2.
The ocean is ripping at Rip's heart. The waves crash and fall and white foam growls as Rip sits in the sand on the beach gazing at the pink and purple horizon. He punches the sand and wants to cry more than ever. Real men cry, Rip thinks. Utterly alone. He sips his strawberry smoothie and thinks about how meaningless his life feels right now. Look for me, his heart screams. He is locked in this body, this mountain weight, with his tan hair and his faerie glare. Stare at the sun. Everyone should be kissed by the sun. The Son, a voice calls out from the very edge of the Sea.
And Rip is getting up and running and running and he is wondering how to get back and why did he ever choose to leave? He knows now that everything happens for a reason and he has so many lessons to impart to his history students.
Listen, Rip. Listen to the tugging of hear heartstrings like a cello playing dark low beautiful notes, a low roar whispering run run run. The wind brushing his hair stinging his heart. Listen, Rip. Listen for your wife, she's alive. Listen to me and dare to go in that water, that shark-infested water. Listen: you are strong you are a man with a purpose listen listen carefully I hear you.
Is that Sara? Is that Miranda? Is that his son? Rip gets up and takes off his sandals and runs towards the place in-between the crashing waves and the sand. He lets his legs slow down and walks, occasionally bending down to pick up seashells. In all his eternity, he has never done this before: this thing that all people need to do. Read the vast ocean, Rip. Listen to the waves crash and watch the white foam. He runs fast fast enough to maybe find the Waverider. But he never does. It was his silly mistake.
Meanwhile, Sara is the temporary Captain of the Waverider. The team of legends – heroes, if you want to call us that – is still saving history, herstory, yourstory. They all miss Rip, knowing there is something tugging on his heart, some trouble he is in and why would he leave everything that ever meant something to him behind?
Sara trains in the training room on the ship, punching and kicking a wooden punching bag Kung Fu students use to strengthen their muscles and bones. She kicks the regular black punching bag too. Train hard, be patient, seek strength. She is no lon ger an assassin and she misses the man who saved her from herself. She has hatred for her enemy Ras-Algul but genuine love for a man she met at the league of shadows: Bruce Wayne. Like Rip, he has a mind that is both dark and light. Both men grieve over a family lost. Bruce, his parents; Rip, his wife and son. Both, potential heroes. Sara sees only the light in them.
Mick yells at Sara, telling her that dinner is ready.
"Are we going to look for him?" Sara asks. The elephant in the room is no longer invisible. It is giant and grey and silver, staring at them.
"He chose to leave, Sara," Ray says and Sara closes her eyes and wishes prays something that Rip is going to change his mind and seek them.
"We have to look for him," Sara said. Because saving people is more important than saving history. Herstory. Yourstory. Ourstory. Let history dangle from a thin strand let the silver pixie dust wake everybody up. Like Rip's knuckles, Sara's knuckles are bloodied from her training. Pushing herself too hard because she wants to be strong, super-strong, so she can save people the way she couldn't save Laurel.
And she thinks she understands Rip. She lost her family. But she didn't let go of the music that plays deep inside of her. Plumb, exhale. It's okay to not be okay. Breathe. In. Out. Then let go. It's important to suffer for a while, to find patience and lovingkindness. Breathe. In. Out. And then be.
There is no place to go right now. No one to be. Nothing to do. And it frees Sara to follow her heart. "Gideon, where is Rip?" Sara asks out of desperation.
"He asked me not to tell you," Gideon says. "Respect him." Sara steps backwards. She wants to save him. She senses that something wrong. Time can go to hell. If you don't have your makeshift family, how can anything else matter? Not all ring-bearers are destined to be alone.
So Sara goes to the kitchen and eats and then they plot a course to the future, just to dare, just to peak, take a glimpse of what becomes of the world.
"Gideon, take us to year 4,000 a.d.," Sara says.
"Yes, Captain Lance," Gideon says. Sara smiles a weary, tired smile. She remembers her training and grabs the air, grabs her strength, and straps herself in her chair. The rest of the team – except for Rip; he's not there – strap themselves in too. They wouldn't stay long, Sara promised Gideon. Sara realized she has no idea where and when was Rip's home before he became a time "master". Her heart is beating so fast and she is dizzy blacking out waking up to the ship landing slowly in England year 4,000 a.d.
"Some people have to stay behind to protect the ship," Sara says.
Amaya volunteers, having the power of the animals. She connects with them, understands with them, and doesn't fear them.
Everyone else abandons the ship, sticking together and walking around. There are tall buildings and shadowy roads and where is all the grass and trees and who is in charge? The trees are hiding dancing swaying and Sara, like Rip, never learned to dance, unless you count fighting. Her body is a weapon, her fight is a dance. Her martial arts once was to kill and now it is a brilliant moon-lit dance to save and to bring peace. To be stronger than she ever dared to be.
