[Radio] You send Kalinka a direct message: "Hey sunshine."

[Radio] Kalinka sends you a tightbeam radio transmission: "Hello, handsome."

[Radio] You send Kalinka a direct message: "Ya home, or at werk?"

[Radio] Kalinka sends you a tightbeam radio transmission: "Right now? At home, where are you?"

[Radio] You send Kalinka a direct message: "At the ranch."

[Radio] Kalinka sends you a tightbeam radio transmission: "Oh, okay."

[Radio] You send Kalinka a direct message: "Ah'll be home soon, unless ya want t'join me here."

[Radio] Kalinka sends you a tightbeam radio transmission: "I can put on some dinner, and it will be ready when you return."

[Radio] You send Kalinka a direct message: "Okay."

(Home sweet home.)

Small Laboratory <SL>(#4907TLen)

Welcome to the Peacemaker-Dmitriev household, Est. 2216.

Although the building's original purpose as a research lab cannot be completely disguised, they have worked to make the place feel like home. What was once the reception area is now a living/family room. The walls are painted an almost-but-not-quite-neutral shade of pale green, the floor tiled in a style of checkerboard black and white linoleum squares that was popular a century ago. The room is furnished in an eclectic jumble of inexpensive "assemble-yourself" and aged commercial furniture, decorated with Bowie's collection of American Southwest antiques. His prize of the collection, a genuine Colt .45 SAA revolver, rests in a shadowbox case mounted on the wall near the entertainment center.

The much larger laboratory (normally hidden behind a sturdy wooden door) has through the clever placement of furniture and folding screens been divided into four areas. Immediately to the left of the door is a kitchenette with a two-burner stovetop and a standing fridge. A wooden lab table serves as a kitchen table and a gray metal storage cabinet as a pantry. Another table holds a small number of kitchen appliances, including a microwave and the all important coffeepot.

To the immediate right of the door is Bowie's home office, which is essentially a mission-style desk and yet another lab table pushed together to form an L shape. Atop them rest a computer terminal with hard-copy printer, global police-band scanner, datadisk storage boxes, a listing of public teleporter hubs, and other items useful for the average Maverick Hunter. A map of the world is tacked to the wall for easy reference.

Beyond the office in the far right corner is a workshop of sorts, complete with a work/examination table, a rack of tools, a small selection of spare parts, and extra weapons and ammunition. There is also a set of metal double doors that lead to the alley on the side of the building.

In the far right corner, beyond the kitchenette, is the bedroom. The sleeping arrangements consist of two beds separated by a bureau chest and the door leading to the bathroom. The first is a twin (single) bed with a mission-style headboard that matches the bureau and the office desk, and covered with a Navajo-style blanket. The other is a daybed covered with a Russian-country quilt. Perched atop the bureau are the plush Kalinka and Bowie dolls given out by Tron Bonne one Christmas - the Kalinka doll wears Bowie's cowboy hat, and the Bowie doll wears Kalinka's fuzzy ushenka hat.

Contents:

Kalinka

Bowie's junk(#5916Ten)

Kalinka isn't doing the gourmet chef thing this evening. Instead, she's heating up a frozen pizza. It's good in a pinch. She hasn't much felt like elaborate kitchen creations lately, not with Vince being a constant torture.

Some time later, Bowie returns home. No fanfare, just a few flurries that follow him in. "Brr!" he comments as begins peeling out of his winter clothes.

Looking over toward the front room area, Kalinka wanders over toward the partition door. "You are cold, sweetie? Have a seat, I will warm you up...poor thing, winter has come early this year."

Bowie hangs up his things on the coat tree and wanders into the back room. Looks like he's going to have to break down and buy some sweaters. "Hot cocoa would be nice...or coffee, if thare's some made." Before he sits down, he fishes something out of his pocket, holding it in his hand.

Kalinka nods, then dutifully heads to the stove, pouring some coffee out of an antique percolator pot and bringing it over to Bowie. Then, she grabs a large blanket off of her bed. "Have a seat, and I will wrap you up...I know you do not have much in the way of body heat, but this blanket has autoheat coils inside of it, to warm you up quick."

