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Violet couldn't sleep.

She'd taken to wandering the halls that night, the solitary lights on the top of the walls lulling her senses and calming her mind. A breath of fresh air was just what she needed, and the exit wasn't too many halls off. As she walked however, she was distracted by the light coming from a room in the distance, and some soft conversation. She recognized the voices immediately and for curiosities sake, disappeared into the shadows for a listen.

"I really wish you wouldn't work yourself to death all the time." Mirage sighed, elbows propped up on the shoulders of Syndrome, who appeared to be in deep thought over something in front of him. He'd taken his attention off of the problem and leaned back in his chair, however, smirking.

"Rome wasn't built in a day, babe."

"It also wasn't built by one man with a bad case of insomnia." She wrapped her arms around him, head set down on a shoulder. Mirage was clearly exhausted herself, or perhaps had woken up in the middle of the night and happened to stumble upon him like Violet had now. He reached his hands up, rubbing his eyes and making no attempt to get up from his spot.

"And I'm gonna lose sleep until I figure this problem out. Go on to bed, I'll catch up later. Promise." Unfortunately she didn't appear to believe him, but reluctantly did as she was told. Not before mumbling, however. "You should start keeping those promises. You've got a lot of catching up to do." She blew him a kiss tiredly and wandered out of the room and down the hall, barely inches away from Violet's form. The raven-haired girl only dropped her disappearing act when she was sure that Mirage was out of sight, and moved to stand in the doorway, peering at Syndrome from a distance.

He was back to his problem, a cup of coffee in one hand and a pen in the other. As she now saw, it was a rather elaborate math issue, written out over a glass board in front of him. It was Greek to her; how he made sense out of it was beyond the teen. He sighed heavily, taking a drink of the coffee, removing several numbers in the equation and re-writing different ones. She stiffened as he spoke, not realizing that he'd seen her there... or sensed her at the very least. "Isn't it past your bed-time?"

"Wasn't aware that I had one." She replied gently, pushing her hair from eyes for a moment. Against her better judgement she moved into the room, pointing out the wall of math problems. "What's this all about?"

"Quantum physics, basically." Syndrome tilted his head towards Violet, smirking at the head-bob she did as a signal for him to elaborate. "Nothing you'd understand in the time it took you to get back to what you were doing." Violet knew that this was his way of telling her to shoo, but she took it as a challenge.

"Oh really? Try me." The look she received was no less than haughtily bemused, but he got up from his chair, spun the pen around in his hand, walking over to the end of the board and tapping the pen on it while taking another drink of his coffee. One problem at a time he explained what it was about and why it was there, and how it correlated with the next number beside it. Laws of gravity, all the science that Violet had slept through and Syndrome couldn't help but laugh by the time he'd reached the end of the problem; She couldn't have looked any more lost.

"Game, set, match?" He asked, moving over to rap her over the head with his pen before returning to his seat. She cringed, rubbing the spot and nodding solemnly. Without any adue Syndrome was back to his math solving, still as a statue and staring at those last few numbers. He assumed that she would've taken the queue, but instead of leaving she spoke again. "Where'd you learn all this?"

"Books, Google, and a college professor." He responded snarkily, eyes still on the problem at hand. Why was this causing him so much damned trouble? Violet rolled her eyes, wandering along the wall and giving it all another once-over before muttering, "I hate my professors."

"So did I." He leaned back in his chair, changing positions of thought. She peered at him for a moment, moving her hair again. In that moment she could think of no particular reason why her father disliked him so, even after what should've been a reconciliation. He'd likely scold her for being this close or even bothering with a conversation in the first place. Maybe that's why she'd stayed... She blinked, shaking her head.

"Wait. Shouldn't you still -be- in college? How old are you anyway?"

"Ah-hah. World's best kept secret." His attention was again diverted, pen raised above his head. He paused for dramatic effect, letting the girl stand there with an eyebrow cocked and head tilted sideways. "Twenty eight and a half."

"Really?" She sounded shocked, and caused him to give her the same look.

"Why would I lie?"

"I don't know, but -- wait, I'm --"

"Nineteen and a quarter? Yeah, I know."

"How did--"

"Someone was talking about it. Might wanna watch out for those guys, they're givin' me the creeper vibe." He'd finished off his coffee by that time, putting his pen down to raise his arms and wiggle his fingers dramatically. Violet put her hands on her hips, smirking. As if you weren't creepy yourself! She couldn't help but think as his attention was once again pulled to the board.

"Guess minds are a dangerous thing."

"I'm guessing you don't recall much of the last time we met."

"I remember it perfectly." The response was more blunt than he was expecting. "It's done, though. Unlike my dad, I'm willing to let bygones be bygones." That particular statement he had most definitely not expected. "People can change, and he doesn't seem to get that. Even Dash just goes along with the bandwagon, but what do kids know anyway." The suspicion in his eyes was apparent to her and what reason did he have to believe it? Outside of keeping him out of prison, the family had done very little to accept the fact that he was indeed one of them now. "I'm not them." As if saying it would ease his mind. In reality, it was her own mind she was settling.

"Is that why you're here?" He asked, sounding a bit harsher than he'd meant.

"I couldn't sleep. Took a walk, and you just happened to be on the way. Should I leave you alone now?" There were several moments of silence as he pondered the response to her question, and she took a breath of relief at the end of it.

"What's the trouble?" He seemed genuinely curious, attention pulled away from the problem for good that time. She wanted to tell him - he'd be the only one actually willing to listen these days - but she couldn't help herself.

"Nothing I could explain in less time than it would take you to finish that problem."

They talked for three more hours.

She was exhausted by the time she'd finally gotten back to her room, but even as she'd hit her bed with a tired plop, her eyes remained open to stare at the ceiling in contemplation. Was the person she'd met five years ago the same person she'd just talked to five minutes ago? Don't trust him, he's just manipulating everyone her father would say... but how could that be? She wasn't swayed to any belief, and he even helped with her math homework, explaining it better than any of her teachers had.

You could've become something greater than I'll ever be, you had everything in the world you could ever want, and you gave it all up for the sake of revenge. Why?