Disclaimer - It's not mine. Never was.
A/N - Hey out there. I know I have other stories to be writing, but this one is very special to me. It is dedicated to a dear friend of mine who passed away in the monstrous storm hurricane Katrina, the storm that tore apart my hometown, along with so many others. He was an avid Acceleracers fan, and had been bugging me for weeks to start a fic about them.
So this one is for you, Justin. If there is a need for a mechanic in heaven, I'm sure they'd take you in a heartbeat.
Remembrance
The road leading up to the desolate graveyard never had much traffic on it. It was a forgotten area lying along the county line, one of the few densely forested areas left on the outskirts of the city.
Nolo shifted his car smoothly into the next gear, gripping the cool metal of the always present chain and broken 'T' that hung from it, the only memento he had left of the very person he was on his way to see. Behind him, he could see the headlights of Karma's car coming through the dust trail he had kicked up.
It was a sunny day, not much unlike any other. The difference laid in the fact that it was the five year anniversary of his brother Tone's untimely death, an event that still haunted his nightmares, and that of his team's. It was depressing, knowing that it had been so long since he had last spoken with his older brother. He knew the rest of his team felt the same way, for Tone had been the one to bring them all together and begin the TEKU traditions they still followed. So on they drove up the dusty road, cars floored as fast as they could go, in true TEKU fashion, just the way Tone would have wanted it.
"You okay, Nolo?" came Lani's concerned voice over the intercom in his car. Nolo almost snapped at her to mind her own business and leave him alone, but caught himself before he could. He had gotten close to Lani, and knew that she was only asking out of true concern for him.
"Fine." he answered curtly.
"We're almost there." Karma's voice said calmly.
"Yeah, we are." Nolo said, shifting the car again and cutting the curve a bit sharply before slowing down to pull up alongside the fenced in area in front of him. He stepped out of the car, shutting the door with a little more force that was absolutely necessary. He saw Karma, Kurt, Vert, and Lani step out of their own vehicles, somber faced and quiet as they walked to his side. Even Shirako had toned down his usual blaring techno driven music today, proof positive that it was a somber day for the entire TEKU team.
No words were spoken, not a syllable uttered as they turned as one and walked shoulder to shoulder up the small hill towards a fenced in plot gated away from the main cemetery. As they crested the hill, Nolo was surprised to see two figures standing near the plot were Tone had been buried. One was a woman, and the other, a little boy. He was about to stomp down there and demand to know who they were when a light breeze shifted her hair, exposing a face that was all too familiar to him.
He knew this woman…knew her all too well.
He watched as the young boy went to her side, and then knelt to lay a small object at the bottom of the headstone. The woman placed a comforting hand on the boy's shoulder, then said something that made her smile. She hugged him, and then motioned for him to go play under a nearby tree.
"Who's that?" Vert asked, nodding towards where the woman had become still once again, apparently paying her own respects to Tone's memory.
"An old friend." Karma answered when Nolo said nothing. She went to the young man's side and nodded towards the grave. "We'll wait here for a little while, if you want." Nolo just nodded, then thrust his hands into the pockets of his jacket to ward off the nip of the unusually cold fall weather.
---
Nolo walked slowly down towards his final destination, coming up beside the young woman who was wiping a stray tear from her cheek. He said nothing to her, just dropped to one knee and said a quick prayer for Tone's spirit, then rose again to look down at the gravestone.
"It is good to see you again, Nolo." she said, acknowledging him in a voice thick with emotion and the heavy accent so similar to his own that was prevalent in the area.
"Belinda." he answered. "Long time, no see."
"I have been busy." she said somberly, having yet to face him. Nolo glanced over to her, somewhat relieved to see that she had not changed since the last time he'd seen her. She was still slight in stature, with dark hair hanging freely around her small shoulders. Her ancestry was clearly Mexican, with the exception of the hazel eyes that were currently turned towards the cold stone at her feet.
"How have you been?" he asked lamely, not knowing what to say to her.
"Fine." she answered softly.
"Still working at Pedro's?"
"Only part time." she admitted freely. "Since Miguel's in school now, I spend most of my time at the company office. It's secretary work, but it pays enough to get by and still have a little for emergencies."
"He's getting big." Nolo admitted, his eyes now trained on the young boy playing under the tree. He saw her slight smile as she too watched over him with a mother's careful eyes.
"And more like his father everyday."
"You say that like it is a bad thing."
"And you say it like it is a good thing." she said rhetorically, grinning to take the sting out of her words.
