"Thank you," she says, smiling at him without a single sign of the mental laughter.

"Barton is...recovering. Doing well." Or as well as can be expected for a forty-two year old man with a back injury and dealing with having his self taken over, causing multiple deaths.

"In answers to your previous not-actually-asking question, I am an intelligence officer. You won't actually have to deal with things nearly as much as I do."

Beat, and she tilts her head thoughtfully. "At least once they calm down about you. From experience, that takes a little while."