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[ His lips thin into a line briefly before he relaxes his expression. Because it's not like that's the same thing. He's still a clone, he's still going to die, and if that happens it will be long after he's dead. ]

Well, I hope if there's another York for you to have to deal with that he doesn't turn out to be a clone that time. [ He picks at his fries for a moment before picking out a couple of long, thick ones and biting them in half. Maybe it helps the other York to know his death means little because of his clone status but for himself, it doesn't calm him from knowing his death is imminent. ]

You never know. [ A beat, he pulls one of the bottles of beer, marked with a sharpie subtly on the label, and pops the top. ] Eat up, yeah? Plenty for you.

He cocks an eyebrow at York. "Don't push me, man. I'm eating at my own pace." He's going to enjoy it, drag it out as much as he can without the food going chilled. A good long drink of his beer seems to calm him, however, and he rubs his forehead after he sets the bottle down. "Don't mean to snap at you, this is just kind of stressful."

"I promised painless." And he meant it. "It's fine. You got a right to be stressed. DOn't worry about it."

Honestly it'd be weird if he wasn't a little wound up about this. Some part of him felt guilty, the rest just wanted it over. As soon as it was over he could deal with his own knotted up feelings about easing himself into the grave.

There's no other option. It's not the same unholy mess that was Connie- but it doesn't sit right. He's a soldier, not a murderer.

"I won't." He wouldn't, fuck this guy. He takes another bite of his burger and slouches forward, setting his hand in his lap. "Listen," he says after a long moment. As he speaks he pauses a lot, trying to gather his thoughts and figure out what his point even is. "It's pretty obvious that our timelines have a lot of differences. I learned some things, talking to you and to Carolina and to Delta. I couldn't...really bring myself to talk much to Maine or Tex or Church. It doesn't have anything to do with your guys's timeline so it wouldn't have done much good or made much of a difference." He frowns. "Just tell me...when we were messaging, you kept talking about death. Saying 'we' always die. What's that mean?"

"The project ends. We end it with Tex and North. Carolina gets dropped off a cliff but survives, Maine goes AWOL, everyone goes to ground. I help Tex five years later with trying to track down and kill Omega, her AI. We get shot. I've seen six or seven alternate realities here and they all end with us dying." He takes another sip of his beer, staring across the pond. "We die. That's what I meant. I woke up here after bleeding out back home. THis is it."

He snorts lightly. "So by 'we' you mean you. My timeline has nothing to do with yours. They didn't catch you and pull D." Maybe he's slightly bitter at that; having the plan fail might have been okay if they'd managed to get away.

"...How the hell did you fuck up crashing the MOI. You lived there forever. You know the security protocols back and forth-" Oh. Oh shit. "Who snitched?"

"Things were different. All around. From what I understand in your timeline D and Sigma weren't the ones who came up with the plan together, and Maine and Church weren't even involved." He has gotten more than halfway through his beer now, and things are becoming pleasantly swimmy. Seems early for that, but who is he to complain?

"As for who snitched,"he continues, "I have no goddamn clue, but between the time I left the Director's quarters and got to the Counselor's that man knew I was coming."

"I'd always wondered how much of what went wrong was the Director and how much was the Counselor. They seemed equally guilty to me in my world." He takes another swig of his beer, eyeing his profile. This isn't any less surreal than last time, but it won't take much longer. He hopes. His metabolisim always did weird things at the worst times.

"Yeah, same." The Counselor was at least complicit but some of the decisions that were made must have been based on his recommendations. That was the only thing that made sense.

Another bite of his burger and drink of his beer later and he finds himself slouching even more, propping himself up with an elbow on his knee. It's when he goes to take yet another bite of his burger that it occurs to him. He stops, about to chomp down, when he pulls the burger away and fixes a shocked look on York. "You put it in the food, didn't you?"

Well he never was much of an idiot, which makes this awkward. Not as awkward as it's about to get, but- yeah. This'll be fun. York shrugs and scrubs at the back of his neck, taking another swig of his beer to stall. "It's just a sedative."