"He's a Pasaro." Nolo said, shrugging. "We're all the same."
"He misses you, Nolo." she said carefully. Nolo felt her arm slip under his elbow, and her head lay on his shoulder.
"I've been busy myself Bebe." he answered quietly, using the nickname he had given her some years before, long before Miguel's birth and Tone's death. "Besides, you parents don't exactly like seeing me."
"I moved." she answered suddenly, looking up at him with absolute anger in her eyes. "I was tired of hearing how I sullied the family name by bearing a bastard Pasaro child."
"Miguel's not a bastard child!" Nolo said hotly. "He's my…"
"I know, Nolo." she said placatingly. "But to my family, Miguel being born out of wedlock… Well, you know first hand how they are. Hence my reason to get him away from my parents. I really don't think Tone would have appreciated knowing my family despised him, and I know you were angry about it. It just took me longer to get away than I had hoped."
"You done what you could." Nolo said, a touch of envy in his voice as he continued on. "Besides, Tone knows you did what you had to do for Miguel. He always valued your opinion on things, and he knew you had a level head on your shoulders."
"He loved you as well, Nolo." Bebe said sincerely. "Please understand that."
"But, you two…"
"No buts." she interrupted, waving off his all too familiar protest. "He was your brother before he was my boyfriend."
"Boyfriend?" Nolo asked incuriously. "You two were practically married by the time I came along!"
"Family first." she said softly, fingering a small silver 'T' that hung from her neck, identical to Nolo's except for the piece missing on his. Nolo noticed the familiar habit and reached out to touch the piece of jewelry.
"You still wear that?" he asked abruptly.
"Why should I take it off?"
"I thought you would have found someone else by now is all." he said with a shrug.
"You mean like you, little Nolo?" she queried, her eyebrow cocked up in skepticism as she reached up to wipe a red smear off the collar of his jacket and bring her finger in front of his face for inspection. "Or am I imagining this red lipstick on your collar?" Nolo felt his cheeks flush red a little, and he turned to the side to escape her inscrutable, knowing gaze. "Who is she, Nolo?"
"He would have wanted you to be happy, Bebe?"
"That goes for you just as well as it goes for me." she countered, shrugging at his evasiveness. "Besides, I am happy with my memories…and our son. I do miss him still, though. Sometimes so much I wish I could dig him up out of the ground just to see him again."
"To each his own." Nolo muttered darkly. "But I understand what you mean."
"You seem more serious than usual, Nolo. What's wrong? Having problems at work?" she asked, noticing for the first time the faint traces of dark circles under his eyes. His surprise must have been quite plain, because Bebe's laugh rang out through the chilly air. It still surprised him that she was able to pinpoint the source of his frustrations so quickly.
"I still say you're a mind reader." he mumbled. "You shouldn't know me that well."
"Female intuition, my friend." she said, winking at him. "So tell me, what's the problem? You still working for that Teslet guy?"
"Tezla? Yeah, unfortunately."
"I can tell by your obvious enthusiasm you're ready to leave." she said dryly.
"We've been having problems lately, lots of them." he said darkly. "Seems like no matter what we do, how we change our tech, we're still getting beat!"
"The computer programs are that advanced?" she asked. Nolo just nodded, thinking her reaction would be a little more extreme had she known the full truth to his racing in the realms. As far as she knew, he was a test driver for Tezla who worked on tech advances for high performance racing cars. It was a plausible enough explanation for the time he spent racing, at least for her.
"Is it mechanical problems with the cars, or computer problems?" she asked.
"A little of both I think." he admitted. Bebe just nodded and fished a small card out of her pocket, handing it to him. He read it and frowned, not knowing the name printed on it.
"She's good with modifications to high end performance engines like your boss is responsible for. Not to mention a couple of the fuel mixtures she's cooked up will boost speed performance to ungodly levels." Bebe explained. "Give her a call if you get too stuck."
"The TEKU don't need help." he said firmly, offering the card back to her. Belinda only shook her had and folded his fingers back over the small business card.
"Get the chip off your shoulder and lose the attitude." she said demurely. "Rumor has it around the office that your boss Tezla already called Sam Cummings at Solaran Inc. and tried to hire her for a temporary position. But Rhia wouldn't go because of some weird reason, she never said."
"Tezla had mentioned bringing someone else in for a while, but when no one showed up, we figured it was all talk." he admitted.
"Well, give her a call at any rate." Bebe said with a shrug. "It wouldn't hurt."
