Hello :D the response to the (admittedly nightmarish) prologue was amazing! Thank you all so much! :D I'm a little worried about how people are receiving this fic but I hope most people are liking it and I promise, promise that while the prologue will be played out in a future chapter, there's a lot to be explained too. Don't give up on me!

Please, please review. Honestly, I love every single one of you for doing so; any writer on here will tell you the same. I hope you all like the way I went with this chapter and think of it as a reprieve before we get into the grittier stuff


1

There was a little boy, once upon a time. All the other people who towered above him called him 'special' but he never knew what they really meant. In his head, special meant that he was Superman and that's how he felt, how he dreamt of being. Junie, the only nice lady he knew, used to read to him from ratty old comic books with the edges worn so thin you could see your fingers through them on a bright day. He heard tales of good guys and bad guys and he drew pictures of men in capes and Junie stuck them to the ceiling of his secret hiding place. This little boy, dumped on the doorstep, wanted to fly away and save people. He wanted to be bright and brave and bold and brilliant. Yeah, that's what he wanted. He wanted to save the world in secret. He wanted to make them stop hitting him when he said the wrong answers to questions he didn't understand. Make the bad go away.

But as the little boy grew older, he grew colder too. Junie left and got married and had a baby and stopped visiting. He wanted to find a girl who loved him like Lois loved Clark and loved Superman too, but he couldn't find one. He wanted to be an adventurer but he had no-one to go with him to hold his hand. He wanted a home. One day, the not-so-little boy saw a man in green camouflage, with dog tags swinging around his neck like a cape and wondered who this man was, walking so confidently down the street. The not-so-little boy watched in the sun as the man in green and brown grinned wider than anyone he'd ever seen before. Why did no-one grin at him like that? He saw the man – the giant – pick up a beautiful lady (even more beautiful than Junie used to be) and twirl her around. The man's big arms wrapped around the lady tight, tighter than the not-so-little boy had ever seen anyone hold anyone else before. Lois loved Clark but it was Superman who swept her off her feet and made her smile. The not-so-little boy smiled too, a little sadly, and wondered who this hero was. How could the not-so-little boy be a hero too, the hero he'd always dreamt of, stuck to his ceiling? The hero and the lady kissed and kissed and kept on kissing until their hands wrapped together like there was glue between them. Maybe the not-so-little boy wasn't a hero yet but he could be.

"Miss Marie!" he ran through to the kitchen, "Who's that man out there? Is he a hero?"

The old lady just chuckled as she looked through the window at the couple walking down the street, hand in hand, "He's a kind of hero. That's Captain Jameson. He's just come back from fighting for our country in the army and the pretty lady is his wife."

The not-so-little boy stared open mouthed at the love down the street. Maybe if he became a hero one day, he could find a pretty girl to love him too. "What does he do in the army, Miss Marie?"

"He's a soldier." She said, going back to washing dishes. "You can't join the army until you're 18 and you have to pass a lot of tests. You don't do so well on tests, remember?"

He nodded, his face fell a little but he smiled too, smiled so confidently, "I can do better, Miss Marie. I know I'm special enough to be better. Junie always used to say that I was special."

"You've got 5 more years, Kenny. Best you get to reading your books the teacher gave you."

"Yes mam." He nodded furiously and ran up to his room at the speed of light, flying up the flights of stairs. The not-so-little boy knew what he wanted to be. He wanted to be a hero and find a pretty lady to love him like Captain Jameson and his wife. He wanted to be a soldier. He wanted to be brave and bold and bright and brilliant. He wanted love.

"Well, did he get what he wanted?" she asks him quietly as the dusk settles, his hands cradling her big stomach like he had the baby in his arms already. Aaron told Marta everything over the last eight months. He told her about the boy and the man he used to be. He told her about Junie and Miss Marie and how the army didn't make him feel like a hero, but she does.

"I think he's got what he wanted." Aaron kisses her neck tenderly where they're sitting on the beach, her sitting between his open legs, "Now I'm going to get what you want."

"What do I want?" she yawns a little, eyes heavy-lidded and warm on his. She doesn't even think of looking at the sunset, only at him. "Aaron?"

He chuckles and sweeps her hair out of her lips, "You want this baby safe, healthy, happy, you want me happy too." He presses a kiss to her lips, "Because you're unselfish. I could never be like that, Doc." Aaron caresses her stomach, "He won't be long now."

"The midwife on the next island says a week and I hope she's right." Marta chuckles and leans back deeper into him, "This kid's driving me insane already."

