Another oneshot from the desk of KomodoClassic. This takes place after the end of the series. Spoilers alert.
Nine months and four days after the war ends, Marco sits alone in his bedroom in his new house. It's big, it's modern, and it has all the trimmings.
Marco throws back a shot.
Usually he doesn't let himself think about it. The battles, the blood. He does all the events Jake and Cassie won't do, tastes fine wines, wears expensive clothes, dates models.
But every now and then, he has nights like this. Bad nights. Nights when all he wants to do is drink, so he doesn't have to remember.
But that would be an insult to her memory, so he doesn't drink until he can forget. Instead, he thinks of her, and her long blond hair and razor tongue, sparkling eyes and fiery temper. He remembers how she looked in combat, slashed and bleeding through her grizzly fur, and how she looked in school, smiling and tossing her hair back. He remembers the way she laughed—her real laugh, when he said something that even she couldn't pretend wasn't funny—and the way he had to take three steps for every two of hers to keep pace with her when she walked.
His house is silent. No music plays through the sound system installed in every room. The blinds are closed, because he doesn't want pictures of this night surfacing in the press.
And because he doesn't want to see the stars. The stars are where this whole mess came from. They hold no wonder for him anymore, not on nights like these.
This night is worse than usual, worse than the other bad nights. It isn't just the war memories that haunt him. He thinks he has some form of PTSD, but he's never really wanted to know. Most of the time, pretending to be normal is enough.
She never liked being normal. Her inner self was always a warrior, just waiting to be tested with blood and fire. The crucible broke Jake, ruined his relationship with Cassie, cut him off from the world. It made Cassie cling to her often-violated morals—she always wanted to create something instead of destroy. It drove Tobias to take refuge in his hawk side, and keeps him away from the world now. It made Ax a stranger to his people, as the rest of them are strangers now.
It brought Marco's cold, ruthless strategist to the surface—the side that he now hides from, most of the time. But her—
Marco downs another shot.
He remembers the way her core of darkness began to consume her. Jake would send her to do the dirty work—and she was always so much scarier in battle than the rest of them. But she learned to love the fire, and it brought out both the best and the worst in her. In all of them.
Marco lifts the bottle and pours the rest of it out on the floor in a toast.
"Happy birthday, Rachel."
Love it? Hate it? Fiery, burning, total indifference?