Work Text:
"Hey, Larry?"
"Yeah?"
"There's a guy downstairs who says he's here to see you. He's..." Ed hesitates; Larry can tell, even though he hasn't looked up from the paperwork yet. "He looks kinda important, in a weird way? And I'm not sure he'll take no for an answer."
"Go ahead and send him up. I'm far enough ahead on this that I can talk to someone."
"If you're sure."
Larry nods. "I am."
Ed goes back downstairs, and Larry goes back to the paperwork for the time being; it's no more than five minutes before the visitor makes it to the office door.
"Well. This is not where I was expecting to find you."
"Oh, hey! What's..." But that's a flash of red in Larry's peripheral vision, not white, and he second-guesses quoting Bugs Bunny mid-sentence. "What the hell happened to you?" he says instead, after he actually looks up.
Dr. Horrible raises an eyebrow at him. "I could ask you the same question. At least in my case, it's been all over the damn news - are you even trying to keep up anymore?"
"I've been busy."
"You were busy before, and that didn't stop you. Anyway, I thought I was going to find you at the museum, not in an office building. By choice, if the name's anything to go by."
"I..." Larry sighs. "Look, times change, all right? Some opportunities opened up, and it would've been stupid of me to say no. It's pretty much ev--"
"Don't say it's everything you ever wanted. That doesn't happen to people. Besides, it's really rich of you to say you're only now getting that, considering you already had it."
"Hey - Doc, calm down. How could I have that when I was working in a museum?"
"Do you still do the freelance stuff?"
Larry blinks. "Not really, no. It'd probably look bad, if word got out."
"So you gave up doing what you love to sell glow-in-the-dark flashlights to people? Have you completely lost your mind?"
"No, I started making money off of what I love."
Dr. Horrible sighs, and looks over Larry's shoulder and out the window. "Your museum's closing for renovations next week."
"It's not my museum. It never was."
"That's not my point. I have a bad feeling about this, regarding your... charges, let's call them."
Larry shrugs. "A little remodeling isn't going to stop me from dropping in every now and then."
"That's... look, I'm trying to return a favor, here. But that's only going to work if you actually listen."
"And how would you know that?"
"Because I didn't listen." Larry can't see a damn thing through those goggles - what possessed Doc to actually wear them over his eyes, he has no idea - but there's a definite 'near tears' waver to Dr. Horrible's voice. "And maybe I should have, but it's your turn now, in any case."
"I'll think about it, all right? We're kinda slammed right now, we're trying to land a merchandising thing with Walmart--"
"Walmart? Seriously?" Dr. Horrible sighs. "Fine. I can't work with this. If you think you might actually listen sometime in the next week, call me, I'll still be in town. If not, enjoy everything you ever wanted. I hope it works out as well for you as it did for me."
He leaves before Larry can ask what he means by that, and he makes a mental note to ask Nick if there was anything in particular on the blog that might explain it. But then he goes back to the paperwork, and gets so caught up in it that the conversation's pretty much gone from his mind by the time he goes home.
***
A month later, he goes home again - just after sunrise. He's exhausted, and maybe a little jet-lagged, and more than a little in mourning (because really, if he could've kept Amelia up here...). But there's one more thing he's got to do before he can go to bed.
He gets bumped to voicemail, which isn't really a surprise, since it's still dark in Los Angeles.
"You don't have to pick up, Doc, but... call me later. I think I owe you one, even if I didn't really hear what you were saying at first. And... thanks. For trying."
Among other things, it's high time he tried to get the full story from his friend, and not by way of the Internet grapevine.