So this isn't the third story in the intended trilogy I started with "All Through the Night" and "Homecoming." (That will be coming. Eventually.) This is a thought experiment that wound up writing itself, or at least the first few chapters, in my head as I pondered what I could logically see these two characters go on to do, given that neither is the house-with-the-white-picket-fence type, in my mind. How do you give characters like that a happily ever after?
Like this, I hope.
I plan eight chapters, with the first four chapters (and a sort-of resolution) to be posted relatively soon, then four more over the course of the month after that. I want to see where the rest of the season will take us. Even then, it should be considered an AU. (For various reasons.)
I own neither the characters nor the show!
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They say we are what we are,
But we don't have to be ...
xxx
They're on their way home.
The others are packing, planning, thinking about the lives they plan to resume, even in a changed way ... because how could what they've all gone through together not have changed them? Sara knows she should be thinking about those things too, but instead she's walking through the ship, remembering, trailing her fingers along the walls and seeing scenes play out in her head.
Here is where they played gin that day. Here is where Kendra ambushed her during a training session and then was horrified at the bruise she'd caused. (Sara had never been so proud.) Here is where they were sealed in with the breach. Here is where Ray sits with his coffee every morning, being an absolutely annoying morning person. Here is where Stein likes to set up the chessboard. Here is where she suggested getting weird in the '70s.
There's one other person she suspects isn't indulging in the collective excitement over the impending homecoming, and that's the one person she's looking for. She finally finds him on the bridge of all places, seated in his habitual jump chair, long legs stretched out in front of him, eyes a million miles away. She drops lightly into the seat next to him, knowing it close enough for camaraderie but not close enough to infringe upon the bubble he constantly maintains. She leans her head back and closes her eyes, and they sit in companionable silence for a while.
Finally she feels the force of his gaze on her and opens her eyes to meet his. She's both pleased and saddened, a little, to realize that she was right ... there's no pleasure in the notion of going "home" there. If there's anything, there's a chilly resignation.
She's pretty good at reading him at this point. She wonders, sometimes, what he thinks of that.
"So, what will you be doing now?"
It's a measure of how far they've come that her words don't draw a sneer, or even the resumption of the mask that's his usual way of dealing with uncomfortable things. He continues to meet her eyes while one shoulder lifts in a shrug and the corner of his mouth curls in a rather self-mocking smile.
"No idea."
Losing the smile, he looks straight ahead and concedes, "Doesn't seem quite ... right ... to go back to the whole 'game' now, but I don't really have many marketable skills ... not that most people would value, anyway."
He's being self-deprecating, but she knows he'll hear the truth and sincerity woven through the words when she responds, "I know the feeling."
Crook and assassin. Of course they do.
They don't really have to work (or the equivalent) now, none of them. Hunter and the new regime of Time Masters have made sure they're all well rewarded, though it certainly wasn't the reason they'd set out in the first place. Still, she's pretty confident in thinking that either of them would go mad from boredom within a week, left back on Earth with no occupation, no heist to plan, no nemesis to chase down.
She's been weighing the offer she plans to make in her head, wondering about his response, her own motives, the ... extent ... of what she's offering here. She's overthought it so much that when she simply says the words, they surprise her, too.
"So, I was wondering. When we get back, would you care to stick together for a while? While we're trying to figure out what we're doing with our post-Waverider lives?"
She's surprised him, which is only fair, because she's surprised herself too. It's more than that, though. She's stunned him, based on the genuinely wide-eyed look he's giving her. She'd be amused, if she's not so truly concerned about his reaction.
"Ah, just the two people I was looking for!"
Rip Hunter has a knack for strolling innocently into fraught situations, and apparently that hasn't changed now that he's a big deal in the organization that once kicked him out. He strolls toward them, beaming, and she can't help smiling in response. This is a thoroughly different Hunter, these days. He was instrumental in changing a warped timeline, in saving the world, in saving his own family and then going on to be leader of an uprising against the deep-seated corruption in the Time Masters. Of course he's happy. He's accomplished everything he set out to do, and he has a renewed purpose in his new role as leader of the Time Council ... and again, a husband and father. She's happy for him; she truly is, but she wouldn't mind having a fraction of that purpose, either.
