Prompto Argentum (
hashtag_chocobro) wrote2019-04-18 07:18 am
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Room 303; Late Thursday Morning [04/18].
Right. Classes were done for the semester for Prompto, his room wasn't covered in ketchup anymore, he was mostly planning on sticking around for graduation because, duh, obviously he wasn't going to miss his girlfriend graduating (although at the same time, no, please don't, like, ohgods, what was going to even happen now?), but he wondered if he should stick around for the whole week before then, or, like, head back home for training early, get in more work, take a break to come back for the weekend, and then back to Insomnia again until the start of the next semester. That...was easily the best plan, he felt, and he knew going back and forth wasn't much of a problem for him. He'd have to make sure it worked with Noct, though, and, in the meantime, he'd just hit the shooting range here as much as he could, get in some work here before really hitting the ground running with the boyos.
He still felt pretty antsy about everything, though, to feel entirely comfortable getting behind a gun right now. But he figured some mindless video games would be a good way to clear his mind, and it was actually working pretty well before his phone started buzzing to alert him to a new text message.
From Noct.
U OK?
Amazing how just three letters could fill a person with such a firm and distinct sense of dread and forebodding.
yeah. y?
Prompto did not like the stretch of time that existed before a response came in.
Got a message yesterday from one of your friends saying you had a real bad weekend. 'Tragically rough' she said.
Well. That definitely helped Prompto get an idea of exactly which supposed friend had gone and sent messages back home, and was just going to let his avatar die a horrible bloody, fiery death right now while he tried to figure out exactly what he thought about that.
She said she'd like to come visit, too, Noctis contined, that your hoes need to meet your bros...
she SAID that????????
Murder. So much murder, Nina. Like, literally, all the murder.
Yeah, she did. You think you'll bring them with you over the break? We can make arrangements.
No. That was a big, fat, emphatic no, one he hoped Noct could feel through the phone. Not this time. Too much work to do. And i'll explain everything later promise. But i think i might head out tomorrow after work, if that's cool. i'll have to come back for graduation but...
He took a long moment, debating on whether or not to include the next part.
I think I really just need to be home for a bit.
The swiftness of the reply was almost as encouraging as the reply itself: Whatever you need, Prompto.
Thanks, buddy.
And he wasn't going to get all teary eyed, he wasn't going to change his mind and head to the portalocity office right then and there, he was going to just go back to his video games and blow the shit out of some stuff, before heading out to the shooting range and blowing the shit out of some stuff there. And then cuddle all the puppies tomorrow, followed by whole weeks of blowing the shit out of some stuff back home.
Perfect plan, really.
It was going to be okay.
[[ I am clearly taking advantage of my day off while I can. door and post are open! ]]
He still felt pretty antsy about everything, though, to feel entirely comfortable getting behind a gun right now. But he figured some mindless video games would be a good way to clear his mind, and it was actually working pretty well before his phone started buzzing to alert him to a new text message.
From Noct.
U OK?
Amazing how just three letters could fill a person with such a firm and distinct sense of dread and forebodding.
yeah. y?
Prompto did not like the stretch of time that existed before a response came in.
Got a message yesterday from one of your friends saying you had a real bad weekend. 'Tragically rough' she said.
Well. That definitely helped Prompto get an idea of exactly which supposed friend had gone and sent messages back home, and was just going to let his avatar die a horrible bloody, fiery death right now while he tried to figure out exactly what he thought about that.
She said she'd like to come visit, too, Noctis contined, that your hoes need to meet your bros...
she SAID that????????
Murder. So much murder, Nina. Like, literally, all the murder.
Yeah, she did. You think you'll bring them with you over the break? We can make arrangements.
No. That was a big, fat, emphatic no, one he hoped Noct could feel through the phone. Not this time. Too much work to do. And i'll explain everything later promise. But i think i might head out tomorrow after work, if that's cool. i'll have to come back for graduation but...
He took a long moment, debating on whether or not to include the next part.
I think I really just need to be home for a bit.
The swiftness of the reply was almost as encouraging as the reply itself: Whatever you need, Prompto.
Thanks, buddy.
And he wasn't going to get all teary eyed, he wasn't going to change his mind and head to the portalocity office right then and there, he was going to just go back to his video games and blow the shit out of some stuff, before heading out to the shooting range and blowing the shit out of some stuff there. And then cuddle all the puppies tomorrow, followed by whole weeks of blowing the shit out of some stuff back home.
