He gave another of those nearly imperceptible nods.

She exhaled explosively. As a teen she used to brag about one day taking down the mighty Ryodan. But the day she thought she’d killed him by freeing the Crimson Hag had been one of the more miserable days of her life. “Figures you’d make me do the dirty work,” she said irritably.

His eyes crinkled and his lips pulled into a grimace of a smile.

“Are you laughing at me?”

“Thought you’d…get kicks…killing me. Old…insults. Could…get Barrons. Hate…that fuck…doing it. Enjoys it…too much.”

“How do you suggest I do it?” she said tightly.

“Sword. Gut. Like Hag.”

She glanced around the room, as if a more acceptable alternative might pop out of a corner or from behind the desk, or manifest in the mirror; one less brutal, bloody, and personal. “Can’t I just give you an overdose of something?”

“Poisons…don’t…work. Chop…head?”

“Oh, you really suck,” she hissed.

“Techni…calities. You’re…right. Logical…I die.”

She dropped her head in her hands and rubbed her eyes. Killing came naturally to her. She could be ruthless, lethal, and without mercy, and considered it a strength. But Ryodan mattered to her. She’d made peace with that Silverside. She liked knowing he was out there in the world, alive, doing Ryodan-things no matter how much some of those Ryodan-things aggravated her. For the first year, she’d told herself stories while wandering worlds about the many interesting/irritating things he was probably doing in her absence, top on that list—hunting for her, having all kinds of adventures along the way. Those stories had always ended with him finding her; they’d swap tall tales and kick ass together all the way back to Dublin. She found the idea of killing him, even though his death would be temporary, abhorrent.

She raised her head, eyes blazing with emotion.

She didn’t think he could go any more still, but he managed to, eyes narrowed, searching her face.

She hated that anything mattered to her. Yet last night all the grief and loss she’d been repressing had escaped. Once triggered, everything that had ever triggered her had a tendency to explode up from the floor of an ocean of unaddressed injury. Now her emotions were floating on the surface, and everything hurt.

It won’t always, she suddenly heard his voice clearly inside her head. Kill me fast. The dying never gets easier. But, Jada, the living does.

With a grimace of determination, she pushed to her feet. “You’d better come back because if I have to carry your sorry-ass death, too—” She didn’t finish the thought.

I’ll be back. I’ll always be back. He was silent a moment then added with a faintly sour note in his voice, In the future, if you need help with something, ask me.

She aired an old grievance just as sourly. “Why would I? You didn’t help me when Jayne took my sword.”

Kid, I had no fucking clue what to do with you. You were a Negasonic Teenage Warhead.

She’d had no fucking clue what to do with herself. She’d been a Mega-powered explosion of pure defiance to anyone who’d tried to impose limits on her. She’d not once considered whether there might be a good reason for those boundaries. Any and all limits—bad—had been her entire philosophy in a nutshell. Wondering when Ryodan had started actually reading the comic books he’d only pretended to know about, she said loftily, “I was nothing like that twit.” She had no intention of saying one word more but couldn’t resist adding, “I was enormously cooler.”

I meant the movie.

Her shoulders slid back and she stood straighter. Even Deadpool had been impressed with the film incarnation of Negasonic. Preening only inwardly, she disparaged, “You’ve seen everything. How could you not know what to do with one teenage girl?”

Fucking superhero on steroids. I’d never seen anything like you.

The inward preen turned into a radioactive flare, lighting up her face. Sometimes she missed those days; how she used to feel when she woke up, like life was electric and she was electric and each day was just another awesome fecking run at riding all the glorious, rainbow-colored currents on the kaleidoscopic electric-life-slide. “Not even in all your…how many years did you say it was?” she fished.

Thought letting Jayne keep the sword would keep you off the streets.

“It didn’t.” Nothing would have. She’d have gone swaggering out into the streets naked and completely defenseless just to prove herself free. Anything less than absolute freedom had offended her as deeply as the cage she often felt she’d never escaped. The price of her exit strategy had been too high. Exit strategies usually were. “So, how old are you again?” she pressed.

The alternative was insisting you move into Chester’s.

“You tried that. On multiple occasions. You’d have had to keep me chained up forever. I’d have snuck out at every opportunity and torched Chester’s the second your back was turned.” And no doubt planted explosives beforehand to make sure it turned into a spectacular fireworks display. “I defined myself by defying you.”

Didn’t know you’d figured that out.

“I figured a lot of stuff out. I just don’t waste everyone’s time droning on and on about it like some people.”

We’ll help you rebuild the abbey.

She stiffened. She’d been enjoying their banter. She wasn’t now. “I didn’t ask for your help. I don’t need it.”

Regardless, we’ll do it. You need to be running it.

Some part of her backed away, withdrew from him, and she bade it good riddance. She’d been an octopus with tentacles outstretched, now she was a shark. Tentacles could be hacked off. No one messed with sharks. “You don’t know a damn thing about what I need.”

He spoke staccato fast and fiercely: I’ve always known what you need. Someone to rage at who’s strong enough to take all the pain and fury you have to dish out until you’ve burned it out of your system and nothing is left but a pile of ashes from which the Phoenix rises. Kid, woman, whatever the hell you are—I want to see you rise. Even if you have to hate me.

She kicked up into the slipstream and swung her sword as fast as she could, with flawless precision and all her strength. When his head separated from his body and bounced away, crashing into the wall from the force of her blow, she doubled over, puking.