Fic in response to this prompt: Carrie/Quinn, leftover Chinese

[Set in 3.08 so all sorts of season 3 spoilers. Some profanity]

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Homeland characters/world. No copyright infringement intended. I'm not making any money out of this.

—

Quinn walked slowly to the operation unit's kitchen area to refill his coffee. The events of the past few days left him drained and his mind kept drifting to tomorrow. With any luck, he'll get Carrie her Langley bomber tonight, and tomorrow... well, tomorrow he'll submit his resignation and disappear. Turns out he wasn't as suited for this job as he always prided himself to be, but at least he still knew how to disappear.

Seeing Carrie in the kitchen stopped him in his tracks. His head began to hurt; it hurt somewhere else too, but he refused to let himself go there again. The other night, after he had settled the police investigation, left that forsaken house and saw Carrie waiting for him, he had let his guard down enough to feel something akin to hope. Only he wasn't the man she was waiting for. Despite his disappointment, he had said yes... whatever you need. Helping her clear Brody's name would no doubt be the first of many hells he deserved to be in for murdering that child.

Quinn resisted the urge to sigh. Even though she was just heating dinner, Carrie was her usual extreme self and jabbed at the microwave panel with more force than the kitchen appliance deserved. Carrie looked up at him, let out the breath she apparently had been holding, and turned her attention back to the microwave.

Quinn broke the silence. "So… I've been meaning to ask. What happened between you and Saul the other day?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Saul - "

"I said I don't want to talk about it."

Carrie started rummaging through the kitchen drawers. One by one, she pulled them open, rustled through the contents, and slammed the drawers shut in frustration. Quinn watched her from the corner of his eye as he waited for his coffee to brew. He grew concerned as she became increasingly frustrated.

"Carrie, you're not going to find your Langley bomber in one of these drawers."

"No shit," Carrie snapped.

The microwave beeped, which caused Carrie to pause. But the moment passed quickly and Quinn watched as she harassed the cabinets next.

"Where the fuck is the goddamn ketchup?"

"Why do you need ketchup?" Quinn asked cautiously. "You eat ketchup with leftover Chinese food?"

Carrie didn't answer and he wasn't surprised. It was reason #3 why she intrigued him so much. She was an unknown and even after he had spent the last couple of months trying to understand how her mind worked, he still felt she was impossible to read. He watched her go through the final two cabinets. After she came up empty handed, Carrie gathered her food and turned to leave the kitchen.

"There's probably ketchup in the cafeteria," Quinn chimed.

Carrie rolled her eyes. "Well, by the time it would take me to trek there and back, my dinner would be cold."

—

Quinn searched the offices for Carrie before finding her back in the kitchen. This time, she was hunched over, head deep, rummaging through the refrigerator. He would have laughed out loud, if he still remembered how to do that.

"You're still looking."

"I can't eat this shit without ketchup."

"Then today might be your lucky day, and I'm not just talking about catching your bomber tonight."

Carrie straightened away from the refrigerator and looked up in time to catch the two packets of ketchup Quinn threw at her.

Quinn could see different expressions flitting through her face as she stared at him, ketchup in hand. As usual, he couldn't name any of those expressions.

"Uh, thanks," she said finally. "Where did you find this? I looked everywhere."

"I told you - cafeteria," Quinn said, unable to break his eyes away from her blue ones.

Carrie held his gaze. "Quinn, I didn't ask you to go get me ketchup."

Quinn straightened his shoulders. He looked down at the floor before slowly meeting her eyes again.

"I was headed to the cafeteria."

Carrie raised an eyebrow. "You never eat there."

"They have coffee."

"You just made coffee."

Quinn pressed his lips together, unsure where this conversation was headed. Carrie shook her head, gave him a half smile, brushed by him, and walked out the kitchen.

Whatever you need.

Quinn gritted his teeth. Her damn smile did nothing but kindle his headache. His mind was strangely riveted on finding ketchup just minutes before. But standing alone in the kitchen, the only thought on his mind was that he really needed to get the hell away from all this.