So… I just thought I could give y'all a little piece of cake during my "hiatus". I'm still busy as heck—I still write, but just a little bit. School has been hell to me, but it will soon be over. And I will continue those stories, I promise.
Just so you know, I'm inspired to write this after watching iMeet The First Lady and a certain show on CBS called NCIS. However, I don't really know that much about navy/marines/submarines and all that stuff… I just kinda made it all up (I'm so sorry if I got it all terribly wrong, don't sue me!). Oh and this fic wasn't beta'd; so if you catch some mistakes/errors here... I deeply apologize for any mistakes that I wrote.
I loved iMeet The First Lady. I'm no American, but I am proud of ALL the soldiers and the marines who sacrificed everything to fight for their country—I respect them very much (:
I hope you'd enjoy this story as much as i enjoyed writing it! (Don't forget to leave me some reviews...)
Warning: Kinda OOC-ish... I'm feelin' angsty right now. And some bad language as well…
Disclaimer: You still think I own iCarly? (Oh and the slight reference of two NCIS characters aren't mine either… but you're all welcome to guess who I am referring to!)
I'm coming home, I'm coming home
Tell the world, I'm coming home
He dragged his feet as far as they could. His chest felt tight, he could only suck a little amount of oxygen through his lungs. He finally slumped down against the wall; he instantly shuddered as he realized that he was now sitting on some… unidentified liquid that ran down from a stinky trashcan near him. But then he rolled his tired eyes at himself, he had seen and touched and felt worse.
Letting his eyes tightly shut, he tried to breathe. At first, it felt painful to even take the shallowest breath he'd ever taken, but a few second later he relaxed, and breathed more and more evenly.
He just sat there for a while, gathering his strength, his energy. Allowing his body to rest, letting his lungs to suck as much oxygen as they could.
Heart still pounding, head still spinning, he tried to stood up. First attempt, failed. He fell to the ground, his butt came in contact with the disgusting liquid once again, making it splash all over his pants—okay, he would definitely burn those pants if he got home—and he cringed. Second attempt, he almost failed but he did stood up anyway. His feet still felt like jelly; slimy, weak, vulnerable, et cetera, et cetera. He, hesitantly, held onto the edge of the trashcan to support his body.
He took a moment before nodding to himself. Taking one strong step, he grinned—even if it made his face hurt even more. Taking another step, his grin widened, now ear-to-ear. And another, and another, and another...
Let the rain wash away
And the first drop of rain fell onto his head. Couldn't be more cliche, could it?
Another drop fell.
And another, and another.
And now it was pouring rain. And his filthy, dirt-and-blood-stained clothes were soaking wet.
But he didn't stop. He still took another step, and another, and another, and another. His brain barely noticed where his feet were dragging his body away; but he couldn't care less about that right now. He just wanted to see her. He just wanted to feel free again. He just wanted to let go of this pain that had been haunting him for ages now.
So he took another step. And another raindrops fell. And another step. And another drop. And another, and another, and another.
Somehow, he finally stopped walking in front of a small house. He clenched his hands on the cold metal of the mailbox in front of the house—he slightly shivered as the metal got his knuckles numb for a moment.
Before stepping further, he closed his eyes, and he let the memories flood in his mind...
All the pain of yesterday
Two years earlier...
"So, you've decided about your future?"
He looked up to see the owner of the soft, quiet voice. He nodded. "Yeah."
"Good," she said, brushing some of her blond strands of hair behind her ear.
"What are you gonna do after this? I mean—are you going to college?" he said, eyes locked on the plasma screen in front of them.
"I guess," she shrugged. "However, I know I wasn't that good in high school, so I'm not expecting that much. Community college, I think. Or maybe I'll just take some online classes while working—at least I won't be turning into my mom."
He looked at her. "You won't turn into your mom. You are so much more than her."
She offered him her small smile; the one that reminded him of a beautiful angel. Well, she is a beautiful angel. "What about you?"
Much to her surprise, he looked away. His face was unreadable, but she was sure that she caught a glimpse of something different in his eyes. Something that terrified her, something that—to her—felt wrong.
"Are you...," she breathed, "this isn't like one of those chick flicks where the girl found out that her boyfriend is moving across the country because of some sort of stupid scholarship, right?"
He had to resist the urge to laugh at that, even if a part of him wanted to curse out loud for letting her read him easily, like an open book.
But his eyes couldn't lie, not to her, and her stomach dropped. "Freddie?"
"Nah... it's not like that, Sam."
She let out a breath she didn't realize she was holding.
