Buried in his guilt
He tried not to be too obvious although he suspected that TJ knew and they were billions of lightyears away from home but there was always a small chance that they would make it home someday and someone could use this to wreck Riley's career.
He ate, slept, worked with Rush and Volker on Destiny's systems and didn't go to the infirmary a fraction as often as he wanted to go. Lisa updated him sometimes because she was helping TJ out in the infirmary anyway and she was Riley's friend, too.
Adam suspected that TJ knew about him and Riley because when he came to the infirmary she was always giving them privacy, turning her back to them and finding something to do as far away from them as possible. Still, he never did more than hold Riley's hand and wish like crazy that he would finally wake up. TJ had told him that as far as she could tell the fracture was healing pretty well but that didn't mean anything until Riley wakes up.
He dreamed about it every night, his fault, his failure. He dreamed about Riley pushing him out of the way, about Riley hitting the wall, about Riley's limp body in his arms and all that blood on his face. Adam knew there was something he could have done, should have done. He should have checked Riley's work, should have held on tighter so that Riley wouldn't have been able to shove him away, he should have gone in there...He had been through it in his head again and again and again. Every ever so slight possibility he could have used to prevent what had happened to Riley.
There was something he could have done differently he was sure of it, which made all this is his fault but Riley had paid the price.
/
Recovery
"You're already up." TJ smiled at Riley who shot a dark look at Brody who seemed to be completely unfazed by said look.
"I'm not up," Riley clarified: "I'm lying in bed."
"You're decidedly more vertical than last week." She told him and began with the check-up.
"Not you too." He groaned: "Adam's already said the same when I'm still lying in bed."
She threw Brody an amused look, forgetting for a second that he and Volker had taken her hostage not too long ago.
"It looks good." She told Riley when she began to wrap a new bandage around his head: "Another six weeks I think, then you can go back to work." Riley seemed relieved:"Good, because I think Adam is going to be sick of having me around all the time, soon."
TJ raised her eyebrows just slightly: "I don't think so."
/
Broken
Riley didn't actually remember his accident or even the hours before it. The last memory he had from before the accident was eating breakfast with Adam. He remembered how they both had said 'later' before Adam headed off to the apple core and Riley went to – and here his memory ended.
The next thing he knew was that he had woken up in the infirmary with a considerable headache and Adam hovering at his side. He remembered how TJ had shone a light in his eyes and asked all these questions while sounding like she was quoting a medical textbook which she probably had.
The first few days after that were also still a blur, he had slept a lot, but every time he woke up someone had been there; Adam, Vanessa, Eli, TJ, Volker, Lisa, Scott even Rush one time and Young had visited him once he had been awake more than five minutes at a time.
After he had been more awake the boredom had settled in quickly. It hadn't help much that the more he was distracted the easier he could ignore the pain but TJ wouldn't just let him go back to work. More than once she and everyone else he had complained too had reminded him that he had managed to break his skull. Adam had even been more adamant about the fact that Riley needed rest than TJ, but Lisa told him that Adam had been witness to the accident so that was understandable. And when TJ finally had allowed him to go back to work it was only a few hours at once to see if his body and especially his head could take the strain again.
He could and sure, he had lied about the severity of his headache for weeks until the pain had eventually decreased to a dull throb around the area of the breaking point but it had simply felt too good to be busy and part of the everyday life on Destiny again to let it go.
Adam had hovered around him a bit more than before but when Riley had re-started their little prank war, which they had started when they had still been on Icarus, Adam had picked it up like Riley had never been on the edge of death.
It felt good to be back.
/
Learning to let go
Everyone jumped when the gate opened the second time. TJ didn't know who she expected to come through but Brody only half surprised her. She was a medic and Riley was her friend and little things added up, on Destiny more than on Icarus and Brody's presence here was simply the final clue. The others seemed puzzled to see him but Brody didn't stop to explain, he walked straight towards the shuttle.
/
The pain was so great it was almost numbing. He didn't want to die but after all these times when he could have died and didn't, now his time had come. He didn't want to ask this of Colonel Young but he knew he wouldn't leave while he was still alive and they were running out of time.
There was a movement at the door, TJ he thought but Colonel Young's puzzled: "Mr Brody? What are you doing here?" made him tilt his head as much as he could.
A part of Riley really wished that he hadn't come.
"I can't tell you." Was Adam's answer but his tone was determined.
"I really don't see-"Young began but Riley interrupted him. They didn't have the time to argue and while he didn't wish for this last goodbye now that he had it he wouldn't waste it.
/
"It's okay, Colonel." Young cast a speculative look between Riley and Brody but he laid a hand on Riley's shoulder and said: "It's been an honour, Sergeant."
"For me too." Riley tried to smile despite the pain. Young stood up and left. He looked over his shoulder when he reached the entrance and saw that Brody had taken his place. He turned away, this was not his to witness.
/
"I wish you hadn't come." Riley said when they were alone.
"Figures." Adam answered and made himself comfortable as if they had hours and not less than thirty minutes.
"Why are you here?"
"To say goodbye." Adam answered as if that was the most obvious thing in the world. Maybe it was. He took Riley's hand in his. It was warm and reminded Riley of too many secret nights and stolen moments.
"Can you tell my nephew that I'm sorry I didn't make it to his first day in school?"
