⋆.˚ ᡣ𐭩 ASKING FOR IT      ╱     Mapping Out Chaos.𖥔˚
chapter TWELVE

On the way back to Cathy's house, Carmen sits in the backseat with Kate. The other girl didn't ask her to, and she probably would've said it wasn't if the brunette asked if it was needed, so she just did it. She sat there, close enough that Kate could feel she was still here━━━and always would be━━━and hoped that Kate knew she'd be there as long as she could be.

When the blonde lays her head on the cowgirl's shoulder, Carmen thinks she does.

"Are you gonna..." she points at Kate's phone, open on her lap and lit up with her messages with Javi. She didn't know for sure what she was planning to say to the other man, but she had to assume it had to do with the data he's been attempting to collect━━━their best chance at a new model.

The blonde shrugs, and she can feel it in her side where the knob of her bone digs in. "Probably."

"Well," she brings a thumb up to the opening of her mouth, nailbed becoming a victim to her teeth. "He'll probably feel bad enough to give it to you."

He'd probably do it for you anyway, she doesn't say, knowing that guilt is not the card to play right now. And that's what Kate would feel, an overwhelming sense of guilt at the reminder of the past and the way it's continued to linger.

"We can only hope," she nods, taking a deep breath. Like she's built up just enough courage and can't afford to lose it, her fingers begin flying across the keyboard rapidly. Turning her eyes out the window, she watches the scenery pass and gives her friend a moment of privacy.

The outside world passes a blur of green and yellow grass and wheat, and she knows if she rolled the window down she'd be able to smell the sundried ground and home.

As they get closer to the ranch, something she can tell only by the familiar roads taking shape, she looks toward the front seat. In the rearview mirror, her eyes connect with Tyler's for a brief moment. She smiles like it's easy, and huffs out a small laugh at the her from not even a few days ago, who thought this man was nothing more than an ego the size of Texas and the epitome of the worst of her favorite thing. While the first might still be true, she shook her head at the latter.

She's never been so thankful to be wrong.

Turning onto the small dirt road that makes up the driveway of the Carter farm, Kate drops her now-locked phone onto her lap, and Carmen looks over at her, anticipating an answer.

"Javi'll be here in the next half an hour or so," she informs them, hand finding the catch of the door handle. "Say's he and Scott were already out around this way looking at different cells."

Yeah, she thinks, probably waiting for your text like a dog waiting for a bone.

"Joy." Popping her own door open and swinging her legs out of the truck, she jumps down. As dust kicks up under her boots, Tyler's door opens in front of her. After getting out, he hooks a finger into one of her belt loops and pulls her close enough that he can press his lips to the crown of her head. It's such a casual move, so domestic, that she almost forgets her next sentence. Thankfully, she continues on. "I sweat to you; if that StormPAR stick in the mud tries to say anything to us I can not be held responsible for my actions."

"And you wouldn't be," Tyler agrees, turning her in his arms so she can walk in front of him and toward the house, all while his hand still rests on the divot of her hip. "Most of those StormPAR assholes need something to wake 'em up to what they're doin'."

"I just can't believe Javi's been working with Riggs this whole time. And, that he had us working for him without really telling us what we were getting into."

"That's because he knew we wouldn't agree," Kate sighs, holding the front door open for them as they ascend the steps.

Carmen nods, knowing her friend's right and knowing that that's probably as much as she really wants to talk on the subject.

As the screen door falls shut with a clatter behind them, Cathy calls out from in the house. "Kate, Carmen, is that y'all?"

"Yes," they answer in tandem, following the sound of her voice to the living room. Finding her in her favorite rocking chair, the older woman looks up at them with a warm, if not wary, smile. "Well?" She asks.

Her daughter shrugs, and Carmen crosses her arms. "No dice."

"Next time, then," is all she says, more of a statement than anything. As if it was a proven fact that the three of them were going to figure it out, and the experiment was going to work for them. Carmen aches for that kind of confidence.

The man behind her doesn't seem to have the same problem. As he repeats, "Next time," in a way that sounds like he truly believes it. She hoped he did━━━that at least one of them did.

"How are you going to get there?"

"With Javi's help," Kate tells her, pulling her phone out and tapping at the screen━━━checking for a message. "Hopefully."

"Javi's coming?" Cathy looks at them hopefully. Behind her eyes, Carmen can just barely see the pieces of an image forming. It's the same one that she had brought to life a week or so ago, only to watch get ripped apart nights ago.

"To help us out with some data," she tells her quickly, wanting to make sure nothing takes shape in her heart that'll heart when she finds it is nothing more than fragile hope. "I don't think he's planning to stick around."