But the look on his face hadn't gone. "But it's... close enough."
And now she really began to worry. "What do you mean?"
He didn't quickly respond. He still looked away. He still looked unsure, hesitant, distant. But now she could see that his masks were slowly dropping. He looked torn apart, he looked broken.
She stared at her boyfriend, tears now forming in her eyes. Her lips were trembling now. She rested her palm on his cheek, turning his head to look at her in the eye.
"Sam, I..."
She didn't want to hear, but she had to know.
But she didn't want to lose him. He was precious, he was special. He was everything she ever needed right now. He was her heart, her sun, her breath, her love, her life. She couldn't lose him, not right now, not to some stupid college across the country. She knew he was smart and he deserved to go to the best college in this world, but this... this will still hurt. Knowing that just in a few months he would go to colleges like MIT, thousands of miles away from her, staying in a dorm, having a free life, meeting some redheads who could give him everything he wanted... she just... she didn't want to risk losing him.
She had lost too much; he was the last and the only thing she had right now.
She realized that she was being selfish. She didn't have the right to be selfish; whatever the choice that her boyfriend took was his own choice and she should appreciate him... she should respect him and support him. Maybe if he really did go to MIT and she had to stay her ass here in Seattle they both could manage a long-distance relationship... and she'd visit him every month... and she wouldn't have to worry about redheads, and they both will be—
"Sam, I want to be a marine... and serve the country, like Carly's father does..."
He looked at her right in the eye.
"... like my dad did..."
And wow, she honestly hadn't seen that coming.
You know my kingdom awaits
A year earlier...
He did it. He didn't fail.
He was sure he had made his father proud of him. He succeeded. He did it.
He was a marine.
Looks like he was more than just a tech-dork after all. He. Was. A. Marine. He'd made his parents proud. His mother shed a few joyful tears when they both read the acceptance letter he was sent.
He couldn't stop smiling. He did it. He did good.
He smiled at the photograph he was holding in his hand. He was smiling in that photo. He stood proudly beside his father; his father was wearing his uniform. He had his arms around his six year old little baby boy—Freddie swore he could still feel those arms around him sometimes. And he could still feel the overwhelmed sadness as his father waved his final goodbye, leaving his little family to protect the country...
It was the last time he ever saw his dear father. He never came back... he never did.
Simple story. An idiot planted a bomb in the submarine, sudden explosion, died in an instant, body never been recovered, sunk deep down in the sea... and he was gone. His father, his hero, was gone. He didn't even get to see his body, to bury him beside his beloved grandmother's grave...
He shed a tear with his thumb; he didn't even realize he was crying. But he still smiled.
He slipped the photograph inside his wallet and put it inside his pocket. He looked around his bedroom for the last time before standing up and left with a suitcase in his hand.
He would do what his father had done. For him, for her, for everyone else that deserved it.
Six months earlier...
He sat on the edge of his bed, staring off into space. His body was here, but his soul was somewhere else.
He missed everything. He missed his overly protective mother. He missed his beautiful girlfriend. He missed home.
Sure, it was great to be here. Everything seemed just fine and he savored every moment he had here. He was proud of himself. He finally could feel what his father had used to feel. It was cool, being down deep in the ocean. It felt great, knowing that he was doing the right thing. It felt awesome... but he still missed his home.
He shook his head and walked towards his locker. He let his palm met the locker door for a while before unlocking it. He opened the locker door and grabbed the first thing he saw inside his locker.
A photograph.
In this one, there were him and his beautiful girlfriend smiling to the camera. It was taken just a few days before he left. He numbly brushed his thumb on the photo. He missed her. It's been months since the last time he saw her...
He really, really loved her. No, not loved, but something more than that. He couldn't even describe how he felt towards her. He just felt right when he was with her; he just wanted to be hers and he wanted her to be his, forever. She meant the world to him. He couldn't live without her—he didn't even wanna think about it.
And he couldn't help but feel guilty as he remembered the day he left her. She had cried (and so had he). She had never cried that loud before, not even when they had gotten the news that their best friend and her brother died an instant death in a plane crash. He felt really guilty for that, he broke his own heart seeing her tears pouring down her cheeks, but he had made his mind and no one, no one, could stop him.
He'd left in honor of his deceased father, of his dead best friend whom he thought of as a sister he had never had, of his other best friend who was a father/big brother figure to him. And no, he didn't want the love of his life to make him chicken out because he knew she could. He didn't want to change his mind.
So he'd left her crying in the middle of the rain.
He had regretted it, of course. Fortunately, she eventually understood what he wanted, what he needed, even though that didn't lessen his guilt even just a bit.
