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A/N: This Is The New And Improved Soldiers :D Hope everyone likes.
A/N II: Its waaay past my bedtime and I'm knackered, but an update is well overdue. I'm listening to the Mean Girls Soundtrack, it's AWESOMENESS !!! (:
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Sunset
(Flashback Part One)
"I looked away
then I look back at you,
You try to say
the things that you can't undo,
If I had my way
I'd never get over you,
Today's the day
I pray that we make it through.
Make it through the fall,
Make it through it all.
And I don't wanna fall to pieces
I just wanna sit and stare at you.
I don't wanna talk about it
And I don't want a conversation
I just wanna cry in front of you.
I don't wanna talk about it
'Cause I'm in love with you.
--Fall To Pieces, Avril Lavigne
"Oh my gosh! A real life starfish!" Taj squeaked from his position, peering into a rock pool from a solid ledge of sand and rock. Lily went haring over to him to see, and knocked him in. She laughed, and it was like doves singing- so innocent and pure. Taj spluttered, spraying seawater everywhere as he staggered up and glowered at Lily. She continued to laugh her sweet little laugh until Taj leapt out of the pool with a roar and chased after her. Maxxie and Heran yelled in protest as the two almost destroyed their masterpiece of a sandcastle. The twins were some way off, hunting for seashells while Jet and Sephy looked like they were trying to drown each other in a crystal blue, sparkling sea.
This was such an amazing day for us, the first in what had been a series of down days, and what made it better was the fact that I was sun tanning (or maybe sun burning) myself on a hot beach, with the flock so serene and happy and my best friend in the world sitting right beside me. I looked up at him from my comfy spot in the warm sand, wistfully hoping he was thinking like I was - happy thoughts with hopeful and optimistic thoughts for future. Thoughts that things might turn out alright for us after all. He smiled down at me, and feelings I can only compare with feelings of flying rose up in me. Feelings that no one else in the world could probably understand. It was only him that could do that to me. The smile, as rare as one of his hugs, was becoming more and more common. I got the special kind of smile, a different smile; slow and sweet and kinda sexy. I didn't see him smile like that at anyone else. I hoped he hadn't smiled like that at anyone else. God, that was pathetic. Worrying about how my best friend smiled, and if I was the only one he smiled at. Of course he smiled at the rest of the flock… Why had I become so insanely jealous of, well, anything to do with him?
Maybe because I was insanely in love with him?
It was hard not to be. I've known him all my life, he's my rock, my absolute certainty. And he's such an amazing leader.
There's a major bonus in the fact that he's so freaking handsome. (I mean, we all were – one of the perks of being created by narcissist whack jobs looking for perfection in every helix strand of your DNA).But Sid… It looked like the labbies had gone to extremes with him. He was so, so gorgeous, in every way.
Sid is tawnys and blonds and honey browns, with longish, straight sun streaked hair and smooth, flawless tan skin. His eyes are greeny blue with a tinge of greyish sadness. God, he's so beautiful and strong and fierce.
A sudden thought struck my head like a gong. Would I have the same feelings for Sid if he was ugly? Or marked like Jet? It was so terrible I couldn't believe I had thought it, but I had. The questions tugged at my heart, but its answer was insistent: Yes. Yes.
Because it doesn't matter what the person you love looks like, you still find a way to highlight every feature into perfection. If you truly love them, everything, even the flaws are perfection.
And anyway, it was the Sid on the inside that I really cared about. Who I could confess everything to, no matter how crazy or bad. Who I could rely on for anything. Who explained what was happening when the Voice started to appear. Who stitched me up (First Aid Kit always near by) after Mercer battered the living daylights out of me (more than once), who wiped away my tears in the few times I actually cried, who calmed me down if I ever lost it, the one who made me laugh like no one else could, the one who could make me cry like no one else could.
I fought with him furiously - yelling until my throat was screaming for mercy and my eyes were streaming with angry tears. He fought back just as furiously, of course, and somehow after a screaming fit we would come out of it alright. We might have a brief, awkward hug and then not hold any grudges. It became an unspoken rule of ours, to never bring up any past fights.
I was his second in command, so I shared the seemingly impossible task of finding our families. Where we apparently truly belonged. But at that moment, I knew where I belonged. On the hot beach, with my family. My real family. The only family I was ever gonna have. And to be honest, they weren't that bad.
I stretched luxuriously out on the sand, as the sun continued to climb even higher in the sky. It was almost midday, and I was praying for a miracle – that my pale skin wouldn't turn sizzled lobster red. I mean, it wasn't exactly a turn on. Not like Sid, who had turned an even glossier golden honey tan. He was still sitting up next to me, and from this angle I could perfectly admire his smooth hairless chest.
"What did you expect, Charla?" my Voice snarled meanly. "He's Avian. When's the last time you saw a bird covered in hair?"
What's eating you? I asked lazily inside my head, actually thrilled that the Voice was so worked up. It really pissed me off a lot of the time.
"I'm sorry that I annoy you a lot of the time, Charla. I really am," the Voice lost its attitude and instantly became soothing, apologetic. "But its for the greater good."
Uhuh, so you've been telling me ever since you got here. But do me a favour and bugger off. I'm enjoying myself here.
"So I can see," the Voice snapped snidely but I ignored it. My eyes were savouring the stunning sight of Sid.