Perfect plan, really.
It was going to be okay.
[[ I am clearly taking advantage of my day off while I can. door and post are open! ]]
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Actually, she was continuing her not-so-subtle fussing over her friends because, like, that was totally the best way to avoid dealing with her own feelings over the whole weekend.
Nina leaned in the doorway. "Oh, wow," she said, impressed. "You got rid of all the ketchup!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
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Which meant his attention was staying firmly on his video games, for the most part. "I didn't," he admitted. "The school janitor did. I owe that dude a whole mess of thanks and he is probably already criminally underappreciated as it is."
But at the same time, cleaning up the aftermath of a ketchup battle was probably one of the least concerning things Fosse had ever had to clean up.
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It was only polite!
Nina wandered in to see what sort of game Prompto had going. "What are you playing today??????????"
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"It's a spy game," he said.
It wasn't.
"You know, lots of sneaking around, secret missions, having to go behind people's backs in an effort to get information without them knowing about it."
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"You don't look like you're very good at the spying bit," she said, watching the screen with a bit more interest than she had before. "What you're doing is, like, the opposite of sneaking around!!!!!!!!!!"
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"Never really was very good at that kind of thing," he murmured, rushing through to scoop up loot from the fallen horde before jumping back into a building, reloading, healing up before the next sweep came through.
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"Then why play it?????????" she asked curiously. "Is it that fun?????"
It… still didn't look like a spy game to her. Honestly, Prompto, she was going to accept what you said, but her doubts were growing here.
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And it did show that she cared, really...
Prompto sighed again, pressing down on the start button to pause the game and open up the menu. "Not really," he said, turning a little bit toward her in his chair finally. "Not right now, anyway. I'm just trying to kill some time."
He gave her a soft, mostly apologetic kind of smile, even if he wasn't even sure she'd know what he was apologetizing for. "Hey, Nina. What'cha up to?"
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"I mean, like, just visiting?????????" she said, shrugging. Which was a total lie. She'd come specifically to check on him, but Nina was good at multi-tasking when she wasn't dealing with her own teenage angst. "If you're busy, I can, like, go?????????? But I was thinking it might be fun to see if you wanted to come grab Vette with me and go for lunch in a bit???????????"
That way she could keep an eye on both of them at the same time. She was a genius, really.
Nina hesitated.
"Are you okay????????? You're kind of… muted?????????"
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Okay, he couldn't really help that one, because, seriously, it was easy enough to pass that off as just their usual over-the-top theatrics, anyway.
"Lunch sounds good, though," he added with a faint but no-less-crooked-than-usual grin. "I've got to head into town anyway to move my portal date up to tomorrow, anyway, so that'll give me the chance to get off my lazy butt and take care of it."
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Sure, she wasn't supposed to know he was leaving in the first place, but Nina had no shame.
"Oh, good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" She beamed at him. "They contacted you, then?????????????? That's great!!!!!!!!!!!"
No shame whatsoever.
Besides, obviously if he wasn't going to tell her when he was going to be on the island and not it meant she had carte blanche to go looking for that information, right?
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"Of course they contacted me!" he said, throwing up his hands. "Nina! Noctis is my best friend! And he had some person he doesn't even know telling him about how bad of a weekend I had! I wasn't even that bad! I would hope that would make him feel maybe at least a little worried and talk to me about it."
No.
Seriously.
He really did hope that Noctis would feel that way, and the fact that he did was...really bolstering him right now, he was not going to lie about that.
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"I mean, yeah, but he's also a prince—he could have been busy!!!!!!!!!!!" None of them had gotten back to her, after all, though she had read receipts showing they'd locked it at least. "I just wanted to make sure they'd look out for you!!!!!!!!!!!! Because you'd, like, go back there and pretend you hadn't gone through a weekend where basically no one you knew was alive and you probably didn't even ask your kid for details about it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Nina would have. But then, if Nina's child had dropped that on her, there would have been a full out interrogation and the kid would have expected that.
So.
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He faltered a little, the heat dissipating as he struggled for words he'd even been avoiding in his own head, and his hand went to rub the back of his neck. His eyes focused on the floor, jaw tightening, as he tried to decide how much to say. But of she was going to do stuff like that, going behind his back, not even talking to him first, she could....she could ruin everything. All it took was just one misstep....