He looked up from the picture and stare at the calendar that was pinned on the wall. Two weeks left; two weeks left and he was coming home. Two weeks left, just two weeks left, for goddamn's sake!
The edge of his lips twitced and he closed his eyes. Only fourteen days left, and everything would be just fine.
He ran a hand down his perfectly shaved hair, still smiling. And then he heard his name being called by one of his roomates. He merely nodded as he shoved the photograph back in the locker and slammed it shut. Stupid emergency calls, he thought, always so sudden.
He half-ran to the main room. He was late, of course, so he could only heard the half of the information that was given. Situation, he heard. It turned out that they had to cancel the unfinished mission they were doing. They needed to come back to the surface and get themselves off to a ship that would take them back to the land immediately. He tried to find out what happened, why they needed to cancel the mission, but everyone seemed too busy to even hear him. Everyone on the submarine was too busy bossing around. He heard voices, he heard words, he heard sentences, but he could barely understand what people around him was saying. He tried not to care; just do your job and everything would be okay, he reassured himself. But something wasn't quite right—he started to panic. He gulped as he watched his mates working their asses off to keep them safe while coming up to the surface.
But he knew something was terribly wrong. He had that gut feeling.
He couldn't help but flash back to what had happened to his father.
No.
Less than 45 minutes later, they managed to go near the emergency ship. He got out of the submarine just after his roommate. He kind of hoped that whatever situation they were in would take him back home even faster. He took a step on the emergency ship.
And hell broke loose.
And they've forgiven my mistakes
Three months ago…
It was raining when she got that call.
The submarine had been gone, all in a sudden. The people had begun searching for it since two months ago, since it had gone missing, and they'd finally gotten an answer.
Pieces of the submarine was found. The remains of the body was also found. No one survived.
The evidence they found gave them the answer. Another idiot planted a bomb inside the submarine, causing another explosion that destroyed the whole submarine and an emergency ship right next to it…
The submarine sunk down into the sea. They were sure that no one, no one had survived.
Just like what had happened to his father.
She didn't believe what the special agents told her through the phone—she didn't want to.
They believed that this was another terrorist attack; the reason was still unknown. But now they were hunting down the bastards that caused all this mess, the sadness, the grieve and the loss of the beloved marines' family…
So now, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (or known as NCIS) were doing their best to catch, or even kill the terrorists. "I'm sorry for your loss," the agent said.
But she just laughed humorlessly. Killing the bastards that took her love away wouldn't do anything to heal this permanent wound inside her. It wasn't going to bring him back to her. She knew she had always loved revenge, but this time she knew it was no use. Even if she got the bad guys herself and killed them with her bare hands in a slow, long, painful death, a part of her would always be missing. The hole in her heart would always be there.
He was gone. Goddammit, he was GONE! DEAD! His body wasn't found, VANISHED, SUNK DOWN into the deep ocean like his father's had been. What was she supposed to do now? She could not live without him. She couldn't lose him. No… no…
Why, why did you have to choose to walk on your father's path?
She didn't cry. She didn't have the strength to cry. She just sat there, her face was blank, emotionless, empty. Her hand was gripping her cellphone so tight it might have been broken to pieces. She finally raised it and dialed a number.
The person on the other line answered. Long and painful silence hung in the air before one of them finally spoke.
"Samantha," the voice quietly said. There was no sign of sobs or anything, but she could sense the flatness of the tone. Much like hers, emotionless.
"Marissa," she replied.
No words needed to be spoken, both of them completely understood each other. They shared their pain, they felt the same thing. Loss. Sadness. Emptiness…
And finally, they both cried.
So did the sky. It was so dark, gloomy… rain washed all over Seattle.
She let it wash away all the pain inside her.
I'm coming home, I'm coming home
Present day…
Now he remembered it all. He remembered the explosion, how it hurt his head like hell. He remembered jumping out of the ship just before the fireblast started. He remembered seeing his friends laying around him, hurt, burnt, face unrecognizable, dead. He remembered seeing the imaginary faces of his dead father and his dead best friends the day they died, their condition much similar to his now-dead marine fellows. He remembered watching them all sunk slowly into deep ocean while he tried to swim and swim and trying not to give himself up to the unconsciousness. He remembered seeing one of the terrorists checking if everyone from the ship was dead. He remembered closing his eyes; half pretending to be dead, half trying to wash the pain away. He remembered wanting to give up after hours and hours swimming around nowhere. He remembered giving up to the darkness. He remembered being carried away by a local civilian to the land. He remembered laying on a small boat on the way to the land—he'd heard people speaking in foreign language trying to wake him up and save his life. He remembered jolting awake on a white bed in a small hospital.
