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Tina turned at the sound of footsteps. FitMC stepped into the bakery, face blank, eyes already on the baker. Tina’s insides burned, just looking at him. She could almost taste her distaste in the air. Then his eyes flicked to her and she jumped to smile pleasantly.
“Oi,” Fit said with a pleasant smile of his own.
“Hi, Fit,” Tina said. Fit returned his attention to the baker.
“Difficult tasks today, huh?” He leaned on the counter to look at the menu screen embedded on it. Tina hated even being in the same room as this guy. He was too – too cold, too harsh, too cruel. She had to admit he was reliable when they were on the same side, though. But when Tina looked at him, she could only see his ax falling too fast for her eyes to track and the resulting splitting headache. “I thought it’d be a two cookie kind of day.”
“Yeah,” Tina said, giggling awkwardly. It petered out as Fit messed around in his inventory. Bagi said he saved her. Tina held that in her heart as she took a careful breath. “I don’t like you.”
“What?” Fit looked up, six traps balanced awkwardly in his hands. He blinked at her, looking bewildered. “Why? What did I do?”
Did he not remember? It had only been a month since the first time he killed her. Bagi was right, maybe people were forgetting all about Purgatory. Maybe it really was all a distraction to keep people from questioning being on the main island. Or maybe Fit was just like that! Maybe he had killed so many people he no longer cared or kept track of the deaths!
Tina huffed and turned to the baker. She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned her weight on on leg. “Never mind.”
“Alright,” Fit said slowly. He was like Foolish like that, she supposed, he just accepted it when she was malding. He’d had that same casual acceptance of the circumstances when they were on Blue Gay Fire together, too. Fit looked between her, the cages in his arms, and the baker. “You ever wonder where he stores this shit?”
“No, why would I wonder about that?” Tina asked, more hostile than she meant to. Fit seemed to take it in stride.
“I dunno, I’ve just been joking that he’s making the cookies out of the resources we bring him,” he said, “I talked to Pac about it the other day, and he and Richarlyson couldn’t manage to steal the baker. Or anything else in the shop. It’s all Federally protected. And if it’s Federally protected, then we can’t see where it puts the stuff we bring it.” He offered one cage to the baker. It thanked him, taking it and depositing it in something behind the counter.
“Of course you talked to Pac,” Tina mumbled. Fit gave her a dirty look. Was that the way to annoy him? Talk about his not-boyfriend? “I guess I don’t know what it does. Do you want me to look?”
She placed her hands on the counter. She would have to jump up to see over it. That was annoying. She could always just not help Fit, of course, but Bagi had said, y’know? Tina trusted Bagi, even if she was still pissed over Fit killing her.
“Oh, I know,” Fit said after a second’s thought, “you give it a cage, and I’ll hold you so you can see.” Tina knew she was small, but she wasn’t that small! Tina contained her anger and nodded. Fit placed four of the cages on the floor and handed her the fifth. For Bagi, Tina reminded herself, because Bagi had said Fit was alright.
Fit’s hands were pretty big. Tina slid the cage over the counter – “Thank you. Please, enjoy the island.” – and braced. Fit heaved her up with a grunt. Belatedly she realized she was wearing a little skirt today; from this angle, Fit would be able to see everything, even if she was wearing safety shorts underneath.
But when she glanced into the mirror in the corner of the store, Fit had his head down. He wasn’t looking at her at all. She relaxed and strained to lean into the baker’s space. It’s movements stopped, half way through opening a compartment.
“Island Residents are not allowed behind the counter.” Its voice was robotic, but somehow worse than Cucurucho’s. “Please, step aside.”
“Lift me higher,” Tina ordered, suddenly determined to get to the bottom of this.
“One second,” Fit said, bringing her back. The baker finished putting away the cage as Fit placed Tina down. He grabbed another cage and slid it to the baker. This time, instead of lifting her by the waist, Fit heaved Tina up and onto his shoulder. “Can you climb over?”
“Yup,” Tina said, “one second.” She waited until she was sure the baker had the compartment open the whole way before she stepped from Fit’s shoulder to the counter. The baker repeated its warning, but Tina leaned over the counter.
The compartment was built directly into the counter. It opened up from a hinge on the bottom and led into a dark pit. Something whirred at the bottom. A conveyor belt, Tina thought. The warning looped as Tina swung her legs over the counter. She bent down and squinted at the dark. “Do you have a flashlight?”
