( That weird background sense of being about to tip over something lessens, and he thumbs at his drink again. Credit to his assertion, his posture's just as soft as it normally is, and his voice is just as raspy-slow. Beneath it, he's trying to figure out whether he feels guilty or relieved. Maybe a little bit of both, jury's out.

After a contemplative beat, he takes a drink and clears his throat at the tail end of the swallow. )

I don't think Nate ever really had a good picture of what it was like. I don't know if you do, either. I've mentioned it once and a while, but... It seemed like it blew his mind when he found out I went with you on that run.

( Which, by the way, he appreciates that Lance didn't seem to second guess him. )

I'm pretty sure what he's got in his head is that I just... took road trip up to Oregon, holed up safely in a cabin doing engineering things every day, and that was it.

( He's sort of... got a point he's getting to, somewhere he's trying to go with this. He hasn't really mapped out the dialogue tree in his head, but he'll find a good way to connect the dots at some point in this conversation. Thank you, alcohol, for helping muffle out that third and fourth layer of thinking where he tries to predict what Lance will say before he says it. )