The words taste like bile leaving her, and she winces after saying them, but there's no good way to put it otherwise.

It must show on her face, or maybe Cathy's still as good at reading her as she is her own daughter, because the dark-haired woman nods sagely. As she lifts the mug beside her to her lips, Carmen almost thinks she hears her say something like, "Not yet, at least."

She smiles at the idea.

Outside, she picks up the sound of gravel against tires and the roar of an engine growing louder as it takes up distance, and she squeezes Kate's forearm lightly. "I think he's here."

"Yeah," the blonde agrees, taking a small breath before making her way back toward the front of the house. Without question, the other two chasers follow behind her.

In the afternoon sun, the StormPAR truck glints between patches of mud and dirt. It's almost infuriating, how they still find some way to shine even with all the muck and dirt covering their name━━━just like Marshall Riggs planned when he took Javi under his wing.

Leaning up to kiss Tyler's cheek lightly, a move she didn't even know she was making until she was, she whispers in his ear, "Give us a minute, yeah?"

He agrees with a nod she can more feel than see, and then she follows Kate to the middle of the yard. Rounding the front of his truck, Javi meets them there with guilt-ridden eyes and a grimace.

"Hey, uh..." He looks at both of them, before landing on Kate and making sure to hold her eyes. "About what I said earlier, I didn't mean any of that."

The two already knew that, knew it as soon as driving away, but that didn't mean the sting was any less hurtful. That didn't mean they didn't deserve an apology, and she hated that this was probably his excuse for one. But, just like she knew Kate and Kate knew her, they both knew Javi.

It must've been why Kate didn't push. Only lifted her shoulders helplessly and said, "It's fine."

It wasn't, and he knew that. If somehow at the end of this, the three of them were able to scrap something together that even began to resemble who they used to be, it would have to start with some major groveling.

Or, "If there's anything I can say or do to make it better..."

"Give us your PAR data," she confirms. "That's a start." A weak one, but a start nonetheless. And, it was one that integral to the completion of their experiment, and she'd be damned if they didn't walk away successfully this time around.

For a moment, he doesn't look like he's going to do it, mind still conflicted between the paycheck running his entire team and the team who've been behind him for the better part of a decade. In the end, she's more than grateful they win out.

Only, not before Javi's eyes flit to the porch where Tyler still stands, assessing and judging. She wonders if it's still distrust or jealousy over being the man here with them now instead of him. If only he'd realize his place is open, and he's the one leaving it empty.

No, Tyler didn't take his place━━━he just carved one out beside Carm and fit himself there as if he'd never been anywhere else. The longer it went on, the more it felt like he hadn't.

"What are you doing?" Scott asks, sticking his head out the window and glaring at Javi as he opens the back door and pulls a hard drive out. Does he have any other default expression, she wonders.

Slamming the door shut behind himself, he waves the hard drive around. "I'm giving this to her. What does it look like?" His tone left no room for question, and thankfully, Scott didn't try to argue. Instead, he continued to sit in the front seat with a pout on his face and annoyance on clear display.

In front of the again, he presses the hopeful answer to their puzzle into Kate's hands, fingers lingering on it like he didn't want to give it up. "I needed money to start StormPAR. That's why I went into business with Riggs." He looks up, making eye contact with Carmen and then the one he's really talking to. "I want to help people, too. I really do."

He looks away, over Carmen's shoulder again before sighing. "I said what I said 'cause I...I carry that guilt with me, too. Every single day of my life, so...I'm sorry."

Out of the six of them━━━other than Kate, of course━━━the project was big to Javi. Addy and Praveen also cared about the science and understood it in a way that meant they wanted to use it, and Carmen and Jeb, were there because of Kate━━━in their own ways━━━and wanted it to succeed.

But no one could touch the bond Javi and Kate had those years ago or the connection they had to what they were trying to achieve. They were pushing the hardest, trying for the impossible no matter what it meant; thinking they were okay with the result when really, they had no clue what they were walking into.

So of course, there was a layer to the guilt the two carried around that Carmen didn't have━━━an understanding she wasn't privy to no matter how much she wanted to be.

It's why when she doesn't say anything more, having nothing to add, Kate extends an olive branch anyway. "Javi, why don't you stay and help us? That way, we could finally solve this together."

At first, Javi looks like he's considering it. Then, he only chuckles softly, something heavy and nostalgic clouding it. "You know," he breathes, eyes only for Kate in a way the brunette has always hated, "there was a time when I'd do anything for you, Kate."

Damn you, Carmen thinks, with half the mind to say it.

She would've too, if Scott hadn't hollered across the yard and saved her the headache. "Javi." He taps on his door like the call wasn't enough to get his attention. "Let's roll. We got a storm developing up near Enid. Team's waiting."