Bowie smiles, partially out of gratitude and partially due to feeling sheepish about the whole thing. "Thankee, sunshine." He picks up the mug with his free hand, the other cupping over the whatever-it-is that he sets on the table.

Kalinka very lovingly wraps the blanket around Bowie's shoulders, and it begins warming upon contact, which is a very nice, relieving feeling. She then sits down beside him and finally sees he has something in his hand. Her brow arches in curiosity. "What is that you have?"

Bowie relaxes a bit as the heating coils begin to heat up. No, definitely not built for deep cold winters. "Somethang fer ya," he replies. "Ah wus thankin...relationships are built on trust, right? Ah thank Ah should trust ya with this." With that, he slides his hand over to in front of Kalinka, then moves his hand away.

It's an old-fashioned key, the kind that goes to a lock with actual tumblers. "Ah have a safe deposit box in the Texas State Bank," he explains. "Thought ya should have access to it."

Kalinka smiles a little bit, looking very frankly surprised. She blinks a few times as she takes the key, turning it over in her hand. "Oh, thank you...I can...put things in it?" She's never really shared anything like this with anyone, so she isn't quite sure what to think. Certainly, she wouldn't dream of taking anything out of it that didn't belong to her.

Bowie nods. "If ya like." Now that his hand is no longer occupied, it disappears under the blanket. "Ah'm keepin papers an such in it right now, stuff Ah don't want gettin lost."

Kalinka reaches over and rubs Bowie's shoulder through the blanket. "What made you decide to um...to let me have a key to your deposit box?"

Bowie gives her a smile. "Because Ah love ya." The other reasons, he'd rather not talk about. He has no illusions about the risks of the life he's chosen to lead. He takes a sip of coffee, then sets it aside so that he can reach up to rest his hand on hers, his fingers radiating the heat stolen from the mug.

Kalinka smiles warmly at the warm touch. "I love you too," she murmurs softly, gazing at their hands on the table. "I am sorry that...I can be the demanding one in this relationship. I must ask so much of you."

Bowie squeezes her hand gently. "Ah know Ah've made mah demands, too...imagine it can't be easy, watchin me go out an fight all the time."

"I do worry sometimes," Kalinka admits. "But I can always fix you up if you get hurt. I would worry more if you did not have armor."

Bowie decides to be bold. He pulls his hand away from hers...and then moves to catch her inside the blanket with him. "Ya haven't made any demands Ah'm not willin t'meet. Hope Ah'm the same with you."

Kalinka giggles, perking up a bit at the close proximity. She snuggles against Bowie, happy for the warmth and the mutual affection. (Ha, take THAT, Vince,) she thinks triumphantly. "Of course, I just worry sometimes that I push you to...act in ways you do not want to act, or do things you do not feel comfortable doing."

"Or meybe yer expandin mah horizons," Bowie replides, "makin me thank in ways Ah never knew Ah could." Now that he's had a few minutes under the electric blanket, he's much warmer. He also smells faintly of leather and saddle soap - he must have been out riding. "Besides, surely you've felt uncomfortable with situations ya've never been in before?"

Kalinka nods faintly, closing her eyes and taking on a somewhat dreamy expression. "Yeah...it's true, you do have a point. If there is something that seems really uncomfortable or too weird...I would like for you to tell me, okay?"

Bowie says "All right." He drifts off into silence for a moment before continuing. "Ah haven't embarrassed ya with all mah questions, have Ah? Ah never imagined bein in love wus so complicated."

"No, handsome, not at all," Kalinka promises. Bowie can probably get a good look at the top of her head from the way she's leaning in toward his chest and cuddling in with him in the blanket. She's letting her blonde hair grow back in, and most of her brown tresses are beginning to grow out and fade. Looks like the sunshine is emerging from the clouds. "I do not have all the answers, either, but maybe together we can begin to find them."

That's probably all Bowie can see, what with them being snuggled in the blanket together. "Ah hope so." He chuckles softly, then shares his thought. "Meybe if we do figger it out, we should write a self-help book."

Kalinka begins shaking with giggles. "If we found out the secrets, we would be rich! We could go on a book tour, and be on all the shows...we are already in the tabloids, so that does not count."

