Hero
Chapter One - Healing a Heart
Summary
Jess comforts Becker after a hard day at the ARC, will it make him finally see his growing feelings for her? JECKER!
They hadn't been fast enough.
He was sat in the armory, his back to the door as he thought over the day's events which had shaken him. An Anomaly from the future had opened and through it what appeared to be a futuristic version of a lion. It was massive and one of the fastest creatures they had ever come into contact with. It may look like a lion but it had the speed of a cheetah. If they hadn't have had contact with the future predators then Becker would say it could have been the fastest creature he had ever seen in his years working at the ARC.
Whereas most of the animals that came through the anomaly hunted for food, this creature seemed to kill for enjoyment as well. As they walked through the devastating destruction the creature had caused he felt horrible, the guilt made It managed to kill a lot of people and several of his soldiers perished fighting to get it under control and in the end, even Abby agreed that it needed to be shot.
He'd only ever felt this bad when he felt he had failed the team when they became lost, Danny, Abby and Connor were all gone, for so long and he had failed them. When he lost Sarah in the future turned his back for a second and in those few moments he wasn't looking for her, they snatched her from his side. He never saw her again. They couldn't even bring her body back to her family because there would probably have been nothing left.
The dead lay scattered around the play park.
Parents lying over children as they attempted and failed to protect them, they only found one survivor and that was a boy who had been at the top of the spider web when the creature had struck. As Matt helped him down and put his feet on the ground, the little boy ran to the body of a woman with a small girl next to her. He had lost half of his family in just 6 minutes.
They had failed the 55, Men, women and children who had been killed in that park.
He had failed that little boy who had lost his mother.
He had failed Connor, Abby and Danny.
He should have saved Cutter and Sarah but he failed there too.
He couldn't do anything right.
Lowering his face into his hands, Becker felt his eyes becoming wet and cursed. He was a soldier who shouldn't panic, shouldn't show emotion and certainly not cry.
Soldiers are supposed to be brave and strong, to be the hero in the situation. He had always kept up this action man front, never showing anyone how he truly felt, how some situations truly affected him. He would save his weakness for later, when he was alone in his flat. He knew sometimes people saw through him, his mother always used to say his eyes showed his true feelings. He knew that although his face could lie easily, his eyes always gave him away.
Thinking back to the little boy as he leaned over the bloody corpse of his mother, the look in his eyes when he turned to him would haunt him forever. The misery became too much and he felt as though holding in the pain was going to destroy him.
His breathing began to get quicker and before he could stop them, tears began pouring down his face. He was pathetic. He'd seen so many people die, not just strangers but his friends, even his own family. He knew what had made him snap today.
The boy reminded him of himself.
He had lost his mother when he was just a child. She'd been in the kitchen when she suffered a blood clot in the brain and dropped to the floor, dead. There was nothing that could have been done to save her or prevent it but still he blamed himself. He had joined the army to try and ease the guilt. If he could save even one life, could he make amends for not preventing his mother's death?
A loud clacking noise echoed in the corridor behind him, heading in the direction of the armory and he groaned. He couldn't deal with her right now; it was already too much during the day. Jessica Parker was one of the prettiest, stubborn, crazy girls he knew.
She brightened his day with her constant happiness and crazy clothes. Everyone else in the ARC wore neutral colors whereas she wore the bright colors of the rainbow. Throughout the room, her heels clacking on the floor could be heard and the sound was soothing in a way, after a chaotic day in the field, it was nice to see something normal although he had often question why Jess wore the massive heeled shoes in a job which you needed to constantly run all the time.
The clacking of her heels grew closer until the door opened. He didn't turn to see her face peak round to look at him.
"Becker?"
He said nothing, keeping his head bowed as she walked further in the room towards him. Coming to a stop behind him, he felt her hand touch his shoulder and noticed how her grip tightened slightly as she felt him shaking.
"Are you alright?"
"Just leave me alone Jess"
Even though he couldn't see her face, he heard the slight sign as she shook her head. She didn't try and turn him, knowing that he wouldn't let her so she walked around him so she stood in front of him. He saw her eyes widen as she saw the tears on his face and the redness of his eyes. Lowering his face away from her intense gaze, he felt ashamed.
Soldiers shouldn't cry.
It was weak.
Her small hand slid into his larger hand and held on tightly, trying to reassure him.
"It wasn't you're fault. You did what you could."
Looking up at her, he almost felt angry that she was trying to make him feel better, she should make him suffer, everyone should, he had failed and he should suffer for failure.
"It was my job to protect those people and I failed so it is my fault Jess. Stop trying to make me feel any different about it."
She shook her head though his words.
"You didn't know that the anomaly was going to open were it did, you got there as fast as you could and took out the creature as quickly as possible. You saved people as well. When anomaly's open, people live and people die. You can't blame it all on yourself. You can't save everyone Becker."
He kept his head down but let he words sink in.
When he said nothing, she stood and made to leave him alone, as he had wished for her too earlier but not anymore. He held her hand tighter, and refused to let her move away from him. Standing as well, he smiled at her slightly before pulling her too him. She squeaked slightly as she collided with his chest but apart from that said nothing and hugged him back. The stayed together for several minutes, every second she spent in his arm, the weight in his chest would lighten. Pulling away from him slightly, she raised her hand and wiped away the remainder of the tears from his face and even when she had successfully removed them, she didn't pull her hand away. Instead leaving it there, trying to comfort him more.
"Thank you Jess"
Leaning up, she kissed his cheek, both of them closing there eyes at the nice sensation.
"No problem"
Pulling away, she squeezed his hand before letting go.
"I need to head back to the computers. Come see me if you start to feel bad again."
Smiling he nodded.
Walking away from him, she looked back once before she left the room.
The realization came to him as he stood watching her leave.
He was completely in love with that girl.
A/N
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