Resigned and having picked a side, he nods at them one final time. "I got to get back to work." He looks at them weakly. If she wanted to read into it, she'd say it almost looks like he's begging for a sign. For one of them to tell him this isn't the end of them. She hates that she can't answer him, and the silence is forced to stretch until he adds, "The more data I get, the better for business."

Both girls sigh, the brunette tilting her head to the sky. She shouldn't be as angry as she is, but she was only granted so much strength.

"Sorry I stole your car." Handing him his keys back, Kate smiles weakly. It made it more abundant none of them had the answer the man in front of them was asking for. Hopefully, soon, they would.

"It's all right," he confirms, answering both the spoken and unspoken. Turning around again, he makes his way toward the truck, only pausing to look at them one last time. "Look...Be careful out there."

Suddenly, she's five years younger, and her mouth opens on her own accord. "You too," spills out, and she needs him to know she means it. Even with everything else going on. She'll always mean it.

With the hard drive in hand, the two girls as well as Tyler and Cathy piled into the barn. She let Kate do her thing when it came to putting the data they needed into the model Tyler had brought to them, but when the machine started beeping and the screen started moving with the new information, she couldn't help but lean forward.

"Wow, these scans are impressive." Behind her, Tyler did the same. His head over her shoulder, words right in her ear and traveling down her spine.

Across the screen, a 3D model unlike anything she's ever seen before comes to life━━━a swirl of grey that was almost an exact replica of the real thing. "It's damn impressive."

"I mean, it's a complete map of the chaos." Awe was clear in Kate's voice as she ran her eyes over the screen and took everything in. Meaning, that she was seeing everything that Carmen wasn't and was running it through her mind until it was practically engraved there. "Tyler, our moisture numbers are off. Currently, the polymer is only absorbing the existing raindrops, not the moisture from the humidity. I mean, we need it to precipitate out more."

Carmen blinks, looking at Cathy and raising an eyebrow. The older woman does nothing but shake her head, sipping her coffee and accepting that she is never going to understand her daughter's science.

Huffing out a laugh, she turns to Tyler next and elbows him lightly. When he looks down at her, she tips her head at the screen and repeats her previous expression. This time, the person she's looking toward smiles in understanding. "Basically, we need to make it rain."

"Right," she agrees like she understands, making a face because she doesn't really, but she trusts Kate and Tyler. She looks to Cathy again, wanting to not be the only one who doesn't understand again, but the shock has cleared from the mother's face.

"They were cloud seeding in Lawton a few years ago for the farmers," she tells them like that's supposed to mean something.

"Yeah." Oh, it does. Just not to her. "Yeah, silver iodide." Kate turns back to the computer screen, a revelation clear on her face. Her fingers press on a few keys, and Carmen knows enough to know she's changing a part of the data to make up for the perception they were lacking.

"We could shoot rockets of that," the cowboy behind her chimes in, sounding a little too happy to bring rockets into the equation. "So, the silver iodide converts the moisture into rain, and then the sodium polyacrylate, we need a lot of it... would pull the water from the storm, increasing the cold pool."

"And that's a good thing?" She looks around the room, feeling out of the loop but without the ugly feeling in her gut. When she first got pulled into Kate's experiment all those years ago, there wasn't a chance of that happening━━━she always felt too stupid and too inexperienced when placed next to Kate, Javi, Addy, and Praveen. But, after a few months with them and learning who they were, she knew they wouldn't judge her.

She knew why she was there; knew she was just as important for who she was, and that they knew that too. It's been a feeling she's made sure to carry with her, and she does now still. It's easy too, when the group she's with is filled with people who could never really make her feel stupid.

Kate nods, as smug as a child who just got told they could have extra dessert. "No faster way to choke a tornado."

The words make her heart beat a little faster. They shouldn't━━━really, they should fill her with more dread and expectations like they've been dealing with for days (years)━━━but somehow, this time feels different.

It's not a feeling she could put a word to; it's not confidence filling her along those lines, but it was real all the same.

"Okay," she smiles, leaning back. Her back connects with Tyler's chest, and his arms come up to circle her just like she knew they would. "So, how do we do it?"

"I think we're gonna need some help," Kate admits.

Following her best friend's eye line, the two gaze at the tornado wrangler standing with them expectantly. He chuckles, nodding because their plan is the same as his.

They needed a bigger team, and they knew just who to call.

▬▬ mads speaks     ╱     everybody thank
paradise cove for motivating me to keep up with
this even though i'm pretty sure none of them
read this fic
i know i've it before, but we really are in the home
stretch here and i can't wait to see the completed story
put together omg
don't forget to let me know what you're thinking!