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[ Claire feels her face scrunch up, almost a physical reflection of the sound of her voice. ]

Right, too bad for comms and medical.

[ It's childish and stupid and she's taking it out on the wrong person and Claire knows that. She regrets her tone and the look she knows is on her face the moment she lets both of them surface, but damn it she is sick of losing the both of them. With Nathan especially she felt like she had been handed another chance when the last one that she'd had ended up being a complete fabrication. He has to go home and keep on being dead or go wherever anyone goes after they leave this loop in time and space. And Peter she almost doesn't trust to function without her ability to check in on him. It's doing him a disservice but she's feeling cynical so she just indulges it.

As for Severus, she kicks herself and digs her fingertips into her eye sockets to dispel some of the tension that has built up there. ]

Sorry. You're right. Comms and medical are completely screwed. And anyone who got used to Nathan calling them an ass is going to have something distinctly lacking in their life.

[ If she wants to yell at him, that's fine. He doesn't know what else to offer. He doesn't really know how to react, either, so Severus just stares at her for a moment and tries to make heads or tails of the situation. ]

He wasn't calling you an ass. [ Which sounds a little weird and off-kilter in his accent. But the point is--

she's still going to have something distinctly lacking in her life. And like Nathan wasn't hurling insults at her, Severus didn't go down and check on departments. Just Claire. ]

[ She doesn't want to yell at him, is the thing. She just wants to yell at someone. And since Sylar isn't here to take her frustrations out on by stabbing him in the face with a pencil and because no one else has asked, Severus gets the brunt of it by default. For a moment, Claire chews on her lip, unsure if she's going to start crying or just start shouting. She doesn't do either, fortunately, though it does take her a moment longer to reply than she might otherwise. ]

Peter's always gonna be there. No matter where I go or what I do or who he decides to forgive this week, it doesn't matter. Nathan's just... gone. And he was gone for a long time before we buried him, and now he's gone again. I should be more upset about it, but I'm not even really that sad. I'm just angry. [ Claire hears the lifts in the distance, and it's a stark reminder that she is standing with her door open, half-yelling at the chief xenogen officer. She moves to the side a bit. ] Do you want to come in?

[ The sudden reminder that Black or Lupin could pop up at any moment prompts him to nod and step inside, glancing down the hall as he does. No one's visible. The last thing this moment needs is a fight with a third party, no matter how much tension it might relieve.

Once inside-- ] Maybe I shouldn't have bothered you, [ he says quietly, sounding a little apologetic but at least not uncertain about having shown up. He decides he would have even if he was sure it was a bad idea, too worried about her having vanished along with the Petrellis.. ] I'm sorry. About Nathan.

[ Claire lets the door slide shut behind them and leans against it with her hands pressed into the small of her back. A little bit of the front she's been putting up slips and dislodges and allows her to look like an actual human being rather than a blank slab of skin and bone. The corners of her mouth pull down, just a twitch and then it's gone. She's learned over time that obvious emotion has its time and place, and she's too old and become desensitized to too much to be crumpling at the drop of a hat. ]

Thanks. [ Using her fingertips, she pushes herself off of the door and takes a seat on the edge of the mattress. She keeps hoping that maybe her dorm sheets will show up in her locker so she can trade the issued ones out. ] You aren't bothering me. If I really put some effort into it, I could probably turn everything you say, nice or otherwise, into an argument at this point. That's not your fault. Losing people just sucks.

You can argue if you want. [ Scream while he happens to be here, if not at him. He understands being angry all too well. Severus has weaponized his anger, but that's not advice he can give her. ]

I know.

[ War. Life. The TQ. Everyone he's 'lost' has died. ]

It's fine, honestly. I don't want to turn everything into argument. [ Claire blinks heavily and lets out an exasperated sound. ] Okay, it's not fine, but I've been through this before with Nathan when it was a lot more real. I buried him. I mourned for him. It was easier to remember the stupid stuff or funny he would say about the college I'd chosen or people I'd dated than him being gone at all. Even here, I always knew he was gone and that this was just some kind of... layover. It was just a pause button on the inevitable. So it's less about being sad and more about just being disappointed that it's done. I mean, I wasted so much time here not knowing how to approach him or what to say to him because I knew, back home I knew he was already dead and that he had been for a lot longer than I thought.

