Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: If you really want the lint from my pockets that bad, just ask.
A/N: No excuses, no explanations.
Caribbean Blue
Sunlight arched down through the sapphire sky to land in a golden heap at Jace's feet. The entire world seemed to tangle upon the happy rays of light, folding in and over itself until up and down were so vastly intermingled that they no longer registered in her mind.
She didn't feel pain or loss; the only thing that penetrated her exhausted mind was the heat of the day and the radiant Caribbean blue of the sky and waves. Mexico was to be her salvation, a place where she could adopt a new identity and live away from Manticore -- the only life she had ever known. Standing in the damp, sticky grass and staring out into the endless blue she realized how incapable her sheltered life had made her.
The earth clinging to her shoes was fresh and smelled strongly of oblivion. Her free hand strayed to her stomach, coming to rest just above her navel.
Still, she felt no real sense of loss, only an aching numbness.
In her other hand she held a delicate looking rose. The petals were still fresh and ruddy with the life that was slowly ebbing from its holophytic veins. Soon, the flower would wither and crumble, becoming a mere shell of its former self. She'd been told the flower itself was customary, but Jace found the practice somewhat puzzling.
The salty wind licked at her hair, tangling it about her face and arms. She didn't have it tied into a soldier's ponytail anymore, but let it freely tumble down her back and flow in the breeze. At Manticore, once she'd been allowed to grow hair, she tied it back and forgot about it. Victor was the only one who'd made her think of it as anything more that an inconvenience. He'd loved her hair, had buried his hands in it and taken in the fragrance of her shampoo.
In memory of him, she let it cascade from her head like an ebony waterfall.
In memory of their love -- whatever the hell that was -- she held the flower.
Things hadn't gone well since she'd parted ways with Max in Seattle. In Mexico she found a job that paid pennies on the hour. The labor was hard, but her body was strong and her reformed will even more so -- dirty fingernails and callused hands didn't give her pause. The job had been her first real taste of freedom. It hadn't hit her on the way from Seattle to the border, she'd done a fair amount of traveling while working for Manticore. To her, the journey became a twilight time without thought or recognition. Even as she stood looking out to the sea months later, she couldn't remember the details of her voyage.
She did remember her belly swelling heavily with child as the months past.
Looking at herself in the mirror suddenly gave her chills. It was odd to think of another being living inside of her, wholly dependant and yet so vitally alive. During the night when the baby would kick irritably at her ribs with its powerful little legs, she was at first disturbed. It felt like some kind of foreign plague infecting her body, and it frightened her more than anything at Manticore had.
Manticore hadn't been so bad...not giving a damn hadn't been so bad either. Presently, she found herself more oblivious to the world than she ever was in the cement barracks of Gillette, Wyoming.
She walked slowly through the thick, dark grass. The sun beat down on it without any of the harshness that, by right, the mid-day summer sun should have. Instead, the light seemed to caress the delicate blades with infinite care, cradling them in its warmth.
One of the thorns still present on the freshly cut rose dug into the flesh of Jace's hand as she tightened her grip. The pain didn't penetrate through the level of insanity she had been steadily building up as a last line of defense. Every night she retreated into the depths of her tortured mind and met Victor all over again. In a twisted way, she blamed him for everything. Had he not touched her so reverently, not whispered sweet things in her treacherous ears, she would have never left Manticore.
She would be staring into the dark forest rather than a blinding tropical day.
The beads of sweat running down her back and forehead reminded her of the day when, big as a shed, she'd given birth to her child. She did it alone, afraid to ask anyone for help with such a personal problem. Using as much as she could find, she built herself a harness which she hung from as she birthed. Being semi-vertical made the ordeal easier for her to handle alone.
The pain had torn through her body like lightning, but Jace bared it with a low groan. She was a soldier, and millions of women had given birth before her. Surely, the process was one that a woman such as herself should go through with good grace.
However, the birth of Jace's child had been a far cry from graceful. Grunting, and hanging from her harness, she let out a long sigh as, after hours of contractions, the baby was finally delivered into a new world. Her head lolling back, she almost didn't notice the unusual silence.
Her head snapping up, she moved to see her baby. It laid on the sheets underneath her, twisted and covered in slime. The creature, whatever the hell it was, looked like a science experiment gone horribly wrong. Confused, she tried to revive the dead infant. Pulling the mucus from inside of its mouth, she begged it to take in breath. Its lungs didn't respond to her desperate pleading, and after hours of sobbing horribly over her dreams and hopes, she rolled it up in a blanket and set it aside.
There was never any guarantee that the baby would be normal. With her genome, any kind of strange mutation was possible. The odd characteristics her child exhibited were human, but somehow not quite completely human.
Like her, the baby was a monster dressed in a white robe.
She stopped at a small, cement brick set haphazardly on the ground. There was no name on it, only a date that meant nothing to anyone except Jace. Her child, and all of her dreams, laid beneath the freshly turned soil in a rediculously small box.
Still not aware of the pain in her hand or her heart, she dropped the rose on top of the overturned dirt and walked away. She'd never really known the child, nor did she know how to mourn its loss. Distantly, she wondered how Max would react to the news, if it ever reached her.
Walking out of the cemetary with less energy than she'd had coming in, she once again became aware only of the gentle blue surrounding her. Blinking, she walked toward it until it licked at the bottoms of her sandaled feet.
Manticore hadn't been so bad...there hadn't been so much sunlight to see by; but, Jace didn't see. She didn't see Victor coming for her someday, didn't see Max wishing her well. She didn't see anything but a rich, frothy Caribbean blue.
The numbness inside of her intensified.
Jace kept walking, allowing the blue nothingness to envelop her legs as it licked coldly at her skin. Her dark hair billowed around her, riding a strong sea current. The world turned over, and for a sharp moment a cloud blocked the streaming sunlight. Clarity sparked for a painful second in Jace's mind and, as fear overtook her, she flashed back into insanity.
The sunlight returned, twisting through the clouds back down toward the sea. Drunk with an aching lack of sensation, Jace sought out sanctuary. She walked, her feet sure and steady further into the blue.
The rose rolled in the sea breeze, turning the bloody thorn into the earth beneath it. Sap dripped slowly, almost methodically, from the plants stem, mixing with the syrup of her own veins in the dank recesses of the grave.
Jace didn't bother to close her eyes. All she could see, all she wanted to see, was the gentle, unwavering, Caribbean blue.