Erin didn’t see much point in denying him. She was annoyed this had to happen, but unless she wanted to quit, she knew she’d run into the Protagonist at some point. 

Erin wondered what he wanted. She moved to throw away the coffee cup from the morning, realizing with a frown that her trashcan hadn’t been emptied since last week. Even the cleaning crew was ignoring her? She wasn’t even here when they came by. Apparently it was too much to ask for them to care. She’d empty it later in the kitchen trash.

She would scream if this ended up being another meet and greet with a villain Protagonist. 

Tyson was already waiting for her at the elevator, as if trying to decide if he wanted to press the button. He must have come down the stairs to her floor. He was still the linebacker in a perfectly cut suit, the otherworldly marketing manager in a software development company.“Hey, Tyson, how’s it?” 

He turned around, almost flinching at the sound of her voice. Curious, but she realized why he was so skittish as he seemed to scan her mechanically, like an EMT, for injuries.

Still worried about being responsible. Last time he’d seen her, she’d been sprawled out in a  parking garage, laid out by his friend. Erin wanted to say something biting, but his fear of her reaction made her think back to what Mistel Mason had said in her car. That Tyson was sensitive.

She gestured to herself. “Told you, I’m fine.” Her head still hurt a little, but really, the biggest harm was Rex’s recurring presence in her incoherent nightmares. She hated him for that, but she could swallow that down. 

He started, guilty, and she waved off the start of an apology. “Do not worry. I am fine. How are you doing? And stop apologizing. I know you are sorry.” She paused, letting go of the clipped formality, not wanting to seem too rude to a Protagonist. “You didn’t know.” 

She actually started to believe that he really had no idea what Rex was. Why would a Protagonist go through this charade if he didn’t feel some responsibility? 

Erin needed the topic to change. She could now swallow down the sick, shaky feeling that filled her when that parking garage at night entered her mind. The memory was already ethereal, that moment when the world broke down, when a Protagonist threatened her. Erin was starting to wonder if she imagined some of what happened, some of what Rex had said.

His jaw worked a few times, as if trying to contain his apologies. “Well. Fair enough. You are okay then?”

Erin motioned non-committedly, leaning against the wall next to the elevator, having already pressed the button. “I’m okay. Work’s been work, life’s going on. How about you, Tyson. How are you doing?” she repeated, emphasizing his name, to move on.

Sometimes she felt like she drove these conversations with Protagonists. Puppets were known for being a little slow. Janey was pretty quick but most Puppets don’t end up love interests for the protagonists. No need to waste processing power on just Plot fodder criminals, she and others had speculated. But Erin was always the one keeping the Protagonists from rambling it seemed like.

“I- Sor-” he realized what he was doing, and smiled weakly. “I’m good. Too many business trips. Too many late nights. I’ve been exhausted.” The elevator arrived, and he offered her the step in first.

“Oh yeah? You said you had to go to New York right? Gotta keep selling that code.”

Erin remembered enough from dinner to follow up on this. She wondered if there was some side Plot he’d gotten into. Being the capital of the North American States, they were unlucky enough to have many more heroes and stories than Meridian City. Their forums were broken up by borough she’d heard. Too much going on to keep track of.

He chuckled and said, “It went well. Got a contract with a small defense organization, handling some mundane back-end for some of their autonomous systems. We may need to take on a few people, but nothing that would need a special clearance.”

Erin raised her eyebrow, both at Tyson’s revelation, and at the sight of Max’s head peeking around the corner to look at the pair of them as they entered the elevator. Max looked rather cross, and she smiled, maybe a little more mocking than she had to. She fought the urge to childishly stick her tongue out. If she wanted to start a blog about Tyson, she could write Max out of the market. Not that she wanted that dubious honor.

Tyson pressed the button for the floor the coffee shop was on, and she wiped the smug off her face, asking blandly, “Oh really? More work for Janey then?”

Tyson nodded. “Probably. How about you, what’s your work lately?”

Erin gave a non-committal gesture as the elevator doors closed. “Eh. Special projects. I am lucky enough to know enough of our legacy code to archive it after making sure it works. Just in case old government customers using a thirty year old system are actually going to pay us to update it without losing anything at all. Lots of typing things from paper. Very exciting.”

“Sounds like a waste of talent to me.”

Shrugging, she answered, “Work’s work. I get to listen to a lot of music while I do it, at least. Rumor has it I might be moved to the government side soon, since they have so much going on.”

“Hopefully something better. Sounds like right now it’s something you could sleep and finish.”

“Ha, probably watch a movie at least, though I do not think the company would appreciate the ‘misappropriation of bandwidth’.”

“Yeah, fair. Hey, what kind do you like?”

“What, movies?”

“Yeah, what kind of movies? I won’t lie, I’m a sucker for romance and romantic comedies. I absolutely loved Love at First Fight.” That was a romantic comedy from last year. Erin was surprised he’d seen it.

From any other Protagonist, Erin would have assumed this was supposed to be a joke, like Beast Hunter ordering a fruity blended drink while covered in blood. She glanced at Tyson, and he wasn’t… posing for a joke. She was the only person with him in the elevator. He was making conversation.

Erin paused, thinking a moment, before saying, “I have two or three favorite directors, mostly but I don’t have a genre I don’t like. As long as it isn’t pure slapstick stupid.”

The elevator doors opened to the sound of Tyson’s laughter. If Erin was being fair, it wasn’t quite as perfect and annoying as she first felt, but she wasn’t used to being charitable with Protagonists. Or was the Plot trying to more subtly influence her thoughts? Could a Pawn be made by complacency, rather than force?

“Slapstick stupid. That, I’ll have to remember. What are you going to get? My treat.” Erin immediately started to build up a protest and he cut her off, “No, please, Erin. It’s probably the only thing that will get me to stop apologizing. It’ll weigh on me.”

Erin raised her eyebrows. “Janey’s okay with you buying drinks for other women?”

Erin wanted to ask, ‘Just one coffee would make the difference?’ but she wasn’t going to quibble if he’d stop walking around her like she’d turn on him any minute. Playing up stupid relationship jokes was harmless.

Tyson smiled, going just a little bit doe-eyed at Janey’s mention. “I asked her first, but you know she’s not the jealous type.”

Erin agreed. If Tyson would stop apologizing and bringing up Rex by proxy, she’d consider the deal a win. “Fine, fine. Just a small Americano with half and half. What are you getting?”

“I am thinking latte with some cinnamon. I love cinnamon.”

Erin almost suggested her favorite little coffee shop down the street, they sold a great coffee cake with oodles of cinnamon. But he was a Protagonist, and she wouldn’t do that to fellow backdrop. “I’m partial to hazelnut myself, but mostly I’m spice agnostic.”

“Ha. Did you know there are four kinds of cinnamon? I actually have some of each kind, and try to get some of the true cinnamon every year, though I am never certain how to best eat it. It's pretty expensive. Most of the stuff sold as cinnamon isn’t the true cinnamon.”

“Interesting. I assume you prefer the real stuff? Do they have real stuff here?”

“No, none here. And I am just an unrepentant consumer of all of it. Sweet or bitter, rich or one-note.”

They ordered coffee and chatted a little more about various spices and seasonings. The clerk looked a little scared, but she wasn’t ever Puppeted. Tyson was better than most Protagonists, and it helped that Erin distracted him. Erin’s Americano was a little weak, but she wasn’t going to complain.