"Nina," he sighed, looking at her frankly for a moment, but once he said more, he just had to look away. "What if it's not that complicated? What if it's a lot simpler than that? What if the only reason they're not there, is that they just....didn't want me anymore?"
Oof. Actually saying it out loud. Feels bad, man.
He shrugged, as if to push it off, one hand gesturing uselessly to side. "The same with you. And Vette...and Sidon."
Granted, Uncle Gladdy definitely blew a very comforting hole in this theory, because he was pretty sure that, out of all his friends, Gladiolus Amicitia would be the first to drop. Still didnt stop it from being there, plaguing him all the same.
"So you're right. I would have pretended like nothing was wrong," and probably still would, "and I didnt ask Lucy for any details, because what's the point? Why does it matter? If it happens, it happens, and if it doesnt? It's going to be because I worked my butt off to make sure it doesn't. That's why I need to get home as soon as possible. Especially now. Now I really have to prove to those guys that I'm worthy, that nothing's gonna happen to screw that up! So thanks for that! I'm really looking forward to every time I screw up being attributed to having a 'tragically rough' weekend."
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Harsh, definitely… but also true.
A terrible, horrible part of her wished she had a way to have his bros listen to him say this, and she could, but she wouldn't. Nina had lines, even if they weren't the ones everyone else had.
"If they willingly spend time with you, if they tease you but help you when you make mistakes, then you're already friends. You don't have to be perfect to be friends with them. I bet they're not perfect either. I bet they do things that bug you and that you don't like, right?"
Her eyes narrowed and she poked him in the chest.
"You don't like that I went and told your boys you were coming off a bad weekend, right?" Nina raised her chin in defiance of the fact that maybe, just maybe, asking this next question was one she was scared of the answer to. "Does that mean you're going to stop being my friend? You're my friend, even when you do things I don't like."
She had a list. Mostly centered around the whole dating-Yang thing, so she wasn't going to air that list, but the point still stood.
Nina blew out her breath. "You having a hard time one weekend… you screwing up… friends aren't going to drop you for that. It's okay."
It… it had to be… right?
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Another sigh, and he just sort of looked at Nina for a moment. "You wouldn't understand."
He thought...maybe she might, remembering some of the things they talked about back in Hyrule, but...after all of that, now he wasn't so sure.
One thing he did know for sure was that he suddenly felt really exhausted. And really sad again, and he was trying to avoid that.
"Can we just...not talk about it? I'm sorry I even brought it up. I know you were just trying to help, and I really do appreciate it, promise." Here, he was going to go ahea and try a smile that he definitely wasn't feeling, but all it took was just trying one and things got better after that. "Let's just....go do that lunch thing you talked about. I haven't had anything to eat today, I'm probably just, like, super hangry right now, okay?"
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She'd, like, die if Lady Teresa and Lord Shin had no more use for her. And that wasn't nearly as dramatic or metaphorical as it was usually. After a moment's hesitation, she figured, what the hell, maybe it would help him to know that.
"If I died," which, well, that was a cheerful way to start things off, "only you and Vette would miss me for me. That's it. That's all. Like, Sidon, yeah, he'd miss me, but I'm pretty sure he'd miss almost anyone he's talked to once or twice too. Maybe that's a disservice to him, but the point is, you and Vette? Are it."
So, that was a start.
"But, like, when it comes to work... when it comes to home, it's all about what I can do for Lady Teresa and Lord Shin. I'm useful to them, so they keep me around, they praise me, they need me. Do they actually care about me for me? I don't know. I, like, hope so, but I don't know and I'll probably never know. But... I don't know," she took a step back from him, clasping her hands behind her back, "like, if you're going to call someone your friend, shouldn't they... be that?"
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She shifted, uncomfortable with the way this conversation had turned.
"And you and Vette haven't seen me at my worst either but… I feel like, if it happened, it'd be okay. Maybe. That… that we'd still be friends. I, like, hope so. I don't know about everyone else. So, I guess, maybe I just… I get that they're your bros. But I guess I don't get how you can love them so fiercely and not have just a little more trust that they love you at least a bit back." Nina looked down, with a short laugh. "Well, like, I guess I get that too because it's not like I always trust you and Vette too, but… I don't know."
