It's just an old coat really. Nothing special. Been patched and repaired maybe one too many times. Kind of battered – a bit like him.
He can't bring himself to get rid of it though. Keeps wearing it like a talisman; like armour. He has a couple of other jackets of course. Things that are newer, maybe look a little smarter. But they stay in his cupboard most of the time while the old coat comes out time and again.
Every time he puts it on it momentarily evokes memories. Of cold, wet nights when it was his only protection; his only blanket. Of boiling hot days when the sun baked down and he felt like he was roasting alive. Of fear and darkness, the sound of guns and explosions, the smell of blood and death. Of people he'd known and befriended and lost.
He doesn't have many things left from his old life. Doesn't have much to evoke the memories. And the memories protect him. Help him to keep other people at arm's length. Help him to guard his heart. He's lost so much over the years; lost too many people that he did or could have loved. And every time it happened he bled out a little more. So the barriers are up now. The walls around his heart securely in place. The determination to keep people away firm.
The day when he realises how much the others care for him comes as something of a shock. When he sent them away he never expected them to come back of their own accord. Never expected them to care that much. Believed that he would have to call them back. Yet back they had come. Back in the nick of time and saved him. And as grateful as he is it still scares him.
Scares him because maybe the walls that surround him aren't quite as secure as he thought. Scares him because if he accepts how much he cares for them and that they care for him, there's always the chance that he could get hurt. And despite the image he tries to project to the universe, the image of the battle hardened, closed off warrior, he's really not sure he could stand that sort of pain again; could survive being hurt that much. So he tries to close himself off even more. But there's a little niggle in the back of his mind, a traitorous little thought that maybe, just maybe, he's found a family – a strange and dysfunctional family but a family none the less – and he hasn't had that in a really long time. And that thought scares him most of all.
But the traitorous little thought keeps working and one night at dinner listening to the laughter of the others and finding himself laughing along with them, he realises something else – these people, this ship, make him feel safe. And he believes in them, trusts them, like no-one else in the 'verse.
And the next time he puts on the coat he finds that he has new memories. Memories of friendship and laughter and fun, of battles won, of camaraderie and hope, and above all of his family. The old memories are still there of course. They always will be, helping to make him the man he is. But the sting is gone from them now. He is the sum of all his experiences.
So he wears his old coat like a talisman; like armour. Patched and repaired – like his heart.