"It's what kids do, isn't it?" he chuckles, "They make sure you never forget about them."

"I don't think June Monroe forgot about you, Aaron. I think she's never forgotten about you. Sometimes it's just hard to admit when you don't want to go back to the life you had, no matter how much good there was in it." She's told him about her family; about how sad she was they were probably never going to meet her child and how their child would have no grandparents.

Aaron kisses her softly, "Let's get you to bed; you're getting too big for me to carry the last couple months."

"Asshole." She chuckles and he helps her onto her feet. "I am not fat…" she grunts as she straightens, "It's all your fault anyway."

"Oh sure, women always blame the men." He smirks and wraps her hand in his like they're glued together. "You're the one who injected me with the green viral, so it's your fault."

"Asshole." She smirks.


Six days later – after all, Marta's the kind of person who did things before somebody asks her to – he's holding a tiny bundle in his arms, a bundle wrapped in soft cottons and wool for warmth. Marta's exhausted but strong and so is their baby boy, snuggling into Aaron's chest at barely an hour old. The midwife has to be the second strongest woman Aaron has ever known and gladly accepts payment of one chicken for her trouble. For all they've been through, for all the bullets and hell and her crushing the bones in his hand during labour, it's worth it to look into his son's scrunched up face and forget about his fears. They don't matter, not really. He's vowed to keep them safe and it'll take it to his last breath if it means he keeps his promise. "Aaron?"

"No, not after me." He says, sitting on a chair next to the bed at the midwife's house: she'd insisted it was better for Marta and Aaron knew to trust her. "He deserves his own name. A brand new one."

"What did you have in mind then?" she sits up as much as she can and strokes their son's dark, dark hair.

"He looks like you." Aaron smiles across at her, just watching her is beautiful. "He's all dark hair and wobbling bottom lip."

"You kidding?" she smirks softly and lays her head on Aaron's shoulder. "He's all you, Cross. Look at those strong hands, his nose, his chin…" she yawns widely, her weight falling onto his side. Marta closes her heavy eyes and Aaron manoeuvres her to the pillow as she falls asleep. He's used to holding precious cargo with one strong arm.

"Sleep, Doc." He mutters under his breath and gets up, bouncing the baby back to sleep. "I don't know what your name is yet, little man, but I know I am going to read so many comic books to you, you'll want to fly like I did. Daddy's going to make it happen, you watch."

The baby gurgles a little.

"Oh that's just Mommy. You took a lot out of her today but she'll wake up soon and want to hold you. I might not let her." Aaron chuckles. The little boy's breaths become steady as he falls asleep to Aaron's heartbeat. Aaron mutters softly in Russian, "мой сын моя любовь моя все." My son, my love, my all.


On the day Jackson was born, a crying bouncing bundle, Aaron promised him that he would tear the world apart to keep him and Marta safe. As he looks at the devastation around him in fear and dead shock, something breaks and twists into anger inside him. Red hot burning anger, the like of which no-one has ever or will ever see. They've taken his boy and baited the trap he'd willing walk into as an oncoming storm. He'd fought and fought against fifty, sixty, seventy of them, so had she, and now there's thick blood streaming down the back of her head, just about breathing. Aaron fell to his knees next to her, feeling for a pulse though he knew her heart would be broken when she woke. He had been so blinded by love that he forgot how to hate the chain around his ankles that kept him rooted to a rotting stump of an organisation. With bloodied fingers, Aaron rips the comms device from the head of a dead agent, one of the lucky few who was granted a quick death by a bullet in the skull and not a slow agonising end, and speaks into the microphone. He knows Byer can hear him but even Aaron doesn't recognise his own voice; so tainted by the pure anger and hatred fuelling him.

"I will not stop until my son is back in his mother's arms safely. I will kill your family and I will torture you and everyone you know and love until you beg me to send you all to hell where you belong. You brought my son into a world of pain, ripped him from his crib, and pain is what I will give to you. This is not a warning, Byer. Oh no. This is me keeping a promise to my son." He snaps the microphone in half as if it were a stick and goes back to Marta. He'd broken his promise to her but he'd be damned if it was going to be two in a row. Marta the brave and beautiful, the kind and caring, the unselfish and the scientist who he had made into a fearless warrior, putting all she had left to give to keep Jackson safe…

If they had awoken the trained monster in him, what the hell is going to awake in her?


A/N: Please review and I'll give you cookies! :D

A/N 2: What did you think of the trip into Aaron's past?