Fun fact: the epilogue was one of the first things I wrote when I started working on this story. As the story progressed, I made a few adjustments to make sure the ending fit with the rest, but most of what you're about to read was written almost two years ago. Which leaves me with the question… WHERE DOES TIME GO?!

She does a double take, checking the coordinates Max sent her. Yep, no mistake. This is the place. Okay then. She always suspected that the Elsters had to be well-off before David went half-mad, but this is bordering on ridiculous.

This is not a house. More like a freaking castle.

She made sure she wasn't followed, but given the many cameras pointing in every direction – that they must have put up when they came back – any unwanted visitor would be seen coming from a mile away anyway.

She takes a deep breath, adjusts the strap of her bag on her shoulder – she came with her laptop, just in case – and starts walking again.

When she reaches the front door, she doesn't get a chance to knock before it opens before her and Max greets her with a genuine, open smile that slightly unties the knot that's been in her stomach ever since she got his message.

"Mattie. You came."

"You know me. I can't resist a cryptic, slightly scary text."

"Please, come in."

He leads her to a sitting room without giving her time to admire the entrance hall or the beautifully decorated staircase. Of course, this is all normal to him.

Her arrival causes different reactions – raised eyebrows from David, a smile from Mia, delighted surprise from Fred. And a completely stunned and less-than-pleased look on Leo's face.

Okkk… Not what she was going for.

"Which one of you called her?"

Fred was about to take a few steps towards her to greet her, but he stops at Leo's low growl and looks uncomprehendingly at Mats, as if expecting her to explain his brother's mood.

She shrugs helplessly. She has no idea what this is all about.

"I did," Max replies serenely, seemingly unaware of the tension in the room. Mattie knows better. He's noticed, he's just choosing to ignore it. "You two need to talk."

"I told you…"

"And we told you we disagreed," Mia jumps in.

Leo is about to speak again, she can tell, but she's tired of being left in the dark.

"Anyone wants to tell me what's going on here?"

They all turn to her in surprise, as if they'd forgotten she was here, even though her presence is apparently the reason for all this glaring. Again, Leo opens his mouth to speak, but David seems to have an epiphany. He shakes his head and chuckles in disbelief, catching everyone's attention.

"We're leaving. And you were going to leave her behind, weren't you?" he asks Leo.

His son looks at him, murder in his eyes, the only confirmation he needed, really, and Mats is left breathless with shock.

"What?"

All the fight seems to go out of Leo in one long exhale, his shoulders loosening, his frame hunching a few more inches.

Mattie feels like she's doing a great impression of a fish out of the water, so she shakes her head to clear her thoughts. Maybe this isn't what it looks, sounds and feels like. There has to be another explanation, right?

"You're leaving," she says slowly, nodding in an effort to appear reasonable. "Okay. That makes sense. You can't stay in one place with what's about to happen." She pauses, takes a deep breath, and tries not to let her voice waver on her next words. "What was that other part?"

Leo's wince is more eloquent than words could ever be, his very posture shouting out 'guilty!', and it's getting hard to breathe again. Max gives her hand a little squeeze, and she's grateful for the contact, but it doesn't help much.

Mia is the one who decides to make things clear.

"His idea of protecting you is to play dead."

Mattie nods, suddenly calm. Astonishingly calm. Terrifyingly calm, in fact.

Leo Elster is in for the tongue-lashing of his life.

She wishes she knew his middle name.

The others watch with great interest and curiosity as she lets her bag slide deliberately from her shoulder to the floor, takes a few steps to get closer to Leo, forces him to meet her gaze with her sheer willpower, and pronounces slowly, "Is it true?"

He leans back ever so slightly, his entire attitude telling her exactly how much he doesn't want to have this conversation.

He nods, and her calm flies out the window.

"Are you freaking kidding me?! Damn it, Leo! How could you…"

"Do what I have to do?" he cuts in, and she throws him a dark look.

"Be so stupid!" she corrects loudly. "How can such a brilliant guy be such a…" she pauses, at a loss for words, but then she finds the perfect one, "guy!"

His mouth drops open at the way she masterfully managed to make this single, innocent word sound like a terrible insult.

She thinks she can hear a few snorts around them, but she doesn't let them distract her. She's about to give him a piece of her mind when he seems to give up – again – and he shakes his head tiredly.

"You know that keeping in touch would be dangerous."

His quiet, defeated tone is like a bucket of cold water on the flame that was her righteous fury, and instead of screaming at him like she was planning to, she settles for a sarcastic answer.

"Because the radio silence you had going the last time worked out so well."

"It would have if you hadn't…"

"Saved your brother's life?" she finishes for him with a pointed raise of her eyebrows.

"I was going to say poked the bear."

"Yeah… Saved your brother's life," she repeats stubbornly, making him roll his eyes at her, an irritated reaction that she promptly ignores in favour of arguing her cause. "Listen, you're not doing this to me again. I don't want to keep worrying about you when all it would take to make me feel better would be a few texts, maybe an e-mail every once in a while, okay? We both know there are about ten different ways to do this safely. Just like we've been doing lately."

He winces, knowing that she's right. Looks like it's time for a full disclosure.

"Mattie…" he starts, before he notices the herculean efforts the others are now making to look like they're not listening avidly to every word. Letting out a frustrated sigh, he shakes his head at them and turns back towards Mats. "Can we talk in private?"

"This doesn't sound good."

"It's not," he confirms grimly, motioning for her to follow him.

She does, somewhat warily. Getting here has been a real rollercoaster of emotions, from her worry when she got Max's text to her rising tension on the train, from her confusion when everyone saw her to her anger at what Leo tried to do, from her happiness at seeing everyone to her concern right now. She's not sure she can handle more revelations or whatever it is that Leo wants to talk about.

