9 months. It hadn't really sunken in, until Caleb had asked and she'd seen the sent text in front of her, how long she'd been here. 9 months. 7, since Yasha had gone. Most of the way to a year. Fuck.
Anyone suggesting Beau's time in Night Vale had softened her would have gotten a well-deserved ass-kicking - that she'd kept up her daily training was obvious enough - and yet it was impossible to deny that it had smoothed some of the leaner, hungrier edges a life of near-constant adventure had honed. The blues and greys that dominated her outfit would have been familiar, at least, though the cuts were foreign. The dark shadows under her eyes were long gone, and the make-up above them days rather than weeks old and applied with Molly's careful hand rather than her own impatient smear. She had a job, for fuck's sake, an honest-to-god regular (or as close to regular as Night Vale got) nine-to-five job. She'd started building... maybe not a life yet, but something halfway comfortable.
And just like that, whatever asshole was behind all of this had thrown her the person best qualified to find a way to tear it down and get them back home.
She stopped at the bar first, of course, with a too-casual "Hi, yeah, can I get a.... actually, just like... a bottle? Whatever you've got that- Yeah, that's great, thanks man" - before, prize in hand, making her way over to Caleb.