; yes, she was giving him all the right signals, but a woman could look at Nathan in the street and he would see it as a signal.

She smelled wonderful, this close up. A waft of fragrance reached him as she pushed her hair back over her ear, and Nathan's lip quivered into a smile.

"I can't imagine the odds you must have faced to achieve what you have. Quite insurmountable, I'd imagine."