Bowie laughs as well. "That'd be somethang, wouldn't it? How to be in love in spite a it all, by Bowie an Kalinka." He grins. "So, are ya goin back to yer natural color, or are ya goin t'dye yer hair again?"

Kalinka looks up at Bowie, grinning. "I never was too much into dyes," she admits. "I did it at a time when...I was trying to make a break from who I was. Because...I was burning bridges. -Some- bridges. Speaking of which, um...oh, I do not want to spoil the mood, nevermind."

Bowie begins to inquire, but stops himself. She lets him talk in his good time, and so he will do the same for her. "Ah do like ya as a blond. It suits ya. Though Ah do wunner how ya'd look as a redhead?" He grins, indicating that he's at least mostly joking.

"I could try it out, if you would like to see it," Kalinka offers, suddenly remembering something from a while back. "Do you remember when I dyed my hair pink?"

"Ya dyed it pink?" Bowie asks, both surprised and amused by the revelation. "Like cotton candy pink?"

Kalinka nods, giggling. "This was when I was fourteen, still," she says. "My friend and I were going to a punk rock concert, and I dyed it for that. But...it would not wash out. I thought that it would, but...nope, it was permanent dye."

Bowie can't help but laugh. For some reason he finds the idea of her having such an odd shade of hair really funny. "That must a been a sight!"

Kalinka says, "It was. It was...a different time. Sometimes I think back on those times, and wonder if that really was me. It is like...you hear about things that you did before you lost your memories, and it seems unreal, like it was not you? It is the same kind of thing.""

Bowie nods, still smiling. He can't help but smile when he's with her. "Ah unnerstand. It wus you, but a different sort a you."

Kalinka is quiet for a while, ponderous, and...probably enjoying the warmth and the closeness of her favorite person in the whole world. The only person who's stuck by her through her good times and bad. "Hey Bowie? What would you think if...I did try to make amends with Cossack? It would never be as it -was-...it can never be that again, because I cannot return. But...I am more and more not sure that I can hold a grudge my whole life."

Bowie's smile doesn't comepletely fade, but it is tempered by the question. He doesn't say anything for a long moment, a sure sign that he's mulling this over. "Ah...ah dunno, sunshine. Not sayin ya should hold a grudge, but...if ya want mah opinion, Ah thank yer better off without him."

This is a hard pill to swallow for the girl who, up until a few short months ago, had very little in her life that didn't revolve around her father. Now that she's totally free, she doesn't know what to do with herself. "Well...okay, handsome. I am just not going to dwell on it. Sometimes, though, it is confusing."

Bowie hopes that cuddling under the blanket helped to soften the blow. He knows how much she loved her father, how much she adored him...and how he allowed himself to blindly fall into the same trap. "Ah find family to be confusin," he admits. Then, "If ya want to know mah reasons, sunshine, Ah'll tell ya. But only if ya really want to hear 'em."

"I do," Kalinka urges. "Please, go on. You can criticize him, I will not be mad. I respect what you think."

It takes Bowie a moment to answer. It's as if he wasn't expecting her to want to hear this. "Ah watched how the two a ya acted around each other. Ah know Ah've never been a father or a son, so Ah don't have much experience...." The corners of his lips twitch downward. "...but Ah saw how he toldja whut to do. It wusn't askin, it wus orderin nicely. Ah watched ya drop yer science classes t'get that MBA like he wanted. Watched ya wear yerself out tryin t'do that an yer Hunter duties an find time fer me. Watched how he spent all that time in that lab a his an not askin himself how ya were doin...how ya wanted to prove yerself to him...an the minute ya did somethang he didn't like, how he punished ya." The frown sets in more firmly. "If that's how someone's supposed to love a father, then Ah'm not sure Ah want one."

Kalinka ponders that for a long moment, then answers... "A good son or daughter needs to obey their parent. Discipline when children fall out of line, that is necessary. Have you ever seen children who are not disciplined?"

"Yeah," Bowie says, "but thare are limits to whut's considered obedience an whut's considered discipline. A good kid does thair chores, goes to school, follows thair curfews, thangs like that. If thay do somethang wrong, thair parent grounds 'em fer a bit, takes away thair computer privledges an thair car keys."

Kalinka lowers her head, doesn't say anything for a long moment. Then, she admits softly... "I always thought that...Daddy was pretty normal for a Daddy...but...he was the only role model I had."

