Title: Days that changed my life
Warning: 1st POV as Jack Bauer, some info maybe a bit off, and well a bit AU, but hey it's a fiction so enjoy it
Spoiler up to s06e10
A/N: Non-native English speaker, bad grammer and other mistaks likely in the story. But it give the story a try.
Interesting how certain days could change a man's life. I can clearly remember every such a day in my life, they marked my life like milestone the roads, and forming me to the man I was.
The day my mother died. She was a beautiful woman with blond hair and pale blue eyes. I can see as clearly now as that day it happened how her bruised buttered body laid at bottom of the stairs, how her once lively blue eyes looked hollow, empty, and died.
The day when Graham, my older brother first turn against me. The confusion, the hurt, and the pain of his betrayal still echoes in my soul. He should have protected me, loved me, not bully, abuse and hate me. I remember to the child who I once was laid curled up in his bed, sobbing desperately and calling out for my brother, my protector to save me, to tell me what have I done to deserve this, deserve his hate and anger. But nobody answered my questions, nobody came to my call, nobody heard my desperate cries. And I learned the meaning of the world: alone.
The day when I noticed I forget how my mother looked like, when her feather disappeared forever, later I noticed I couldn't recall how she laugh, how she smiled at me. And she slowly became a strange from the pictures.
The day I first stood up for Graham. Not because of myself, because of a strange. He and his paid side-kicks tormented a smaller boy, and I could not just proceed like nothing happened. I needed to do something, to save him, a complete strange even when I could not save myself. The fight was fast, they were more and I was alone, but the kid got away, and even beaten up I felt good because I could save him, and maybe myself as well.
The same day was the first time my father looked at me with disappointment in his deep blue eyes, and it was worst them Graham's hate or the beatings I received. When I first knew how much power my father had over me. He could achieve the same with only one look what Graham's years of bulling couldn't. I felt humiliated, lonely, all alone, when the injustice of the whole situation finally sank in, that no matter what I do I would never be good enough for my father, my word would never be equal of my brother's or a complete strange.
The day when the world went numb and gray. When things lost their importance, when the words, insults and disapproving stars did not hurt anymore.
The day when I first met Terri and the light first creped back into my life. The way she laugh and room seemed to light up and even the world seemed more peaceful place. That was the day I learned how to smile again, because without noticing I lost it somewhere along the road.
The day when I walked out of the house, I once called home without a note. When I left behind everything to be able to start anew and joined the army to make my own road.
The day I first killed. And the numbness settled in again, as the grayness closed around me, and the worst it did not even bothered me anymore.
The day when I found out I would be a father. As I kneeled before my Teri as I asked her to marry me. The joy, the laugh, the warm slowly slipped though the walls I erected over the years. And the light finally fully found its way to my dim world.
The day they chosen me for Delta Force, the day I was given the opportunity to protect, to save the once who needed to be saved, the innocent, the bystanders.
The day my daughter was born. I stood there watching Kim as she blinked her baby blue eyes at me, and shiver run tough me, cold panic set in. I felt too young to be a father, too inexperience, too afraid to became a man like my own Father, but I hoped somehow in the end we would manage, as my eyes met with Teri's tired gaze, I knew will manage.
The day I joined to CTU. The first step to fully settle down, the beginning of a peaceful life.
The day Terri died, when the world turned in its exe and the carpet was pulled out from under my feet, when the darkness first showed its ugly head. When my past first tried to clam me, and my present lost it meaning. The day I cried.
The day, I first met Ramon Salazar. He was a cruel, sadistic, cold blooded bastard, or a charming, loyal and intelligent man. He was the bad guy who sold drugs, who killed whoever stood in his way and he was the guy who loved his brother and his family above almost everything, expect his business. Ramon Salazar. He was a man who you never forget if you once met him, who saw something in me, a killer, a strategist and give me something I long for a long time even if it was built on lies, he gave me a family who cared if I lived or died, a brother who sometimes even give me a smile.
The day, I lost it all, when I betrayed Ramon's trust, the day when I sat alone huddled up to a wall in the corner of my room, a sole tear run down my check as the shadows of a doubt the first time darkened my thought as the last night's lingering memories of companionship, of acceptance, despite being a junky, a killer was still vivid in my mind. It wasn't question I did the right thing only maybe the cost would be too height.
The day, they kicked me out of CTU, despite everything I had done, everything I lost, everything I sacrifice. When I was left alone with only my addiction as a company, the day the shadows closed up around me, and almost swallowed me completely. Only one thing helped to keep my head over the dark waves, the anger, and the stubbornness to prove the addiction couldn't win over me.
The day Audrey smiled at me. No not me, the mask I became, the man I chose to be, the one who know how to smile. And there and then I believed maybe there was a future after all.
The day when my new life fallen apart, when Audrey saw behind the masks, saw me maybe the first time. The day I died. That was the day I found out I had friends after all.
The day I lost them all: Tony, Michel, and David. When my past cached up to me again, when I learned the chine's have a long memory.
The day I learned even I can be broken, no not broken, maybe my screams could be heard until my voice give out, maybe my body shut down on me, maybe the defiance broken in my eyes, maybe I wished to die, but I never betrayed anything, never broken.
The day when I first caught sight Los Angeles siluet in the raising sun's light. When I was given the opportunity to die for something, when I learned it was all for nothing, when I found out my brother want me died. Graham who always was loyal to the family, who would have sacrificing everything for it, expects maybe the company. The day I tortured my own brother, the one I spunned up when I was small, the one I asked why mommy won't came home anymore, the one from I only wanted a good word, only wanted his love, and would have done for him anything. But the memories couldn't stop me to do what was right, because someone needed to do it, and I wouldn't, couldn't allow anyone to hurt my brother. The day, when my estrange-father on look could call back even from the darkest place in mind, and wondered for a moment how could the man had so much power over me even now. When my brother death, and my father ordered my death.
And now.
Now I was kneeling before my father, rocking my body in a slowly and waiting to die. Because, today was a good day to die.
"Anyway... I'm ready."