[ That probably doesn't make a lot of sense without context. Claire remembers Noah standing in her doorway, trying to inch his way back in after that one big truth had been exposed, how she'd said she needed time to grieve without being reminded why. She's already mourned Nathan, been through that whole process and come out intact on the other side. There isn't as much of a reason to be angry here, and the only thing she has to mourn is the lost opportunity. ]

I should have spent more time with him, that's all. I realize that now.

[ Severus sits down slowly as she's talking, listening. He should say he understands, that Lily's dead, that it's been years and he doesn't know what to do - but of course he doesn't really understand. Nathan loves - loved? - Claire. Lily is terminally forgiving but he knows that even now it's not going to be the same. ]

Are you going to be all right?

I'll be fine.

[ It's said resolutely, and she really does believe it. She was fine the last time anything like this reared its ugly head, and she'll be fine this time. Peter's the one she's always had to worry about. ]

At least now I know neither of them are going to get... I don't know. Chopped in half the next time the ship decides to throw a temper tantrum.

[ Besides, Nathan deserves a break. ]

[ If she says she'll be fine, then-- okay, she'll be fine. Her reasoning is sound enough. He's not sure anyone can be pleased with the situation, but that she's okay is. Good. He thinks. ]

It's a small miracle they vanished during the jump, [ he observes, on the subject of getting chopped in half, ] and not anything else. I'm still not sure I believe the lack of fatalities from that whole ordeal.

[ The fact that they were lucky during this last round of atrocities to avoid anything like what other people went through isn't lost on her. And the memory of Shepard and Javik and what happened to them isn't so far enough away as to not be a reminder of what could have happened. In all the ways they could be gone, this is the kindest. Listening to him, she knows that for a fact. ]

I think my pride suffered a few fatalities. I actually had tissues shoved up my nose. [ Now is probably not the time for wisecracks. It's just easier than actually dealing with this much gravity all at once. ] I'm sure there's some kind of explanation behind it. No idea what it might be, but maybe it's like that whole looking a gift horse in the mouth mentality.

[ A small smile flickers over his face, brief. Yeah, her pride did take a hit, probably - tissues up her nose and sharing a cot with a greasy Slytherin traitor. (No he doesn't actually think she thinks that he doesn't know how to handle any of this oh crap) ]

Evil nanites. [ His tone is dry and more than a little resentful. ] Something injected different nanites into us, and it started programming people into whatever all of that was. Which is why we had to go through the extractions. Why, and who, remains a mystery.

[ Has Severus mentioned how much he hates muggle tech, because he really hates muggle tech. Who the fuck even invented nanites. What a dick. ]

[ Claire doesn't even know who invented nanites. Are they a real thing where she comes from? She has no idea but anything that can change the structural composition of a bunch of people who aren't even from the same universe, who can mess with her cells and genes enough to actually make her sick when she hasn't been sick since she was a toddler, is nothing she wants to be screwing around with. Or maybe it is everything she wants to be screwing around with if it means finding some answers.

Not that she's interested in being a guinea pig, just that figuring it all out might be interesting. ]

Attack of the Evil Nanites. Sounds like a really bad sci-fi channel movie. [ She curves the palms of her hands over the edge of the bunk, leaning all her weight forward. ] Do you think that means there's something that can actually survive outside of the jump that did this to us? Or maybe the ship pumped it into the blue stuff while we were sleeping.

[ She absolutely thinks that the ship is alive, just for the record. ]

[ Attack of the Evil Nanites prompts him to shrug. He tried to follow it, but gave up. He gets the basics of what happened, but in his opinion, everything about it fails to make any sense whatsoever under the lightest bit of scrutiny. Privately he's not convinced anything they did had an impact, given the miraculous survival of everyone. ]

Things can survive. Plants, insects. That young woman Jaye transfigured herself into an insect and stayed out once, supposedly it lasted a full year, and permanently disturbed her.