She was sad, now.
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"I just can't take anything like that for granted, Nina," he said. "You can't....you don't even know, how extremely lucky I am to be where I am. I'm no one, Nina. Less than no one. But I've earned a spot. And I have keep earning it. I'm not going to just throw all away."
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Both his bros and his hoes!
"I just…"
Nina shook her head, thinking about what to say to that. She wanted to argue that he wasn't nothing. That he mattered, just as he was, because he was him, but that argument wouldn't work on her and… she didn't think it would work on him either.
"Look… I'm sorry if I've made things worse for you back home," she said, finally. "If I did, I didn't mean to."
Her hands were clasped together so tightly that they ached. Nina hated this, that he felt he had to earn friendship. Respect, a spot, even acknowledgement, those things she understood having to earn. But friendship was precious precisely because it was supposed to be freely given.
"Is there anything I can do to help make up for that? Make it… I don't know, easier for you to keep that spot?"
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But there was no room for logic when it came to crippling self-doubt.
"Just....I don't know," he said after another long moment to try to sort through all of this. "Maybe just...butt out?" Tall order for Nina, he knew that, but seriously, what else was he supposed to say? "Look, I know you were just trying to help, but did you even think about what that conversation was even going to sound like? 'Oh, hey, Prompto, so what was up about that weekend?' 'Oh, yeah, you know, just some future kid of mine showing up from a future where it's possible you guys are all dead, NBD, lol, whatevs!' That's kind of a conversation that shouldn't be forced on me, you know? And it's cool that you, like, want to get to know them and meet them and stuff, it really is, but it's just not a good time. Yet. It's not that I'm trying to hold out on anyone or anything like that, but I just want to feel a little more confident about where I stand before I start shaking things up, y'know?
"It's, like...you didn't trust me," he added, rubbing his hand on the back of his neck again. "You're all talk about being such good friends and all that, and then you don't even trust me to be able to handle my own shit. You go behind my back and get Noctis involved, when this is one-hundred percent the sort of thing he doesn't need to worry about. Or Ignis. Or Gladio. Or you, for that matter."
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"I'm going to worry about it anyway," Nina said, since that was... the easiest part about all of that, where everything he said hurt. "You're my friend. I care about you. If your future is potentially going to be horrifically terrible then I'm going to want to help."
But this conversation was telling Nina that, really, if she needed his help on anything, maybe she wouldn't ask him. If he, like, found out she needed help with the stuff she was going behind Vette's back to work on... well, she wasn't going to tell him now.
"I didn't say much to them," she said, since he made it sound like she had. Nina dug out her phone. "You can see the message if you want. It's not that I don't trust you, it's that I want to help. As for mentioning the visit that..."
Nina blew out her cheeks.
"That wasn't so we could, like, babysit you or anything. Or because I don't trust you. It was partly because I'm curious about your world but also because, like, Vette and I were talking about you and your bros and how... ilke, maybe you were ashamed of us or something, since we--mostly Vette--haven't even met them through, like, when you're gaming. I mean, I don't game, but Vette does, and that just... stuck, I guess."
And... really... none of this conversation was making her feel like he wasn't ashamed of her.
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He shook his head again.
"You guys'll meet 'em, I promise. It's just gotta be the right time, okay? It's not about you guys, it's about me."
He just needed a little more standing with those guys. A little more confidence. So it didn't just end up being everyone realizing all at once he was pretty much garbage.
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"But we didn't know it was about you," Nina said, though she was relieved that he wasn't ashamed of them. "Like, we just knew you talk about them all the time and that if you were talking to them, you'd end the conversation or the game if we wandered by. So, eventually, that just wound up with us going 'is it us?' because we couldn't think of what else it could be."
Because they both also had fairly terrible self-esteem when it came to things like that. And insecure paranoia was a sport all three of them participated in to an extent.
Tucking her phone away, she glanced at him sideways. "And I didn't know you'd be working the whole time you were away either. I thought it was, like, a visit. Not like when I tell Vette I'm gone for a job."
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Just a deep-seeded terror that opening that door would all but immediately dispell the mystifying illusion he'd managed to maintain here where people seemed to think he was someone actually worth knowing.
