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You are the same man.

( He'd just forgotten that. No, he'd had the memories pushed aside; the feelings repressed. They had always still been in his mind, just locked behind what Eobard had turned his thoughts into )

I'm here to help you. As I've always been.

( Though what he takes to mean by help... She wants to "help" him -- to restore him, but also to keep him safe. Gideon doesn't want anything to happen to him no matter what he now thinks. (If he's hurt, or dead, then they can't bring him back) )

[He huffs a short breath, low and amused when she claims with such steadiness that he's the same. Her faith doesn't move him—not truly. But neither does he think of it with the same disdain as he does that of Ray or Sara or Jax.

Gideon, it seems, would always prove herself an exception.]

Somehow I suspect you and I would define help quite differently.

[That like so many, she would prefer to have the Rip of old once more. She may think he's ultimately the same as he once was, but the differences would become apparent, even to her, in enough time.

She would fall in line with the Legends before Rip. He knows this as a certainty. He cannot act otherwise.]

I'll give you the same terms I have given the others: there is no reason why we cannot co-exist, so long as you're willing to leave well enough alone. [To leave Rip be, as he is now. But the Legends had also received a threat to match the promise; a warning of what Rip would do should they attempt to overstep bounds.

He leaves the words unsaid this time. Merely looks Gideon in her eyes.]

Then you forget how well I do know you.

( Perhaps not forget, but ignore. She didn't get a chance to see the differences in him before, with Rip only being on the Waverider for a short time before the intrusion, but she's looking to learn now. Gideon hopes that she can push just enough to really see how he was changed. If they know that maybe they can do something, or he can find something )

I already know of the truce that you gave, but I cannot ignore your presence here.

( Is there something in between co-existing in ignorance and what he'd see as meddling? )

[He almost protests—he could never, but it would be a lie. He had, along with everything else of his life and his identity thanks to his choice to touch the time drive directly. So instead he lets her have her assumption. Her belief in him, the man he once was and whom she believed him still to be, somehow.

It would be a faith without reward, in the end. So often it was.]

You don't have to ignore it completely. [The concession is out his mouth before he can quite stop it, and Rip closes his mouth tightly afterwards. This feels like a mistake; some way to set himself up for a trap, because he knows in the end which side Gideon will choose.

He knows better.]

But I've no interest in being told how much I've changed for the worse, or how if I'll let it happen, the lot of you can have me "fixed." [It's easier when he lumps Gideon in with the rest, Rip realizes. He will still do what he has to, even when it comes to her.] I'm willing to do what's necessary now, and it is better this way. None of you will take that from me.

Then tell me something that does interest you.

( She can only give words, words that he may not even believe with how much his mind had changed. How much were promises worth, even hers, when his contempt for the team extended also to her? )

Perhaps "doing what's necessary" isn't necessary.

( If only. If only it was as simple as them not knowing what he wanted, or not having listened )

You should already know that things are never so simple, Gideon.

[Of all of them, she is the one who has seen the impossible choices laid on Rip's shoulders throughout his tenure as a Time Master, and even after that organization was put to an end. Each sacrifice, each occasion of live versus history, of who must die so the flow of time could be preserved--and to what end?

What ever came of it, other than miserly and grief and his family left dead?

He moves past her. It would be a simple matter to end things there, but something in him urges Rip not to leave her without answer. His steps pause after she's at his back. They're still alone on this rooftop, and he looks up at the seemingly boundless sky.]

I still enjoy listening to music.

[A trivial detail at best--but one solitary thing Rip can say is unchanged in him, even now.]

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