A story inspired by another I am reading right now, Follow me back home by the brilliant xStarlitSkyx. I love your first BMFM story, and when I went to bed last night I kept thinking of a story that I just had to write. The only problem is now I have written it I need a big box of tissues.
Grow old with me
The hum of the city was more incessant these days. Even at night the bright lights and bustle of traffic penetrated though to the residential streets, an indication that people seemed to have forgotten that they actually needed sleep. Sleep was particularly important for one of the residents in such a neighbourhood. At nearly 83, the grey-haired woman appreciated her rest much more than most people might have thought, considering who she was. A well-known, well-liked lady, who had spent many years tirelessly campaigning for the rights and well-being of those around her, trying to stop the inevitable march of progress from trampling all of her good work.
In her youth her passion had been for mechanics, but her genius and ingenuity had moved her well beyond tinkering in her small garage. So far beyond, in fact, she had even left the planet on several occasions. That fateful day when she had met those alien bikers had most certainly been life changing.
The woman sat at her window and sighed. Those had been good days, back then, when she felt she still had a purpose. Politics really wasn't her thing, but her body was no longer that of a 20-30 something young woman, fit and ready for action. Now she had to be content with signing petitions, holding coffee mornings with the resident's association, and other such things to keep her mind occupied. Anything to hold back the emptiness she had been left with.
Her eyes left the street and fixed on the calendar above her desk. The emerald green of her irises were a little duller now the cataracts had taken hold. She didn't need to see the date to know what it was, but it was habit she couldn't break. Three times a year she would sit at her window and gaze wistfully down the alleyway, her mind filling in the view with the image of three mouse-shaped headlights approaching from the darkness, the roar of their bikes reverberating from the brick walls, the whoops of triumph punctuating their return. There would be no lights today, no roar of engines, no cries of victory. And there hadn't been for nearly 10 years now.
The ex-mechanic pulled a small, white handkerchief from her pocket and dabbed her eyes. Oh god how she missed them.
Today marked the first of her losses. The oldest, strongest, and gentlest of the three mice had lost his final battle 25 years ago. The grey-furred giant had always hoped to go out fighting, and he had always imagined it would be in the line of duty, protecting his friends and family from enemies. Modo had always had a big heart.
After finally returning to Mars to help in the re-build, the mouse spent years searching for a soul mate to settle down with, only to lose everyone he ever came close to. Without a family of his own he lived though his sister's children, and his nephew Rimfire's children. Without the infrastructure that had once been the pillar of Mars' great cities, and with so many dead, missing or maimed, many of the remaining population fell ill to a mysterious plague. Modo had fought so valiantly all of his life, and saved so many other lives in the line of duty. Eventually the stresses and strains of such a life left so much damage to his body, he fought his last battle with the disease, and lost.
Poor big guy... I never even got to say good bye.
The funeral had been incredible, there must have been almost every available Martian mouse at the ceremony, not to mention countless other aliens whose lives he had touched. But the effect the loss had had on his closest, dearest friends had been devastating.
She herself had been living on Earth with one of them. Married in fact, although it had been the strangest marriage she had ever known. Aside from him being a mouse and she a human, the whole occasion had been surreal. Martian mice didn't do churches and white dresses. They did do plenty of food, motorbikes and something called 'the bond', which had probably been the most embarrassing part of the whole affair. Vinnie had been enjoying himself immensely until he remembered that tiny obligation. She couldn't recall seeing the white-furred mouse turn so pink.
His skin shone so bright that day, even his fur couldn't conceal it. That beautiful, snow-white fur... I never touched anything so soft... was never touched by anything so amazing as that mouse.
But the death of his friend had wounded him much more deeply than he had ever cared to admit. She spent the next five years dealing with a practically suicidal thrill-seeker, who would disappear for days, sometimes weeks, trying to find some way of dealing with his pain. She had shouted at him, pleaded with him, even tried restraining him. But the mouse was determined to try to recapture his freedom fighting youth, and one day he simply didn't return. She had got a knock on her door, and recognising the two police officers who knew about her and her alien husband, she knew instantly the sad purpose of their visit.
After the second funeral, she hadn't been able to bring herself to go back home to her garage. Not on her own anyway. The third of the three mice invited her to stay on Mars with him until her grief had lessened, and she ended up staying there for the best part of the next three years. Throttle had had troubles himself since the passing of his older and younger bro, and the grief put so much strain on him his own marriage had eventually broken down. General Carbine called it a day when she found him in a bar, so drunk and so angry he had tried to kill the barman, the punters, and then burn down the building.
Her loss was my gain, it kept me going... he kept me going.
The locals no longer recognised the tan-furred leader of the biker mice. He hadn't been the same since Modo had died, and now he was so far gone people even started to fear him and his unpredictable temper. And so she had returned his hospitality and took him back with her to Earth. For a long time he had brooded, the adjustment to his new life was not easy. The only thing that kept the last of the three bros going was the only person left in his life that he could trust, indeed could ever have.
The mouse and the mechanic by this time were already in their 60s, and too old to spend their days fighting crime and pummelling goons. They settled down together and ran the business that was the woman's lifetime labour of love, and reminisced about the days when they had rode their supped-up Martian bikes around the streets of Chicago, battling to save Earth from the Plutarkians who had decimated Mars; eating hot dogs and drinking root beer on the shore of lake Michigan; saving lives, being heroes. The laughed at the memory of Limburger tower being demolished time and time again, until finally Limburger had been defeated and no tower was built again on the site. It was now a memorial hospital for wounded war veterans.
They spent a happy seven years together, becoming as close, if not more than, to each other as their previous partners. They went to bed each night secure in the knowledge that Earth was safe from invasion, and that they had each other and needed nothing else. They would nuzzle their heads into each other's necks, and wrap their arms around their bodies to share their warmth. Every night they would drift off, lulled into sleep by the other's steady heart beat, and wake still together, still safe, still happy.
And then one day she had woken, and he had not.
He looked so peaceful, so at rest. There was no one left to fight, he had no reason to stay.
She had always known that they would leave her. Martian mice had shorter life spans than a human, especially the males. Throttle had told her that to get into their 70s was quite exceptional. But then she had always known he was exceptional. Like Modo, though, the strain his body had endured through years of suffering had taken its toll. He had fought wars and witnessed death; been taken prisoner, tortured, beaten, humiliated. Seen everyone he ever loved taken from him, and still he kept on going, kept on fighting. And when all the wars were won, and all the wounds were healed, all the mouse had left were his memories, his scars, and the auburn-haired, emerald-eyed woman who had stayed with him until the very end.
That woman at the window wiped the single tear from her cheek. She wanted to join them. She couldn't imagine another year alone, another night sat at her window waiting for them to return to her. She had done everything she had to do, and it was time for her to go to them now.
For weeks the flowers continued to be lain at the door of the garage, until there were so many the city council were forced to have them moved. A plaque had been laid in the local cemetery, and it too was covered with trinkets from well-wishers and mourners that visited. But there was no one in the grave in the Earth city, for she was resting with her friends, far away on another world. A world where she would always be known for her role in saving the two planets from destruction. The four headstones lined up side by side were almost touching, a symbol of their owner's close and unbreakable bond, even in death. The fourth and final of them was carved in neat scripture, both English and Martian. It read: Here lies Charlene (Charley) Davidson, honoured friend and saviour, whom will never be forgotten.