marvel: luke & thomas Who: Luke & Thomas What: A visit. Where: Brandon Shipping offices. When: Nowish. Warnings/Rating:IDK. Luke will probably swear at some point. Yes, Luke swears.
Luke had taken Max's advice. He'd spent time with Wren, spent time with the kids. He'd calmed down. He'd breathed. Too much time, though, and he might chicken out, so he didn't give himself the opportunity. At least, he thought, they'd set this up in advance, even though he really wished this could've happened before the hotel decided to dump everyone's memories in bottles and pass them around. He had no way of knowing what, if anything, Thomas had seen, but he couldn't do anything about it now. Don't dwell on it, that was his plan. He was more than just his past. He tried to tell himself the things Wren always told him, the things he couldn't bring himself to believe, and part of him wished he could bring her with him. He always felt like he could take on the world with her in his corner, and she gave him strength he didn't have on his own. Was it all kinds of unhealthy, to rely solely on another person for any semblance of self-esteem to exist? Hell yes, but he'd been broken down and rebuilt that way and there was no changing it now.
Come quietly, that was what Thomas had said. It'd been a while; SHIELD was a desk job, and cops didn't spend time doing the kinds of things he'd done when he was playing at being part of the X-Men. But he'd been good before the pulse, and he was better now. It was, quite possibly, the one thing he was actually sure of. Quiet wasn't going in the front door. Quiet wasn't announcing himself, like he had an appointment, sitting around and waiting to be led to Mr. Brandon. No, he wasn't going to be led anywhere. He'd do this on his own terms, thank you very much.
Getting in was the easiest hurdle. From there it was just a matter of timing, knowing when to move and being quick about it. Sure, he didn't belong, but people had to notice him to be able to figure that out. And, since being noticed would have meant getting himself arrested or killed once upon a time, well, he'd honed that particular skill to near perfection out of necessity. It probably helped that, just this once, he'd foregone his usual style of 'I dress like I'm still in high school' for something that looked a little less out of place in an office building. No need to draw attention to himself.
He waited until the hallway was quiet before stepping out from around the corner. He considered just barging in (because he couldn't pull off the whole appearing out of nowhere thing, no matter how hard he tried) but no, he knocked. Politely. So far, so good.