Bowie holds her close. The words are difficult for both of them, but they need to be said. "Ah don't know whut thay call handin yer daughter a gun an tellin her to shoot ya in Russia...but in America, thay call that abuse. No sane person would make ya do that..."

Kalinka leans against Bowie, feeling comforted and fighting conflicting thoughts. Even after all the evidence, she still fights against the thought that her beloved father could possibly be an abuser. When she thinks of abusers, she thinks of those unfortunate children who bear physical scars from their parents' rage. And of course, Cossack never, ever raised a hand to her. But perhaps this kind of abuse runs much deeper... "He always did mean well," she murmurs. "He was...trying to show me how failure was not acceptable."

Bowie idly runs his fingers through her hair. "We all fail sometimes, sunshine," he says, part in confession, part in assurance. "We're fallible. We make mistakes, sometimes big ones. An yes, thare's consequences fer failure. But sometimes failin is part a learnin."

Kalinka nods slowly. Suddenly, it's like a light comes on inside Kali's brain. Her eyes widen, as a thought occurs to her while considering Bowie's words. "Handsome, do you think...maybe...do you think it is possible, that...no matter whether I did mess up with the whole Abernathy thing or not...do you think that it is possible that he would have come to a 'last straw' with you and I sooner or later, no matter what?"

"Ya mean us bein in love?" Bowie asks.

Kalinka nods. "I mean...do you think that even if I had not lost the temper so badly, and was still a Hunter and all of that...do you think it was maybe inevitable that he would have kicked me out anyhow? Maybe it was a situation I was trying hard to win, but it could never be won, because he wanted me to be something I was not."

Bowie considers that a moment before answering. "Ah thank his expectations, whut he wanted ya to be, were so high that ya could a never met them. It might not ended the way it did, but eventually ya may a disappointed him one too many times." Besides, he thinks to himself, the reason why he kicked you out was because you showed that you could be just like him.

Kalinka nods, somewhat sobered by the possibility that she was doomed to 'lose', one way or another. She still looks confused, though. "This is all so strange...maybe it seems pretty straight forward, but I will tell you...I did talk to him not too long ago. He sounded happy, like it was old times, and...he said...he said he -never- said he did not want to see me again. But then when I asked him if we could meet, he said, 'Yes Kalinka, but not today.'" Perhaps it's no small wonder why she's so torn over this issue.

Bowie doesn't entirely understand all this himself. He's never had close ties to anyone like this, at least not before he realized how much he loved her. "Ah really don't know whut's goin through his head anymore." If he ever did. He lapses into silence for a moment as he thinks. "May Ah ask ya somethang?"

Kalinka nods, cradling comfortably against him. "Sure," she answers, "I know this is all pretty crazy and does not make much sense, so...ask away."

Bowie shifts positions slightly, so that he can glimpse more of her face through her brown-turning-blond hair. "Did he ever once tell ya that he fergives ya?"

Kalinka blinks a few times, clearly at a loss. "...I think that he must have," she offers uncertainly. "I know when I messed up on little things, he would. Towards the end, though, I cannot remember that."

Bowie frowns slightly. "Ah'm learnin that if ya really love someone, ya have to fergive them when thay make mistakes. Especially when it's a big mistake." He tightens the embrace for a moment, holding her snugly but not to the point of discomfort. "Ah fergive ya, Kalinka Dmitriev Cossack, fer the mistakes ya made."

Kalinka cuddles Bowie, tears in her eyes. "Thank you. Thank you so much...that means a lot to me. I will try never again to go down that path...you are so wise."

Bowie leans down to kiss her on the forehead. "Ah've walked some a the same path," he says quietly, then quirks a sad smile. "Funny thang is that the path Ah walked brought me to you."

Kalinka giggles. "Well...that proves to me, then, that making mistakes is not the worst thing one can go in this life. In fact, it seems more worth it when mistakes are a part of that path, and not just an obstacle."

In the background, the oven clicks off once the pizza finishes baking. Ah, the conveniences of the twenty-third century.

"Thangs don't always go as we expect, an we all make bad judgements," Bowie agrees. "So long as we learn somethang out a them, it's not always a bad thang."