"Of course," Adam brushed a few strands of his hair aside. He tried for a smile and failed when he adds: "I imagined meeting your family differently."
"So did I." Before Destiny happened, Riley had told his parents, without giving too much detail, that maybe next time he would bring someone with him.
"I love you." He did, so much that it hurt. He didn't want Adam to see him like this and yet he didn't want to miss a single moment with him. He wanted Adam to remember them and know without doubt that what they had was real and serious and important. Riley had never before wanted to bring someone back to his parents, not since he joined the military.
"I love you, too" Adam answered unceremonially and without hesitation. All the things Riley could have said and suddenly they were out of time.
"I'm in pain." Young was gone. Now he had to ask Adam and he hated himself for it. Adam was a scientist, he would understand.
"You were going to ask Young to kill you, weren't you?" Riley nodded.
"Thought so." To an outsider Adam had to look unbelievably cold-hearted but Riley could see that he's fracturing apart at the seams. His hand is shaking in Riley's.
"I don't have a pistol." Riley was silent, waiting for Brody to continue. There was an obvious answer to this.
/
When Brody came back, they all looked at him. His eyes were hollow when he returned their looks.
"Riley?" TJ asked tentatively. Volker looked like he wanted to ask why Brody was here in the first place but she didn't think that this was the time.
"He's dead."
/
Brody never mentioned Riley once. Eli did and Volker and Young and Matt and Vanessa and Greer but never Brody. When someone mentioned Riley when he was in the room TJ had seen him tense but he never joined the conversation.
He always smelled like alcohol.
Sure, he had done that before, too, because he ran the still but probably out of her concern she noticed it more. She spoke with Lisa about it because she figured that if anyone knew about Brody and Riley then it was Lisa and she was right but Lisa could only tell her that Brody was never drunk at work, only closed off and snappish.
TJ knew that he should talk about Riley's death but she couldn't talk about the death of her baby either, so who was she to demand it of him? She knew it wasn't healthy but nothing about Destiny was.
Time heals all wounds, at least that was what she had been told, so maybe in time both she and he would learn to let go of their sorrow.
/
28 Days Later
"How long?" Everyone turned to Brody, surprised at the barely suppressed anger in his voice.
"I discovered it shortly after we took back the ship." Rush said nearly blasé.
"So the planet where Riley died, that was you."
"Yes." Rush didn't meet Brody's eyes. Without hesitating Brody grabbed Scott's gun and fired a shot into Rush's torso before anyone could do anything to stop him. Scott disarmed him immediately and Young bellowed orders to bring Brody into the brig but Brody remained stone-faced through all of it, yet with a burning anger in his eyes.
/
"Did he die?" Was the first thing Brody asked when Matt came to his quarters where he had been confined to, later that day.
"Why did you want to kill him?" Matt asked instead of answering. He was a bit frightened by how calm and collected Brody appeared.
"He killed Riley." Brody answered darkly.
"Look, I know he was your friend but-"
"You don't get it." Brody interrupted him: "He wasn't just my friend. He was my lover. It's been 28 weeks since he died and without Rush keeping this secret he would still be here."
Matt looked utterly perplexed at that revelation.
"How long?" He blurted.
"Long enough."
"Look, we've all lost people-"
"No, you didn't. Not like this." Matt gave up. It was clear that Brody felt completely justified in his actions. It was in Colonel Young's hand now what would happen with him.
"Did he die?" Brody asked again but Matt left without an answer.
/
"Hey," TJ said when she came in.
"Did he die?"
"It's touch and go." She shrugged and he laughed hollowly. "It always is."
"Did Young send you?"
"No." She said it fast and hard, leaving no doubt that she wasn't lying. "I thought maybe you'd like to talk about it."
"Like you do?" he asked without caring if he hurt her or not.
"I found someone to talk to." She admitted. Her soft tone broke through his resentment. "I'm sorry."
"It's okay." He rolled his eye at that. "Is Young going to execute me?"
"No. I don't know. Maybe. Would you like that?"
"I don't think I care." His honesty was brutal but not unexpected. She had been in his position herself, not caring whether she was alive or dead and the person she had wanted help from had been unable to give it. Without her responsibility for the people here on Destiny, without Varro she would have died a long time ago. Varro was the fundament of her strength, of her new will to live. Maybe in time she could lend Brody a hand to until he learned to stand on his own feet again without Riley to support him anymore.
"You're not going to take my shoelaces, are you?" He joked half-heartedly.
"You said you don't care, not that you will actively try to kill yourself." She turned to go, hesitated and turned back to him until she was nearly touching the bars. She didn't want to be heard.
"Did it help? To shoot him?"
"I killed Riley. I suffocated him with my own hands." She gasped a little at his confession but again, little pieces pulled together to form the picture of a puzzle. "Yes, it did feel good."
She had been there, too. Imagining standing with a gun over Young and pulling the trigger for killing her baby. After the shuttle had come back and crushed her hopes for once and for all, there had been a moment. For one second, for one terrifying second, set alight with grief and rage at his blasé reaction, she could have done it. She could have taken her gun and shot him for killing her baby.
She nodded, taking his answer for what it was. When she reached the door, he said, "TJ."
"Yes?"
"I'm happy for you." And underneath his anger and grief and guilt, she could see that he genuinely meant it.
"Thank you."