[ Pleasant thoughts with Professor Snape. ] Any number of things could go on during that time.

[ The part of her that hurled herself in front of cars and off of bridges and stuck steel bars through her chest just to see what would happen is intrigued. Partially. Claire hasn't been that person in a long time, and she wouldn't consider doing anything remotely like that unless it was because of her own interest. Still, it's going to nag at her as something easier to be curious about than what happens to people after they leave here or anything else pertaining to her missing family members. That doesn't mean she's going to bring it up, though. ]

That's pleasant. And annoying. Thinking about it on any level makes me feel like I'm watching my brother play a video game and he's just running into walls and getting lost all the time. [ She rolls her eyes and shrugs. ] Science.

[ Just because your body would regen doesn't mean your sanity would, Claire!! ]

I'm coming to quite dislike science. [ Understatement of the century. ] I'm not sure why anyone would create half the things I see here except to cause misery. It's bloody ridiculous.

[ Fuss fuss. ]

[ She looks over her shoulder at him, and the angle she's leaning at means that she has to look back more than just look up, and maybe for the first time since the jump, she's actually actively trying not to grin. When you're convinced that you should be mired in misery, it's hard not to wallow, but there are times when it is equally hard not to laugh.

Also, shut up about her sanity, already. She's absolutely not a crazy person. ]

That's how I feel about math. Absolute misery.

[ Severus seems like he's about to say something when he realizes - maybe?! - that she's teasing him, and his eyes narrow. It's not really very scary. ]

'Maths'. It's short for mathematics, so it should be maths, or else you're shortening 'mathematic'. Which isn't a word.

[ Leaning slightly away anticipating some kind of retaliation-- ] And maths are easy.

[ Severus Snape. Spy. Former Death Eater. Imposing teacher to small children all over Scotland. Arguing grammar and arithmetic with a Polly Pocket sized blonde. That scowl is so nonthreatening. ]

The rules of grammar and spelling have changed. There's such a thing as creative license. For example, ending a sentence in a preposition isn't a crime against humanity anymore. Also there's this whole group of people who think that it makes sense to stick a 'u' in words for some reason. I've never understood it but I guess it's a thing.

[ There's no retaliation. Except that. Crazy European people. ]

It's not grammar, it's maths.

[ If you don't think he redpens the shit out of grammar on essays even though it has nothing to do with potions, though, you are sorely mistaken. ]

And herb has an 'h' in it.

[ She absolutely believes that 99.9% of the essays that have ever come under the careful scrutiny of his red pen have been handed back looking like they just came out on the losing side of a civil war.

Regardless, Claire is just going to smack him in the face with her pillow. ]

[ The brief, impossibly rare sound of his laughter is rusty-sounding but genuine. Severus barks a laugh when she whacks him, but grabs the pillow after to prevent further assault. ]

Oi-- [ cut off by forcing himself to stop laughing, though he can't quite blank his expression. ]

[ Severely lacking in the tools necessary to adequately assault him with a pillow, Claire is forced to settle for trying to pinch him. It's either that or sit on him, and she really isn't sure how that one would work out for anyone involved. ]

Jerk.

[ She's admonishing but hardly seriously, not laughing as openly as he has but letting it lurk under the surface and really show in the sly slant of her eyes and the way her lips press together. So not laughing, but really trying not to. ]

Ah-- stop that. [ He's swatting at her hand now, obviously coming into this with negative a billion percent experience in playful roughhousing, but going along with it anyway. Hilariously feebly, but. Whatever. At least he's stopped laughing!! Dignity. ] That might be one of the nicer things anyone's called me.

[ Claire isn't so sure about that. It's refreshing to hear him do something other than glower. He might be out of practice but that doesn't mean it's a bad sound. For her part, Claire just holds her hands up in mock surrender. ]

Well, implied indignities about Americanisms only get you to the 'jerk' level on name calling. If you insult my cooking, it'll be all out war. [ Meanwhile, she is taking her pillow back now, just in case. ] Give that back.

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