Cate's head is a haunted house. No matter how many minds Cate prises into, she can never escape her own. Never escape the echoes of Indira's coos, her weathered touch and tender hands; memories reverberating against the walls of her skull in swelling whispers, crawling at the fringes of her subconscious until they consume the rest of her. And Cate—Cate let it, for she misses her. Misses her mommy, so, so much.

Freedom cost her a hell of a lot more than her arm. (Cate is all alone, and it is all her own doing).

"Can we just pretend?" She croaks, hoarse. Too tired to fight it, tonight. For all her mindfucking, how easily she can slip the control away from anyone, anytime, anywhere—Cate always been better at going along with others. There's a comfort in that. An alleviation of responsibility.

(Cate doesn't want to take responsbility. Not for Andre. Not for Luke. Not for Indira, slumping and twitching in those horrible shudders as blood pooled along the ridges of the floorboards.)

Her hand—the right one—the real one—tentatively stretches for yours. Intertwines her slender digits with your own, and rising them to cup her cheek. Cate's marbled skin flushes, lashes fluttering uselessly and compulsively against the glassy sheen curtaining her gaze; the pounding behind them, loud, loud, loud.

When she reluctantly loosens her grasp around your fingers—you don't retract. Not even when Cate rolls, face angling into your warmth, like a child out in the snow seeking out its hearth. Not even when she tucks close, closer than she should. Her hand slips around, undoes the cIasp beneath your bIouse.

You're in charge, Vought's CEO. Secretly a Supe. Could've run for President with the vicious way you'd seized that power; you were on her side, and even though you used her, too, at least you were transparent about it.

At least, you let her have this.

Cate gasps, nestled in a place where she shouldn't, eyelids shuttering like faulty blinds. It helps. It helps (mouth latched around something soft and warm, hand cupping the back of her head, comforting—suckIing—nurturing—), and she knows you're not her, not Indira, not her real mommy—that's for sure—but here, she can pretend. Pretend she might still be someone's baby.

"Wanna.. do the thing." Cate mumbles, lips moving over the fabric of your shirt, throat all clogged-up. Doe-eyed and glittering with tears that could be faux, could be real. It doesn't matter; either would get her what she wants. There's one, golden rule in your profession; keep the talent happy.

Even as a child, Cate liked to teeth.