"I have ... what I suppose is best termed a sort of 'job offer' for the two of you."
... What?
Besides her, Snart pulls his habitual slouch into something resembling actual decent posture, and she can tell at a glance his eyes are narrowed at the other man in a way that's more focused than menacing at this point.
"What does that mean?" His words are clipped, curt, instead of drawled. She levels her own intimidating stare at Hunter in support.
"Well, I thought you two of all this lot might be at some ... loose ends ... with the end of the mission." He gives them an expectant look, one that is apparently in no way deterred by whatever their silence and body language tells him. "And ... as we all know to our sorrow ... the Time Masters have a long-standing history of working with bounty hunters in the pursuit of threats to the timeline. Between cleaning out those who were ... brainwashed, shall we say ... and those whose main attribute was their simple brutality, we're left without our slate of operatives. Or any operatives at all, really."
"You want us to be bounty hunters?"
She knows she's not imagining the pain in his voice or the tension in his body here. What happened to Mick, happened, and he still blames himself, though she thinks he now blames the (now-toppled) former leaders of the Time Masters more. There was redemption at the end, but Mick is still gone, and Hunter better know what the hell he's doing here.
To his credit, the Time Master sits down opposite them and meets their eyes, and there's both sadness and sincerity in his own.
"Yes. Free agents, though under the auspices of the Time Masters. I need," he says simply, "someone I can trust."
Those are powerful words, directed to a crook and an assassin, and for a moment, she just stares at him. Snart is silent besides her, though she thinks she detects a minute lessening of the tension that was there moments ago.
"Why us?"
"Well, as I said before, it seemed more possible you'd be less interested in going back to your old lives than the others ... and, quite frankly, your individual talents would line up quite well with this ... line of work." He spreads his hands. "And to be honest, you make an excellent team."
OK, they are very carefully not looking at each other now.
Hunter has the sense to leave that be, and continues with his pitch. "You'd need some training. Not the old, errr, tactics. Timeline calculations and piloting and ..."
"Piloting?" Snart interrupts, as she's thinking the same thing.
"Well, you'd need a ship, wouldn't you?" Hunter pauses to look around fondly. "And there's even going to be one available."
Can he mean ...
"You mean the Waverider," Snart says, an air of amazement in his tone. "You'd give us the Waverider?"
"Loan, rather. Still, she'd be your ship, your responsibility. I'd actually like her to go to someone who respects her."
"You'd trust ... me ... with a time ship." His tone is incredulous. She's momentarily annoyed that he's dropped the "us," but she understands why. Her, he's deemed worthy of trust now. Not so, himself.
Hunter gives him a level look. "I said 'someone I can trust' not five minutes ago, Mr. Snart. I have not changed my mind in that time." He stands. "You'd have to spend some time at the Vanishing Point, which would ... complicate ... the aging process, so that's a consequence you'll have to consider. But it's not like you can't go back to your timeline to visit; you just need to be careful." He pauses again. "While the offer would still be open to either of you individually, with some modifications, I hope you'll consider accepting it as a ... team. Please, do consider, and let me know by the time we land."
He leaves, and if there was tension in the air before, now it could be cut with a knife. She's very carefully not looking at him, and she's not sure why ... didn't she make the suggestion of staying together herself right before Hunter dropped this bomb? But he's not moving; he's barely breathing, and she doesn't want to see what she's afraid she'll see in his face.
Because this offer seems very, very right to her, and a good portion of that is the opportunity to continue kicking ass across time and space with the man sitting next to her.
He stands abruptly; she still doesn't look at him, which is OK, because he also leaves the room very quickly.
As if he can't wait to get away.