A/N: There wasn't nearly enough Rachel / Tom moments in the season premier. So I wrote this.
No Doubt
Rachel was watching. Watching Baltimore and the disaster of the past few days disappear from sight, but not from mind. The city had changed them all. Rachel just wasn't sure how much. She thought of the mother who she had not been able to save and her boy. About the select few. About the Captain's wife. About the thousands of others that were sure to have died prematurely to provide power for the ovens. About not having Quincy around. About all the brave sailors that had died.
About trust.
"They said you were out here," Captain Chandler said from somewhere behind her. She's heard - or felt - him coming. One of those. She was too weary to try to figure out which one.
"It's finally gone dark," Rachel said, still looking at the city in the distance. What she could still see of it in the dusk. With Olympia and the power plant shut down, there was no more lights for the city of Baltimore.
Chandler said nothing but came to stand next to her, looking out over the dark city. She knew she should give him her condolences. She hadn't heard about his wife until they'd all returned to the ship. But right then, she thought she'd be more of a help to him to just be there with him. To just be someone he could stand next to silently. Besides, she worried he would blame her for it, even though the logical part of her told her he would not. But still, she wondered if he blamed her for not figuring it out sooner. Just a few hours and things could have been different. But he wouldn't blame her. He was too good of a man to blame anyone. But he would blame himself, she knew. That was what good men did.
"I heard they managed to keep the primordial safe," he said after a long minute of silence.
"Yes. They did. We can still produce more vaccine."
"Good. Going back to the Arctic for more would have been a pain," he said, finally turning to look at her rather than the city in the distance.
"Agreed. But with Quincy gone, I'm going to have to make sure doc Rios knows how to create more vaccine without me and how to collect a new sample of the primordial if something was to happen-"
"Nothing is going to happen to you," Chandler said firmly. "Nothing."
She wanted to argue; tell him of all the dangers of the world. But he already knew them and what he wanted to hear right then was that she agreed with him. That she believed in him enough to trust that she would always be safe with him. And she did. She'd never doubted he would come for her in Baltimore. So she only said, "I know."
He looked out over the water again, almost dismissively, but he moved his much larger hand from the railing to rest on top of her hand. They stood together watching Baltimore disappear. Stood until full darkness fell. Until the stars came out. Rachel stopped thinking about the past and the present, and just for a little while she thought about the future, and for the first time in what felt like forever, that future looked truly bright.
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