He taps his pocket, the dull tink of a syringe audible. "That's for after. Quick and painless, like I promised."

He chucks the burger at York; he doesn't think to compensate for his weakened state and it lands just at the toe of York's shoe. "Asshole." The beer gets set on the ground and kicked over. "Not like I don't know that, right? Ha." He's trying to keep his agitation under control, so he looks off to the side to seethe a little bit. Then he looks back at York. "I don't know whether it's worse if you realized what you were doing or worse. You know in the time since they brought me here I didn't have one thing that I could call mine. The only thing I've had is the ability to choose when and how I check out. You gave me the option of how—I guess it was too much to ask you'd respect me to choose when."

"You're me, dude. You know the last person I'd ever respect with me. Because we're assholes, because we're selfish, because we think we know what's best." And that much is true. He leans back enough to stare at him, unmoved. He knows he'd do the same damn thing for himself if their positions were reversed. "You came to me today. So today's your call. If you wanted to pick out the hour, the place, the exact second? Shoulda been a little more specific."

"Fuck off." The fries follow the burger after a moment, what remains scattering across the ground. Doesn't matter that his words are true, it doesn't make it sting any less. "Quit lumping us together like that. Just because we have the same general personality doesn't mean I would pull this kind of bullshit on you."

"Look me in the eye and say you wouldn't." York crosses his arms, brows lifted, waiting for some grand line of bullshit that neither of them would buy.

Easier said than done. York's comfortable lying, even if he's bad at it. But sitting up and keeping his eyes open right now? That's another matter. "Shut it," he mumbles irritably. He gestures toward himself. "Do it now." He doesn't want to be asleep when it happens. He wants to feel the needle go in, the depression of the plunger. He wants agency in this whole thing.

"Any last words for D, North, or Clair?" Because they sure as hell don't have last words for each other. There isn't much more to say. Still, it bears asking as he comes around to sit behind himself, prop him up so he's at least not staring at the great blankness of the Dome's sky when he goes. No one should go looking at nothing. He's done it before, not fun. One arm around his own waist, one on the syringe, he tugs York's sleeve up.

"Nothing for you to hear," he retorts weakly. "We already sorted our shit, anyway. Said our goodbyes." If only he could touch Clair one more time, he thinks, but he's not going to say it. This York doesn't need to know what they shared; it's none of his business. He slumps against York's side, and as pissed as he'd just been at him moments before, he can't help laying his head over on his shoulder. He knows he smells like some weird cleaner but the other York is just going to have to deal.

"Nothing I wouldn't say, probably." Which is a pretty short list, really. He hadn't had time for last words. Just 'don't let them take D.' That's the only sentiment he had time to really parse before darkness took hold and-

Nothing.

And here he is. Spreading that nothing along.

Sure the cleaning fluid smells weird and his skin is tacky where they've touched but he slides the needle in without complaint Runs a hand through York's hair like their mother did when they were upset. Presses the plunger and tries not to think about morphine overdose. "Just like falling asleep, man."

He tries to laugh but it comes out as an ineffective warbling chortle. "Nothing you'd repeat, if I told you," he mumbles, and follows that up with a strained little 'mm' sound, slumping even more. "I'm gonna miss her," he says under his breath, the world elongated, and trails off, eyes closing.

It's about three breaths later when his lungs quit.

That's not ominious at all. He could ask. Could poke- not at him, he's gone, but Clair but-

She has her own life. She's got a right to it. He's fucked it up enough and if she'd found something good with this other him he's not gonna ask about it. He doesn't have a right to much of anything when it came down to it. Not anymore.

Just like sleeping except for how the breath goes still, then the heart, then- well instead of a death rattle it's this strange sort of upkick in heat and smell as the melting starts. Along with the foaming. Soon what had been him is a mass of sweet smelling suds, soaking the ground and York entirely. Cleaning fluid.

Ugh.

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