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It's not like Jesse didn't notice Mr. White giving him the brush-off after the meet. He'd told Declan and his guys that they had two cooks, not one, and he hadn't wanted to talk about just how Jesse was eventually going to get his share of the money. Mr. White needed time or whatever to make a transition and get his new operation up and running, and wanted Jesse to help out.

The problem is, Jesse' s not sure if it's bullshit or not.

Because he's told Mr. White a couple of times now that he's out. After Drew Sharp and all, he can't do it anymore. Every time they say nobody else is going to get hurt, it happens. Combo. Jane. Brock. And now somebody's kid is gone and they're never gonna know what happened to him. Just gone forever because Jesse had said the wrong thing to that douchebag Todd, who apparently thought "no one finds out about this" meant shooting some innocent kid on a bike.

Mike had said there was a time bomb about to go off, and Jesse'd made the mistake of sticking around long enough to watch it go off. And the worst part is, he's pretty sure Mr. White doesn't even give a shit about what happened.

So Jesse helps with one last thing. He goes with Mr. White to the car wash he owns with Mrs. White to move the methylamine back to Vamanos. But after that, he doesn't hear from Mr. White, like at all. Not about whether he's talked to Mike, or about finally giving Jesse his cut. Nothing.

That's what brings Jesse back to Vamanos that afternoon. Standing outside, he finishes a cigarette, crushing the butt under the heel of his shoe before he enters, because they still store bug killing chemicals inside, even though it's separate from all the cook stuff.

No wait, not they. Just Mr. White. Because Jesse's out, no matter what happens when he walks through the door.

Except, he's expecting the garage of Vamanos Pest to be on the other side of the door, not what looks like the lobby of some hotel Jesse's never seen before. It sure as hell isn't The Crystal Palace, that's for sure.

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Because she hadn't heard anyone else in the lobby, Bella hadn't bothered to slow her speed to the more human-friendly pace she usually did around others on her way from her room to the forest door to hunt.

When a door suddenly opened and a man stepped into the lobby, Bella stopped her moving the second she saw him. To his eye, like she probably looked like she'd been flash frozen.

"Um. Hi," she said.

He's turned toward the door and doesn't see where the lady comes from. Mostly he's kind of thrown at the moment, trying to figure out just what happened.

"Yo," Jesse says, frowning, "What the hell is this? Is this some kinda joke?" Though even as the words leave his mouth, he realizes that he doesn't know who would play some kind of random joke on him. Or even who could pull something so weird off.

It took her a second to get her human voice on, the one that sounded rougher and less like a wind chime.

"It's all too real, I'm afraid," Bella said with her best commiserating voice. "Feels like a kind of bad dream sometimes, in the fun stuck-somewhere-you-can't-leave sense."

"Like that makes anymore sense," Jesse says, and this lady looks like, super familiar, even if he can't really put his finger on why or how. He knows he hasn't met her before or anything, so there's no way it's that. Either way, it's really fucking weird.

Alex is seriously going to have to start rethinking her stance about meeting guys, because apparently weird hotels in the middle of nowhere that pay you actual cash money to just show up and work at their weird store is a great place to meet cute guys.

Seriously, how did Penny never tell her about this? Or maybe alternate universe Penny doesn't want her to meet guys. Oh my god, what if alternate Penny is evil? Alex stares at the guy with her mouth slightly open, realizing that she's been gaping at him for a little too long and probably looks kind of weird.

So she does the only thing she thinks is sensible. Yanks up a bottle of perfume and wields it half-maniacally. "Sample?" she offers.

"Uh, no thanks," Jesse says, because the last thing he needs is some chick spraying perfume or whatever all over him when he doesn't even know where the hell he is. If it wasn't for the fact that he's been clean for what seems like fucking months now, he'd think he was on some weird trip or something.

"What the hell is this place? "

Okay, so the perfume was a bust. Alex set it back on the counter and leaned her chin in her hands, peering up at Mr. Gorgeous and taking a moment extra to really appreciate the looks he had. "Well, personally, I think it's some kind of evil universe that traps you in and gives you decent job opportunities. It's only evil because sometimes, they don't have ribs on the lunch menu and what kind of place doesn't offer ribs all the time?" she scoffs. "I mean! Come on!"

"Decent job opportunities," Jesse echoes, deadpan. Yeah, like that makes a whole lot of sense. "Okay, so... I'm gonna like, bounce, if that's alright with you."

He heads for the door without another word, only once he gets it open, this whole thing starts to make even less sense than before. Because that's definitely not Albuquerque outside. No way. Not sure what to do, he strides back inside, back over to the perfume lady, a confused and lost look on his face.

Alex had returned to her magazine and had her chin in her hands when he got back to her with that confused look on his adorable face. She stumbles slightly as she gets vertical again, waggling her brows. "Did you find Jurassic Park?" she asks eagerly. "I totally want to go, but everyone says it's a bad idea and I'll probably get eaten since I'm roughly goat-size."

"What, like the movie?" he asks, and that makes everything even more confusing. He backtracks, tries to remember what this lady said a few minutes ago before she started going on about ribs and perfume or whatever.

"What was that you were saying before? The part about being trapped."

"Duh, like the movie," Alex replies, scoffing. "Like Jurassic Park was what, a book or something? Come on," she scoffs again, as if he's the really idiotic one in this situation. "And yeah, trapped! I mean, I'm not, but I earn way more money here and it means I can actually pay my store's rent back home without doing anything super illegal, but other people get trapped and can't go home."

"You mean, like, forever?" Jesse asks and while there's a part of him that almost likes that idea, as much as he doesn't want to admit it. It means he won't have to ever actually go back and tell Mr. White he's out. That's a conversation he won't ever have to have. He's out, Mike's out, and all that shit can be behind him.

But either way, it's all pretty fucked up.

"How do you get back, then?" he asks.

"Open a door," Alex replies, setting her magazine aside as she hops to her feet and nods so that he'll follow after her. "C'mon, I'll show you! Ever wanted to go to Chicago? There's this awesome bar we go to called Rosalita's, best ribs outside of the place on Halstead."

A few feet down the same wall another door opened and Fiona bustled through, messy hair piled high on her head, Liam on one hip and an overloaded canvas tote bag knocking against the other. Focus on all the things she needed to get done before her shift, she nearly ran into the guy stopped in her path, and several articles of toddler-sized clothing were knocked from the bag as she drew up short.

"Shit," she cursed, and rapidly took in the stunned and guileless face of the guy she'd nearly mowed down. "Sorry, that was my fault. Hold him a sec?"

Without waiting for a reply, she'd handed off her two-year-old brother and stooped to rapidly pluck up the escaped clothing.

One second, he's trying to figure out what the hell happened to Vamanos, and the next, some lady's shoving a kid at him. He takes the kid, only because the alternative is dropping him on the floor. As freaked out as Jesse is at the moment, he's not about to do that.

"Hey lady, what gives?" he asks, because this whole thing is pretty much bullshit.

"Look, if you can't deal, you can just put him down," Fiona answered with a terse glance up through the mess of her hair. "You know what? Never mind," she hastily added as she pushed herself back up again, the last of the lost clothing clutched firm in one hand as the other reached to lift Liam from the guy's arms. The kid had always been better than any of them at rolling with the punches, and now was no different: The entire exchange might as well have not happened at all as far as he was concerned.

"Sue me for ever counting on the kindness of strangers," Fiona said with a roll of her eyes, and shoved the wad of clothes back into her bag.