Chapter 1: Never be like you
*Rip*
"So you were just going to leave without saying goodbye?" It's her. It's Sara. Damn.
I turn around slowly, clutching the strap of my traveling bag in nervousness I desperately try to keep from showing in my face. I'm afraid to look at her, but her eyes demand nothing less than full confrontation.
I can tell she's angry because she's smiling. The cold curve touches her lips but her glare is glittering with resentment. Sara Lance is beautiful, brave, strong, caring, and extremely imposing when she's mad.
Does she have to be that beautiful?
And also, what in the hell am I going to say?
I smile affectionately, forcing my sadness aside, and remark, "I've realized that there's really nothing further I can teach you. Any of you." I mean the comment to indicate in particular what a fine captain Sara's grown into. And yet…
Somehow, I immediately get the feeling that was the wrong thing to say. It's so…disgustingly simple, so painfully reductive, and worst of all, dismissive in a way I don't actually feel at all. Sara bristles and I don't blame her.
"Oh, I think there's something more you can teach me," she replies with shrapnel cutting through every word. She strides up to me until we're almost touching. Close up, I can watch her chest rising and falling so quickly, her breath coming fast and indeed quite furious. "You can teach me how I could ever be so completely wrong about someone as I've been about you."
With that, Sara turns on her heel and storms off.
I watch her go and then I turn and glance in the other direction, towards the jump ship I was going to use to depart, to find a new purpose for myself in the utter lack of such a meaningful role here. Or so I felt at the time.
What am I really running away from?
I can still go if I want; no one else will try to stop me. Even if they wanted to, only Sara realized my absence and its implication.
I take a deep breath and murmur quite emphatically, "Fuck."
Then I square my shoulders and follow Sara.