Fit did, indeed, have a flashlight. Tina clicked the button and aimed the light down the hole. Yup, it was a conveyor belt down there.
“They’re taking the crates somewhere,” Tina said with a sigh. She clicked off the flashlight and handed it back to Fit. “There’s a little conveyor belt.”
“Huh,” Fit said, taking back the flashlight. “That’s strange. I wonder if you can see it from the map.” He tugged the communicator out of his pocket and squinted down at the map on it. Tina hopped off the counter. She picked up the cages, passing the rest to the baker as Fit continued looking. “Nope, the tunnels are too small to see. Here, let me try something else.”
Tina took the cookie from the baker, bringing it to Fit’s side. He’d put on his glasses (she’d only seen him wear them once, late at night when Tina snuck out of the base for a couple moments alone in the cold, glasses on as he messed with his prosthetic), clinking a little button on the side as he looked at the floor. Eventually, he shook his head. “Nope, nothing.”
“You tried,” Tina said, offering him the cookie. He took it from her with a little smile and shoved it into some pocket in his backpack.
“We tried,” he echoed. He headed for the door, holding it open for Tina. “Damn. I guess I’ll let Pac know next time I see him. How’ve you been, by the way? We rarely get to see each other.”
“I’m good,” Tina said, with an awkward little laugh. She pulled out her map so she didn’t have to look at him. This was awkward. It was getting more awkward by the second. She needed a way out now that it’d turned out they couldn’t even solve this tiny mystery together. “What about you? Do anything fun?”
That was, Tina cautiously thought, something they might have in common. Bagi always spoke highly of Pac and from what Tina had heard, which wasn’t much, Pac had managed to save the island once or twice. Or something like that. And apparently he was into a violent asshole like Fit, who killed with impunity and wasn’t a big mystery guy. Something like Tina, a demon who wasn’t all that smart.
“This and that,” Fit said, “a lot of errands and all that. Ramón’s taken a shine to Sunny and Empanada, so they’ve been spending a lot of time together. How’s Bagi?”
The mention of Bagi and Empanada and Sunny was almost enough to distract her from the way he deflected her question. Frustration burned in her gut. She thought she was over not being trusted. She didn’t even like Fit anyway! She wanted Fit to eat glass, actually.
“She’s good,” Tina said anyway, voice coming out too soft and gooey. “She’s great, even. Solving all the problems in the world as always. And she’s so good with Empie. She’s amazing.”
Fit grinned at her, like Foolish smiled when he smelled blood in the water. “She’s amazing, huh?”
“Shut up,” Tina groaned and halfheartedly tried to kick him. Fit graciously allowed the kick to connect. “How’s your thing with Pac, anyways?”
Fit spluttered. Tina gave him her most BadBoyHalo-like grin as his cheeks went a splotchy red. “What are you talking about? He’s just my roommate. We don’t have a thing. Definitely not.”
"Uh huh,” Tina said. She crossed her arms over her chest. Actually, watching him squirm was nice. Maybe she couldn’t kill him back for what he’d done to her on Purgatory, but she could be a gremlin about it. “Well, when you do ask him out -”
“What?” Fit said, shaking his head. “No, that’s not – we’re not – hey!”
“Just let me know, and I can be your chef,” Tina said. It had been nice to be served by Bad and Dapper and Richas on her own date. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt. And hey, then she’d have the gossip, the fofoca, first on this one thing. “I’m great at cooking.”
“No kidding,” Fit said with a resigned little sigh. “You were the one to figure out the tea thing, right? Thanks for that.
“You’re welcome,” Tina said, “even if you did kill me. Ok, I’ve gotta go. See you around. And don’t forget to call me!”
“Will do,” Fit said with a bashful little smile that seemed somewhat at odds on his scarred face, “thanks, Tina.”
She waved and teleported back home. The second she fully reconstituted, she sighed heavily and folded onto the ground. That was horrible. Next time she was just going to threaten him and call it a day. He didn’t trust her, the same as everyone else on this stupid island. What was she doing, involving herself with him? Just because Bagi said to trust him?
“I’m sorry,” Tina mumbled into her wooden floors, “I can’t do it. I don’t like him.”