"And, I mean, it is a visit, kind of," he offered. "But it's going to be mostly training. Some much needed, long overdue training, really, if I'm honest. It's going to be good for me. I think....I think I really need it."
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"Um, like, can I ask why you think you really need it?????"
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"Because I've been lazy and complacent here and I really need to step up my game," he said. "Especially if there's something really bad on the horizon. And it's not just that I'm barely good enough to hold my own. It's also that Iggy and Gladio are already Crownsguard, practically have been slated for those spots since they were born, and I'm just some guy who's only been around for a couple of years. Got some catching up to do, you know? And I can train here all I want, I can train with everyone here, too....you, Vette, Yang, Sidon....but it'll only get me so far, because we're supposed to be a team, Nina, a full unit. So I've gotta put in my time with them if I'm ever going to hope to be....half as good as I need to be."
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Did it really have anything to do with friendship when he had to earn his spot on a team? She didn't think so, except, perhaps that it was friendship that had gotten him the chance to try for the team in the first place.
"So, like, while you're there you need to work on working with them, but here--you can work to make yourself stronger and more qualified and, if you want... I'm sure people here will help train you or train with you. Even if, like, it's just a matter of keeping you company while you study." Nina was a champ at research, Prompto.
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He could try to run with that.
Prompto gave a faint grin back. "If it's anything to do with keeping me company while I"m studying, you're definitely out. I wouldn't get any work done."
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"I don't know what you're talking about," Nina said loftily. "I grew up in a school!!!!!!! I'm good at studying!!!!!!!!!"
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And trouble.
A whole ton of that there, too.
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Because yes, yes she would. Or he'd get bored and start talking to her and that way would lead to a lot of distraction and trouble.
"I can run with you, if you'd like," she offered instead. "Vette would be more help with your guns, I think, though since I'm more of a close combat sort of person." Or a fry them with magic sort of person. Nina was pretty adaptable but she didn't have any long-range weapons. "But then, if you're okay with... everything, for now, I guess we could just... ask her, if you wanted?????????? Like, we could still do lunch???????????? The three of us???????????"
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"I'm sure we'll figure something out," he allowed, his grin gaining a little more warmth and a whole lot of relief. "But figuring out lunch first sounds good. I mean, if you'd still want to..."
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Nina had, overall, been very good about not opinioning about Yang and his relationship with her but, really, talking about that would only make it worse. She knew her crush was horribly unrequited but that would just be mean.
In her own way, Nina was doing her very best to be considerate of his dating life while mourning her own feelings for him.
She brightened.
"Yes!!!!!!!!!! I still want to!!!!!!!! Especially since you're leaving tomorrow oh my gosh!!!!!!!!!!!!"
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But she was laughing too.
"Maybe, like, I'll grab Vette and we'll go on a totally rad vacation and send you all the selfies of us having loads of fun, though, so you don't forget us!!!!!!!!!!!"
Because that was, in fact, a horrible niggling worry of hers.
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But that did give him an idea. "If you do," he told her, "I expect my phone to pretty much die from all the selfies you sent me." And then his grin sharpened a little. "Want I should send some of my training? When, of course, we're not working on super specail secret Crownguard stuff, anyway."
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A beat.
"And, like, pictures of your bros too!!!!!!! Have they seen pictures of us??????? If so, that's totally unfair!!!!!!!!!!!"
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"Yeah, well," said Prompto, "life's not fair. Noct so happens to be my most dedicated photo viewer out there. But don't worry; I'll try to make up for lost time. I'm sure they'll have objections, but half the time, they don't even notice me taking the pictures when I do."
He was that good. He could take pictures of himself mid-battle. It was logic-defying.
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"Life should be fair," she said, grinning, "at least, in my favour!!!!!!!!!!"
That wasn't fair at all, Nina.
"How do they not notice you taking pictures though???????????"
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"
Totally logical game mechanics, reallyI'm just that good," said Prompto, who smirked faintly as he held up his phone, featuring a quick snapshot of Nina that he'd literally just taken.It wasn't a great shot, no, but the point was that he'd gotten it.
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"That's... that's really impressive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Also a crying shame that he wasn't spy material.
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But Prompto grinned, shrugged his shoulders. "Gotta be good at something, right? How about we go see what kind of shots I can get of this so-called lunch..."
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She was going to steal a head start on that too, bolting out the door.