"Alright. What is it?" She asks when he stops and faces her again. He opens his mouth, to answer she assumes, but before he can, her surroundings register in her mind and she holds up a hand to cut him off. "Hang on. Is this your room?"

"It used to be."

"That's… unexpected."

He looked like he was about to reprimand her for getting off track, but at that he changes his mind, taking a look around the room as if seeing it for the first time. It's cosy and comfortable, with a queen-size bed, a small desk, a tall dresser and a deep armchair with soft cushions near a window overlooking the gardens. There are pictures on the wall that she would love to take some time to examine. Without being messy, it's clearly lived-in, warm and homey.

"What did you expect?"

"Less."

"Less what?"

"Just less."

He wisely decides to leave it at that.

"Listen, Mattie, this isn't just about your safety."

"It's not?"

"Not entirely, no. You're right, it would be relatively easy to keep in touch without taking huge risks."

"Then what is it about?"

"I…" he starts, before reconsidering and backing up a few steps, putting some distance between them. "Where do you think this is going?"

She scrunches her nose, feigning confusion, and half-answers, half-asks, "Back downstairs at some point?"

He glares at her in retaliation.

"You're deliberately misunderstanding me."

"Yes, I am. Because I don't want to hear what you're trying to say."

"Mats…"

"Leo…" she mocks, crossing her arms over her chest.

"You're not taking this seriously," he reproaches.

"Yes, I am," she says again, in denial this time. "And I know exactly what you're trying to do. You want to cut off all ties so that I don't get hurt, not physically, but emotionally, and that's very noble of you or whatever, but that's bullshit, and you need to stop. That's not how it works. Just because I won't be hearing from you doesn't mean I'll stop caring about you."

"In time…"

"No," she cuts him off immediately, as if she already knew exactly what he was about to say. "This isn't a crush, a silly little infatuation I'm going to get over in a few weeks. I don't even do crushes."

"I know," he acknowledges. "But you can still get on with your life."

She feels like storming out just to teach him a lesson, to let him know what she thinks of him presuming to tell her what she wants, needs, deserves, or whatever, but she has to deal with this rationally. It's the only way to get through to him. Even if it's hard when emotions are this close to the surface and he's being such an absolute idiot.

She takes a few seconds to gather her courage. She needs it for what she has to say next. They've been through a lot together, and he's kind of an open book now that he's let her in, so she knows she's not wrong in her assumption that this is it for him, but voicing her feelings and making herself vulnerable the way she's about to doesn't come naturally to her.

"No, I can't," she says quietly, but firmly, uncrossing her arms in a more open stance. "This thing between us, it's not going away anytime soon, and you know it. I'm in this for the long haul. And sure, I'd love for things to be simple and quiet every once in a while. But I knew what I was doing when I let myself fall for you. I knew it was never going to be easy. There might be more bad than good in the near future, but I don't care, because as bad as the bad gets, the good is extraordinary."

There is more she wants to say, but the next thing she knows, he's kissing her within an inch of her life, and it's not anger that has her breathless this time.

He does that quite often, she's noticed. Express himself with a kiss whenever she leaves him speechless. As if he's not sure how to react to verbal support when it comes from someone outside his family.

Not that she's complaining.

Really, she's not.

Except, this time, she kind of is.

Don't get her wrong, the kiss is hot and she would love to follow it wherever it might lead them. But it's not going to solve anything, and she needs to make sure that he's not going to get it into his thick skull again that leaving her behind without so much as a way to contact him is the right thing to do.

So after letting herself enjoy this for a little while, she brings her hands to his chest and gently pushes him away.

He takes the hint, breaking the kiss, but his arms don't let go of their hold around her waist and his nose bumps hers tenderly. He stays silent for a minute, processing everything that just happened. She has to admit this is a lot for him too. He went from trying to keep her away for her own good to letting her persuade him otherwise – which has to go against his every instinct – in a rather short time.

"So what do you suggest we do?" he ends up asking.

She can tell he's still torn, unwilling to believe that this could really happen, that he just needs to let himself have this, that danger or not, complications or not, she's not going to let him go through with the self-sacrificing act he now has down to perfection.

"I suggest you stop being a martyr and accept that we'll make it work. I suggest we keep in touch, and you ask for my help if you ever need it, and we do the whole long distance thing until we've solved this and we can actually be together."

"What if we never solve this?"

Where's the optimistic trait she managed to bring out of him not that long ago?

"We will. I know you. There's nothing, nothing you can't do, Leo Elster. And if you don't push me away, I will be with you every step of the way, even from a distance, ready to ask Fred to hit you over the head with a blunt object every time you're being stupid."

This drags a chuckle out of him.

"He might enjoy that a little too much."

"I know I would."

"There will be something else, you know. It's not just the near future. Even if this situation is ever under control, even if things go back to normal – whatever that is. It won't last. There will always be something in the way. Because of what I am, what we are."

"So we'll solve this next thing too, and the one after that, and the one after that, and enjoy the moments of peace in between."

"If there are any," he says grimly.

"You can stop with the doom and gloom anytime you want now."

"Fine. Let me try this, then. We'll need to leave soon, but not right away. Do you…" he hesitates, unsure, then goes for it, finally embracing the possibility. "Do you want to stay for a few days?"

She beams at him.

"See? That's a moment of peace."

He nods, and his mouth does something that could almost be called smiling.

"Plus you can help with the sleeping synths in the basement."

She feigns a groan.

"Forget about the Emo-Synths' problems. You're enslaving me."

"I'll make it worth your while," he promises.

"Now you're talking. Come on. Let's go tell your family you've come back to your senses."

"And yours that you've completely lost yours."

"Trust me. They know."

The End