The grass dances as the sun sets. There is Grace in Sara's limbs and her bones are aching a still, silent ache that nothing, not even seeing Laurel again, can take away. It was there before she lost her sister, and long before she met Rip Hunter.
We all have this ache, this empty hole inside of us. It exists so we will seek God. And Sara Lance dares to hope that Rip will change his mind and seek them. Seek her, seek Miranda, seek a way out of this pain for all of them. Because saving others, saving time, isn't enough. You have to take the time to save yourself first.
Rip takes the jumpship back to 2017 and gets back to his job as a history professor. He sees light in his students' eyes, a glimmer of hope, a desire to learn. And Rip wants to shield them from the nightmares and monsters that hide in the glitches of time, the aberrations written in stone, written in a new history that needs to be restored.
First, Rip needs to restore himself, to the man who was not a weary traveler who lost Miranda and Jonas. The light, the humor, in his son's eyes. The way he would laugh and tell his teacher that his daddy is a time traveler, the way he would play with leggos and go in to stories. He missed the way Miranda's silky dark hair would caress Rip's skin and the way her eyes told a million songs, a million poems, and that there is no going back, no going back to when they were alive because then there would be timequakes. Time would fold in on itself and everything as Rip knew it would be destroyed.
Sometimes Rip is depressed, self-loathing, weary. He finds a surprising passion in teaching his college students the lessons he learned from his centuries of time travel. As much as he loves time travel, he feels just…tired. Not physically as much as emotionally. He is a big teal ocean wave, he is a mountain, he is an island. He blends in; he is a wallflower.
He discusses how Hitler started fascism and how people with no power who fight evil anyways are the real super-heroes. He discusses that with every war that comes there is both good and evil at stake. He teaches the terror of September 11, an experience far in the past. And he dares his students to not only examine history, but to examine the future as well. Dare to glimpse into your future.
And then the wanderlust comes back. It's a dance Rip was born with: a desire to travel, to run, to escape solitary confinement of a boring life. It's a fight deep inside Rip's blood to resist settling down. That isn't the kind of person Rip is. Rip is a time traveler. He wants to go to his time period, the 31st century, and beyond. See if there is a glimmer of hope in 4,000 and 5,000 and he has to go now now now incase he dies before he has a chance to see it. Not likely as he knows he is immortal, but he is a weary man fighting not to be suicidal.
Listen: self-harm has nothing to do with suicide. It's the opposite. It's a way of preventing and ignoring suicidal thoughts and trying to make yourself better. It's like putting one foot in the ocean and digging your toes into the muddy sand. Jesus, let me see. Jesus, let me fly and dance and let me see. Let me see hope, because I seem to have lost all of it.
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Amaya is from the past just like Rip is from the future. She is an animal warrior, a soft brown skinned warrior. Being soft is not a weakness: to be gentle is to be strong. She thinks fondly of becoming a seal and jumping into raging white water to save Steel. She remembers that night naked in the tent with him. She remembers courting, and she remembers we can do this chill. But Amaya wants a soulmate, someone that will love her for her soul and personality and not just her lithe shifting body.
She is screaming. She wakes up sweating her covers twisted. She puts one hand on her head and notices bubbles of sweat falling down her face, like sweet bitter tears, like rain falling and crashing and boom what was that dream? It doesn't matter, not right now anyways.
Amaya barely knows Rip – neither does Steel – but she senses the team cares about him and she wants to reach out to him and tell him that he is not a monster. Sara and Kendra and Amaya all know what it's like to feel like an evil monster at times. Sara, the ex-assassin, dancing the dance of swords that way and this way and kicking and flipping. Amaya watches secretly as Amaya trains, punching and kicking and working on her backflip kicks. Amaya watches as Sara Lance's strong mind wins over her body as she forces ten more pushups five more twenty more. Ten pullups, break, ten more. Sit-ups, V-ups, the gymnast she was before league of shadows recruited her.
Sara and Kendra spar and Amaya sits there and watches, her super-strength and flight and super-speed all there unfolding but she lets go of it and watches. Train hard. Train until you're bleeding and crying and sweating too much and out of breath and ready to collapse. Then drink water and start over. Back handspring. Two hundred roundhouse kicks. Five hundred side-kicks. More V-ups. Then remember to nourish your body: two protein bars, orange juice, a water bottle.
