Greta's interference is the necessary buffer between himself and the physicist who is so obviously and utterly at sea. He has at his disposal too many points of reference aligned with this, too many spirals into the embittered slide away from self-worth, and in the tensing of his shoulders and the darkening of his gaze he slams the memories bound in loss into the forefront and neglects nothing, dismisses nothing, conceals nothing. His hands drop and his eyes blaze an escalating warning, and he closes in on the chair and its occupant in a brusque stride and pins her with a glare vicious and direct.

"You're not," Rush growls, the words ground out, slow and deliberate, between teeth gritted on an unstable edge, "nobody. You're fucking brilliant and you've one of the finest minds I know. Your worth is not defined by mechanical or technical skill. I'd have thought that was fucking obvious."

His voices lowers, soft and vibrating with cold, furious intent. "Do you have any idea how many problems with extremely low probabilities of success I have circumvented in the past five years alone. Do you think a lack of technology has in any way impeded me in the past." He straightens, his contempt bare, his scowl hard. "One solves the problem. A solution," he hisses, "always exists."