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[hyperkinesia]

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[arcreact]

Yeah, I'm sure the past two weeks have been tediously free of interruption for you.

[ He pockets his hands, turning to face Bruce. ]

Congrats on the squishy eyeballs. And heart, presumably. [ He jerks his chin towards the stained glass. ] Love what the Ingress has done with the place.

[ Except he says it like "absolutely deplore what the Ingress has done with the place". ]

[hyperkinesia]

You joke, but they really have been. Kept waiting for you to barge in through the door. The department door, that is. [ Not his bedroom god please no. ]

Everything back to being squishy, yes. Thanks. [ Looking around them. ] As far as residual damage goes, it's not so bad. At least it's pretty. [ And it hasn't affected the ship's systems, so. ]

Anyone caught you up on our little adventure at the slave outpost?

[arcreact]

[ Tony rolls his eyes at 'at least it's pretty', but looks away at the question that follows. If he didn't look tense before, he certainly does now. ]

In very vague terms. [ He dutifully ignores any treacherous emotion that feels too much like guilt. ] I trust you were all fantastically heroic and all.

[hyperkinesia]

[ Yeah well, life on board the Moira isn't easy, Tony knows that well enough by now. Bruce counts this little amount of lasting damage as a small blessing, honestly. They could've ended up with much worse problems on their hands. ]

We were, uh... I guess everyone tried to help in what ways they could. [ He presses his lips thinly. ] I'm not sure leaving so many innocent people behind can be considered heroic, but... we didn't have much of a choice. I managed to get some out of there, at least.

[arcreact]

How many was it?

[ Why is he asking when he really doesn't even wanna know the answer? It's a goddamn mystery. ]

[hyperkinesia]

[ Tony doesn't want to know the answer, Bruce doesn't want to tell him either— in fact he hadn't even think about it in those terms until now. He doesn't particularly like to. But since he asks. ]

I don't know. Hundreds, give or take. I don't have a specific number to give you.

[arcreact]

[ Hundreds. Probably better than he was assuming, but that's mostly because he was picturing some kind of fucked up Deathstar full of slaves from across the galaxy. The truth does jack to actually ease any of his agitation over it. ]

Sounds like a great time. [ The sarcasm is practically a puddle on the floor. ] ... I'm glad you made it out.

[ That part, at least, is earnest. ]

[hyperkinesia]

[ Better than expected still doesn't make it better. It could've been worse. Could've been hundreds of thousands or even millions, but the truth is: in a system where there's a whole outpost dedicated to legal human trafficking, the numbers have to be much greater than the ones Bruce is giving Tony. That's just the outpost. Now multiply it for however many stations, ships and cities in all the planets that exist within this system.

The bigger picture in this case is a horrible one. And what can they do? Nothing, pretty much. ]

I'm glad we all did.

[ It's a very small comfort. It's selfish and self-centered too. The ship's fine, the crew's fine, let's just keep flying by as quietly and discreetly as possible and not call any attention to ourselves. It's all very brave and heroic. ]