"I'll think about it."
"You do that." she said. A few seconds later, three quick beeps came from a pager on her belt clip and she frowned.
"Something wrong?" he asked.
"Not really." she said. "But we've got to get going. My shift starts in two hours, and I've still got to drop Miguel off at the sitter. I just wanted to bring him down here this morning. Therapy, you know?" Nolo just nodding, understanding that it was just as much therapy for her as it was for Miguel. She smiled and called out to the boy, who turned around and smiled big when he seen who his mother was standing next to.
"Unca Nolo! Unca Nolo!" he cried, holding his arms out to be picked up while he ran. Nolo knelt and hugged the boy, throwing him into the air and catching him with ease.
"Hey, Miguel, buddy. What's up?" Nolo asked.
"Nothing! Where you been at? You haven't come to see me in a long time!" the boy said, his dark eyes so reminiscent of Tone's that it made a lump form in Nolo's throat. The TEKU leader swallowed it, and listened in as his nephew avidly told him how he had played a prank on the teacher at his school using some crayons, glue, and a roll of tape.
---
"Who is that?" Lani asked suspiciously, watching as Nolo hoisted the little boy into the air before walking back towards where she and the others had been waiting for the last twenty minutes. "And how does Nolo know her?" Karma regarded the other woman with surprise at the tinge of jealousy in the mechanic's voice.
"She is a dear friend of Tone's." Karma answered evenly. "She helped him find Nolo when he was on the streets."
"You know, that kid kinda looks like Nolo." Vert pointed out. "You don't think…."
"Hardly." Karma said coolly. "Her name is Belinda Torres, and the boy is her and Tone's son, Miguel. Belinda had him about six months after Tone died. " A few minutes later, Nolo had met them at the top of the hill, a very excited little boy on his back, and a smiling Bebe at his side.
"Guys, I want you to meet someone." he said, sitting Miguel down on the ground. "This is Belinda Torres, and her son Miguel Pasaro. Bebe, you know Kurt and Karma already. But this is Shirako and Vert, two of my teammates. And Lani is our mechanic."
"And the owner of that red lipstick, no doubt." Bebe asked pointedly with a grin, causing Nolo to color faintly red, as well as Lani.
"He's gotten big, Belinda." Karma said, smiling at little Miguel and nodding at the young woman.
"Hi, Miss Karma!" Miguel said enthusiastically, running over to hug Karma's legs. "Hello to you too, Mr. Kurt!"
"Hey, kiddo." Kurt said with a wave. Belinda grinned and untangled her son from Karma's legs, hoisting him onto her hip.
"I hate to run, but I'm going to be late if we don't go." she said sadly. "It was good to see you guys again. Nice to meet you, Vert, Lani, Shirako."
"But I wanna stay with Unca Nolo!" Miguel protested vehemently, pouting to the best of his ability. Bebe laughed and shook her head.
"Why don't you con him into coming to see us this weekend?" she suggested, causing the boy to perk up instantly.
"Will you, please, Unca Nolo!" he asked excitedly. "I got a new video game we can play, and I bet I'll beat you. I beat mom all the time, so it's no fun anymore."
"Sounds good to me, kiddo."
"That goes for the rest of you as well. Please feel free to drop by. We like having company, and Nolo has the address."
"I'll be by soon." Nolo promised.
"I'll hold you to that." she said with a grin and a wave. "Goodbye."
"Bye, Bebe. Bye, Miguel." he said.
"Bye, everyone." Miguel called out with a wave, following his mother towards their car parked at the bottom of the hill. Nolo was lost in his thoughts as he watched them pull off. He was glad he had run into Bebe and Miguel today. Seeing that his brother lived on in little Miguel's eyes made it a little easier to hold onto the fact that Tone was gone in one sense, but still present in another. Having that little reminder was comforting at least.
And in the back of his mind, he made it a point to remember to get to Bebe's house this weekend to spend some time with his nephew. He'd been avoiding them the past few months, but now it was time to get to know the boy, and try to salvage what was left of the friendship he'd once had with Bebe.
He felt someone put a hand on his shoulder, and turned to see Kurt
"Tone would have been proud." he said simply.
"Yeah. Yeah, I think he would have been."
A/N - Hey to everyone out there. I'm new to the Acceleracers fandom, so please excuse any incorrect information you may see. And please remember to review.
A.A.
Dedicated to Justin for all his hard work in this lifetime and the next. I'll miss you, buddy.