"You're good with her."

Nova turned away from the window that looked into the training area to see Adrian coming to a stop next to her. Normally he wouldn't have been able to sneak up on her like that, but she had been distracted watching Maggie spar with another kid her age.

"What do you mean?" Nova asked, mostly because of surprise.

"Magpie, you're good with her," Adrian shrugged "It's just sort of surprising given how much you seemed to dislike her. And- I mean- no offence but you don't really seem like you'd be super great with kids."

"I'm not," Nova agreed, not really sure how to respond "I'm just helping her train at night sometimes. It's a nice break from data entry sometimes."

"Yeah, but you're good at it, and training kids isn't always the easiest thing to do," He shrugged again.

"I'm mostly just mimicking how I used to train," Nova shrugged as well. That was sort of true, but she also realized it wasn't fully. To a degree it was, the moves and ideas were the same she had learned, but the way she trained her wasn't. Nova wasn't exactly nice when they were training, but she also wasn't nearly as pushy as Leroy and Ingrid had been. She didn't push Maggie passed when she wanted to train, and focused mostly on hand to hand rather than working with any sort of weapons.

"How did you train?" Adrian asked curiously as he looked over at her.

"What do you mean?" Despite herself Nova felt a slight defensiveness. It felt like Adrian had somehow been hearing what she was thinking.

"I mean, you're really good, right? So, how did you get that good?" Adrian raised an eyebrow "Did your uncle teach you, or how did you learn?"

"Oh- um- yeah, my uncle taught me some stuff," the reply was more awkward than Noa would have liked, "But I also just kind of learned a lot about it on my own. Eight extra hours in the day with nothing to do after all."

"But your uncle didn't want you to be a Renegade?" Adrian asked, still looking at her curiously.

"No, but he still wanted me to be able to defend myself," Nova, shrugged "Especially after-"

She cut herself off. Adrian hesitated for a second, before moving to take her hand. Nova was surprised, but she didn't pull away. It helped keep her grounded, not letting her brains spiral into memories.

There was a long pause, before Adrian spoke, his voice much softer "She's about the same age Evie would be, isn't she?"

"Yeah," Nova admitted, before shaking her head when she realized what he was getting at "And I know what you're thinking. I'm not thinking of her as a replacement sister or something weird like that. I'm just helping her train."

"Okay," Adrian agreed, though he was still looking at her curiously. After a moment he added "But maybe there's something to be said about sisterly instincts not just going away."

"Do I seem overly sisterly to you?" Nova shot back before she could really think about it.

"Not with most people," Adrian agreed, seeming to think for a moment before speaking again "But I wouldn't expect you to express sisterly feelings in the way most people do anyway. The way you act with Maggie- yeah I could see that being your version of sisterly."

"You do realize saying I don't express things the same way as other people isn't exactly flattering, right?" Nova muttered, though it was more to buy times to figure out what to say than because she was really offended by it.

"It's not a bad thing, just you," Adrian shrugged, giving her an awkward smile, and it seemed genuine.

"I guess you've got a point," Nova muttered a little reluctantly, before adding "About the emotions thing- I'm not using Maggie as like a replacement sister or whatever."

"Alright," Adrian nodded, apparently deciding to let it drop, though he said it in a way that Nova knew meant he didn't buy it.

Sighing, she reluctantly turned to give him her full attention "She doesn't remind me of Evie. Honestly I rarely picture Evie any older than a baby, and when I do I don't picture her like-"

She cut herself off, realizing what she was about to say. However, Adrian was less likely to just let it go now "Like Magpie?"

Nova hesitated, looking over at Adrian for a moment, part of her wanting to just agree and be done with it, but before that side could win out she said "I don't picture her like me."

When she picture Evie as anything other than a baby, which was rare in and of itself, she didn't like to picture her growing up in subway tunnels or learning to fight when she was six years old. Instead Nova pictured taking her to the park, or going on walks under the stars. Part of her knew it was unlikely, that if Evie had lived she would likely have grown up be exactly the same as her, but she didn't focus on that. There was no point.

When Adrian didn't respond Nova sighed, looking over at Maggie for a second before looking back at him "Maggie reminds me a lot more of what I was like as a kid then how I picture Evie. Determined to prove myself. Practicing whenever I could. Using it to process bad thoughts and emotions-"

Adrian squeezed her hand a bit "So you decided to help her, because you know what she's going through."

"Yeah, I guess so-" Nova murmured, her focus on Maggie as she thought about it. Honestly she wasn't sure it was that deep, it had mostly been a spur of the moment decision to help Maggie train. Maybe there was something to what Adrian was saying though, if not the reason she had started to help her than the reason she continued to.

After a long pause she finally shook her head a bit "We should probably head back- the others are going to be waiting for us."