I'm a Monster
Sara Lance wandered aimlessly in the hallways of the Waverider. The events of the day were still heavy in her chest. She hadn't killed anyone today, she was sure. Despite the hunger to do so, she had been able to hold herself back. Barely.
She hugged herself tight. Her arms were still trembling. She was staying away from everyone else because she could still feel the blood lust just brimming on the surface. She even went as far as self-imprisonment. Locking herself up in her room would have been more ideal but she had been feeling more and more claustrophobic with every passing minute. She needed to move. She found herself walking into the bridge. Her feet automatically gravitated to his study.
"Join me for a drink?"
Rip Hunter raised the decanter. He had already poured liquor into the two glasses in front of him.
"Were you expecting me?" she asked, nodding at the two glasses.
"I saw you on the surveillance monitors," he said, gesturing to the tablet he always had nearby. "When I'm not distracted by an evil villain's henchman, I usually do keep tabs on my crew."
Sara picked up one of the glasses and downed its contents in one motion. She pushed the glass back to him. He poured her another shot and handed the glass back again.
"How are you feeling?" he asked quietly. He noticed the slight tremor in her fingers when she reached for the glass.
"Like I want to beat someone up," she answered. "Care to volunteer?"
"Another time, perhaps," he said with a small upward curve at corner of his lips. He could still remember the feel of her fist from their first mission.
"There's blood on your shirt," Sara observed.
Rip looked down. He hadn't changed out from the tuxedo he had been wearing earlier. His jacket was draped behind one of the chairs while the bowtie and the top two buttons of the dress shirt were undone.
"Savage's blood," Rip murmured before taking a long drink from his glass.
"So you succeeded in slitting his throat this time," she said. "Not that it did anything for the timeline. Your family is still dead and Vandal Savage will still rule the world in 2166."
"And you succeeded in not killing Blake," he replied. "Though from the look of it, you still appear the worse for wear and troubled by the desire to slaughter someone."
"So despite doing the exact opposite of what makes us monsters, we're still monsters," Sara said softly. "I guess we'll never be heroes."
"Sometimes the world doesn't need another hero, sometimes what it needs is a monster," Rip breathed.
Sara looked at him curiously. "Was that from a movie?"
Rip cleared his throat. "Yes, it was. Dracula: Untold, circa 2014. Dr. Palmer is not the only one knowledgeable about pop culture."
Sara grinned. For the first time today, she felt a little lighter.
"So what happens now?" she asked the Captain.
"Well," Rip fiddled with the tablet he had placed beside the decanter. "I had Gideon plot a course for quiet field where we can say our goodbyes to our fallen comrades."
Carter Hall and Aldus Boardman. Kendra's soul mate and her son from a past life. Her family.
"Oh, poor Kendra," Sara said sadly. "How is she?"
Rip used a finger to swipe the surface of the tablet. A video of the Medbay was displayed on the screen. Sara could see Kendra asleep on the medical bed. Professor Stein was watching over her.
"Ray and Martin assured me that physically, she is on the mend," Rip said. "Emotionally, however, will probably take a bit more time."
"She lost her soul mate again," Sara said. "I can't imagine what she must feel right now."
"It feels like trying to breathe while your lungs are being torn away," Rip's voice was barely a whisper.
Sara looked slightly horrified. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean—"
"It's quite alright, Miss Lance," he shook his head. "It's a feeling I've had to live with everyday. Eventually, she will learn how to breathe again."
"Because the truth of our existence is that we are blessed and cursed by the drive to move forward," she repeated his words to him.
"Indeed," he nodded and took a sip of his drink.
"I don't even want to think of how I would feel if anyone in my family was taken away from me," Sara said. A sad expression flickered across Rip's face but it was gone so quickly, she could have imagined it.
"You should get some sleep while you can," Rip said to her. "With the way things are unfolding, I doubt we will get many opportunities for rest."
Sara nodded and looked down at the empty glass in her hand.
"Listen," she started. "I'm sorry about hitting you the other day."
"I deserved that for lying to all of you," he interrupted. "I lied to you to serve my own selfish purpose."
"No… well, yes, you sort of did, but not really," she shrugged. "You said you were motivated by the need to stop Savage in order to save your family. But you actually jeopardized and eventually abandoned the mission of stopping Savage just to get Carter back. Weighed against saving your family, that was a difficult choice to make. I'm not sure I would have been so noble as to choose to save someone I hardly know over saving my family."
He gave her his usual half smile. She smiled back and turned to leave.
Rip watched her leave his eyesight and eventually tapped on his tablet's screen to follow her movement through the surveillance cameras.
"My plan is that you would never have to choose between saving your family and saving the world," he said quietly. "But then, when did things ever happen according to plan," he said ruefully.
He watched as Sara reached out a hand to open the door to her quarters. She stopped abruptly, and even from afar, Rip could see that her hand was still trembling from the residues of her blood lust. She made a fist and drew her hand close to her body, as if trying to ward off the feeling by keeping it locked in. Close.
Rip touched her figure on the screen of his tablet.
"I'm sorry I couldn't save Laurel," he said softly. "But I swear to you, I am not going to let that monster consume you. I will find a way to help you, Sara. I can promise you that much."
Sara looked at the camera as if she heard him. Rip stared at her unreadable face. She looked away and reached out to open her door again. Rip sighed as he watched her enter her quarters. He swiped at the image on his tablet as Sara's door shut behind her.