He remembered running away from the terrorists that seem to recognize him. He'd finally met a few Americans, he'd told them what'd happened. They'd helped him; they'd given him some new clothes, food, drinks, medicine, and a ride back home.
A ride back home. A freaking ride back home.
Home. He's coming home!
He remembered being in the helicopter, anxiously waiting to get home. He remembered stepping out of it; taking a deep breath as he felt his feet stepping to his "home".
Home, yes, home. No more bombs, no more terrorists. He was home.
Home.
Home. He was coming home.
He remembered calling the NCIS agents, telling them he survived the damn explosion and how the hell it actually happened. He remembered staying in a safehouse with two special agents—one Italian-American dude who wouldn't stop flashing a wide goofy grin and rambling about movies, and one thick-accented exotic-looking chick (an Israeli, maybe?) who kept sharpening her knife and messing with her idioms—on protection detail, as they believed that one of the bad guys was still after him. He remembered feeling frustrated that he couldn't call his mother and/or his girlfriend to inform them that he was alright, in flesh and blood.
He remembered stealing the Italian agent's weapon and silently snuck out of the safehouse. He remembered seeing that bastard as he ran away—so they had been right, the bastard was still after him. And he didn't know that the man was so much closer than he'd thought.
He remembered being shot, twice. The pain was terrible; it felt like fire, it hurt him so much (but then he realized that he was in a better shape compared to his dead friends and his father, so he just sucked it up). One bullet hit him in his right shoulder—good thing he was left-handed—and another one just barely missing his left leg. He remembered drawing his—or more like the stolen—gun, pulling the trigger for the first time with no hesistant. And then he fired the second shot. And the third one. As he did, he'd seen the faces of the deceased people he really loved and he knew he'd done the right thing.
He remembered seeing the bastard fell down with one gunshot wound in the leg, one barely missing the heart (a fatal wound, but he knew he wasn't dead), and one right in the middle of the eyes, killing him instantly before he even hit the ground. He remembered how it felt after doing his first kill; sort-of scared, panicked, confused, angry, shamed, relieved.
He remembered seeing the bastard laying on his own pool of blood with his eyes wide open, as was his mouth. He remembered throwing away the weapon and running away from the scene.
And here he was.
He let the rain soak his clothes—he was even glad that the disgusting, unidentified liquid was slowly washed away from his pants. He was still bleeding a bit, but he couldn't feel it anymore. All he could think of was her face, and he didn't even want to think of anything else.
He walked and walked and walked, and stopped right in front of the front door. He knocked it one, twice, thrice.
And the door swung open.
He saw her. She was still beautiful, her hair had grown a little bit, her skin was slightly tanner, and he was kind of taller than he had remembered. Her blue eyes were still the same, now staring into his brown ones. He almost couldn't breathe—he'd missed her so much.
They both stood there. Her mouth fell open and she felt paralyzed. Her heart almost stopped beating when he smiled.
Was this a dream?
"Freddie," she breathed. He nodded and pulled her into his tight embrace. She rested her head on his left shoulder and he buried his face on her goldie locks—oh dear, he really had missed the smell of her strawberry-scented shampoo.
He brushed her hair with his uninjured hand as the tears fell down his cheeks. He was home, he was home, he was home. He was lucky that God gave him another chance to stay with the woman he loved.
"Freddie," she said, louder. She repeated his name over and over again between her sobs and laughter and he just nodded.
He finally pulled away and stared at her beautiful blue orbs. He rested his palm on her cheeks and began stroking it softly.
She put both of hers on his cheeks, grabbing his face, making herself sure that this was real. She planted a kiss on his lips, and then two, and three, and four, and they both lost count but didn't care anyway. She laughed as she realized that this was real, but then she noticed the bruises and wounds on his body.
"You're hurt."
He just shrugged and laughed, planting another kiss on her lips. He pulled her for another hug and whispered in her ear.
"You miss me?"
They both stayed like that, being held so tight in each other's arms, not caring about anything. They stood in the pouring rain as if nothing else mattered. They slowly fixed each other's hole in their hearts, healed each other's wounds and took care of the scars that remained there as the symbol of the war they had fought and won. They slowly let go of the knives that had been stabbing their souls all along while he was gone. They let the rain wash away all the pain of yesterday.
And for the first time in what feels like forever, they both knew they were going to be just fine.
Tell the world I'm coming… home
FIN