Amaya drinks coffee and then sneaks into the training room. Sara and Kendra are done and it's Amaya's turn: she is gentle with her kicks and punches and then she uses her super-strength to rip through the punching bag. She closes her eyes and holds her heart with her left hand. She lets tears fall. She does push-ups and sit-ups and she remembers that when you are training be gentle with yourself and whatever you did in the past, it doesn't matter…forgive yourself. Amaya wants to tell Rip this: you are not the animal that roars inside your soul. You are a person.
Then they eat and they time jump to 2017 Star City because their intuition tells them that Rip is setting up base there. Amaya closes her eyes and silently prays for direction, for the path to Rip, a man who does not want to be found. But he is hurting, Amaya is an empath and she senses Rip's energy. He is tired and hurting and his eyes are filled with stardust pixiedust and there are more reasons to travel than to save history and to save lives: Rip travels just because he wants to see the world, see history unfold and see the future and the past and participate in it.
Before he was a time traveler, he was a historian like Steel. He paid careful attention to glimpses that he found that showed a weariness that perhaps he was born with. He senses that his ex-team is near and a part of him is happy: go back, don't forget who you are again. When you lose yourself, your mind is pliable, and darkness is always there haunting him. But beyond the dark moonlit night, there is a sun filled with stardust exploding, and Rip tears his heart out of his body and smashes it and puts it back inside of his body. The shell. You must keep the shell. He closes his eyes and tries not to cry so he cuts himself and lets his blood be his silent tears. Keep the shell, decorate it, do push-ups, become a stronger man.
Go back, remember who you are. You are not a murderer.
Or go to the 31st century. Or find your team. Not ex-team. A family of misfits who love him. Or kill yourself. Find Miranda and Jonas. But that isn't right. Wait. Be patient. Go back.
And Rip takes out his compass and opens it, looking at a picture of Miranda and Jonas. He smiles and tears roll down his cheek, and he finally lets himself grieve. He senses that the legends are close. They would not leave him alone to the solitude he sought for so long. But he missed Gideon even though it was never real. He misses Sara most of all, and then he feels like he is betraying himself: wait for Miranda. She's still Rip's soulmate.
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Sara closes her eyes and tries to focus on the strawberries she puts in her mouth. She chews slowly and thinks about how much she wants to scream and fight. She thinks about Laurel and she wants to go back and get between Damian Darhk and her sister. Stop the murder from happening. But Sara knows she can't do that. There are rules, and they are there for a reason. To guard time, to save history, even though sometimes there is this deep ache; this low roar. A bull screaming as a lone man fights it. A dragon soaring through the sky and a rising phoenix, not colorful but its feathers filled with shades of brown and gold and yellow. Sara's mind is filled with this. She lost a sister, a friend, so now she can't bear to lose Rip too. Whatever problems he's facing, Sara guesses she can understand. Been there, done that. Whatever it is.
Sometimes you start to black out and you just have to hold onto the air. The waverider lands somewhere in Star City in 2017 and they get off the ship. They find STAR labs and talk with Oliver Queen and Barry Allen. They say they don't know where Rip went, that he hadn't reached out to them. "What would a time traveler do for a living?" Jax asks. "History," he says, answering his own question. Perhaps like Steel [I forget his real name], Rip became a historian. A history teacher. Listen to your intuition, and it will guide you towards your lost friends.
They have to stay there. Fixing aberrations can wait; helping friends is more important. Sara closes her eyes and thinks about her battle scars. She was a trained assassin, a fifth degree black belt in kung fu, but everybody loses sometimes. No matter how strong you are nor how hard you train, you must lose to truly understand the heart of mankind. You must become vulnerable and different and dare to dive beyond into the abyss and let it look into you.
So they wait. And wait.
When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, 'I will return to the house I left. Mathew 12:43-45
The team stops at a book store just for the sake of relaxing. They hadn't done that for a while. They buy cheesecake and coffee at Borders and start to sit and talk. They laugh and cry and browse the stacks for books on history. Sara blacks out and starts screaming and wakes up to hearing herself screaming and rocking back and forth. When you train hard, remember to train your mind, heart, soul and spirit too. Both internal and external martial arts are important. Without moving meditation, you won't be calm when it comes to fighting a foe.
I will wait for you. Do not be afraid.
Amaya finds a Bible and decides she wants to understand. "Looking for God?" Sara asks Amaya and Amaya almost jumps out of her skin. She shrugs her shoulder and buys the Book with money that Gideon made. Think. Think. Amaya reads and sips her coffee – she takes it black. A part of Amaya misses 1948 but 2017 is pretty much better for woman and for people with brown skin and that's not why she left the justice society and joined Rip's team. Rip's team, Amaya thinks, though she barely knows him. I will not be afraid. She opens her new Bible – a Book that should be free and given to everybody – and opens to John. She reads it and smiles. All is not lost afterall.