"What?" Sid asked, his 'adorable' paranoia taking over.
"It's – nothing," I shook my head. How could I ever admit to these crazy, uncontrollable but extremely intense feelings?
"Quite clearly its something when you keep looking at me. What is it? Breakfast in my teeth? Zits on my face?"
I laughed. "Sidney, we do not get zits on our faces." He hated being called Sidney, so I did it to annoy him.
"You never know. And, you do keep looking at me you know."
"Do not."
"Do so!"
"Do not."
"Do so!"
"Do not!"
"Do freaking so!" Sid said, shoving me, so I shoved him back. Soon enough we were wrestling roughly, sand flying everywhere. He ended up straddling me (Yeah, yeah I know) and grinned in triumph.
"You only won cos you're fat," I complained.
He pretended to be offended, a who, moi? expression on his face.
"Yes, you. You're just so fat. Lose some weight, will you? Come on, Sidney. Fight that flab!"
He grabbed my wrists and drilled his forehead into mine.
"Malkie!" he said and then started to mutter, in the husky playful voice I just can't resist. I don't know what came over me. I just pushed his forehead away so we were looking at each other again, and reached up to kiss his mouth. Just like that.
I kissed him hesitantly and fiercely at the same time.
But here's the thing – he didn't kiss me back.
Mortified, I pulled away, hating myself for ruining our friendship in one stupid moment of impulsiveness.
"No, no," he grabbed my wrist again, keeping me down. "It's okay, Char, its okay."
No, it wasn't okay. Our 'okay' was like the sea – for now, glittering, but soon enough a storm would come and wreak havoc and destruction. I shifted uncomfortably and Sid moved off me immediately. Gee, didn't realize I was that repulsive. I stood up, dusting sand off nonchalantly and walked away from him, heading towards the sea.
"Hey," he said. I turned, knowing fine well that my thoughts were scrambled all over my face.
"I owe you one, right?" he said quietly, sadly, hopefully.
"Right," I said, before running right into the sea, which was freaking freezing. I dived right under, swimming as far away from the shore and Sid as I could. I dived right under, so that no one would know that half the salt water on my face wasn't from the sea.
XxX
In the late afternoon, when we were all remarkably happy and at peace with each other, and smelling of salty sea water, we decided to leave the beach. Better to leave it on a good memory, rather than leaving just because we had to. Plus we were all starving hungry, and it would probably be the best thing to get started on our "mission" again. The impossible task, the one I didn't really want to accomplish, if I was being my honest selfish self.
We were flying towards the city again, the one that never sleeps. Sephy, with her useful skill of detecting any kind of movement (like, if she was looking the right way, she could see a caterpillar wiggling on a leaf hundreds of kilometers away) spotted a flag waving 30 stories up, and therefore we found a roof that became our home for the night. It was huge, obviously, as it was the roof of a 30 storey complex, with two vast water tanks side by side at one end and a brick tower with a steel grey door (a fire exit?) at the other. Strangely, there was a battered couch propped against one of the brick tower walls. And that was all. The flag that Sephy had spotted was fluttering pathetically, as the wind was dying down. It was such a boring flag, dirty white with black letters stamped on it - GL CORP.
What did they stand for? Did I really care?
No, I think not.
We flew down and even though I'd seen them fly about a million times now, I couldn't get over the sheer grace and control of Phina and Anielle. The pretty twins, who were joined at the hip - literally. The labbies had messed up - some strands of DNA had fused together and the result was flying to the left in front of me. Two beautiful, big eyed, dark skinned, soft featured Avian hybrids. They were perfect in every way - apart from the fact they were conjoined, with three kidneys and a shared blood supply. They were, for lack of better words, complete miracles. It was amazing that they had two full grown wings - but I knew it had been excruciatingly painful to grow them - and it must have seemed pointless to grow the other wing if they knew they could never use it. But they were fighters (of course - they were expected to die at birth and proved the labbies wrong) and managed to shake off every clumsy fall, every unintentional swoop, every stumble in the sky with remarkable dignity and ease. From far away, they just looked like two sisters standing close together for support.
Sid decided to take Jet and Sephy with him to find some food for tonight (meaning they'd find a cheap convenience store, we weren't the richest mutant freaks). So they headed off, and I was in charge til Sid got back. Thank God for Maxxie. He saved my sanity. I mean, I love my little guys, they're like my babies almost, but they sure tire me out.
Lily, Taj and Heran headed straight for the couch, with Maxxie hot on their heels. It did raise a small smile to my lips, watching the long legged, long haired adolescent running after them like an overgrown kid himself. He was cute, I decided. His big almond brown eyes said: I'm vulnerable, take care of me, while the muscles he was beginning to get suggested something different. His skin was nice, in that almost-tan way. He was great with the kids, not as obnoxious as Jet or as stubborn as Sid and extremely good natured and caring.
"Hey! Hey, back off guys!" I heard him protesting, as he wanted to touch the couch first. Maxxie has this weird ability to sense if people have been around, and if he touches objects that other people have, he slips into this weird trance thing, where he relives someone else's memory. We all watched, as Maxxie sat down on the couch and immediately curled up in a corner of it. He seemed to stop breathing and started to frown. I began to panic a tiny bit. But my fears vanished as his eyes sprung open and he began to suck in huge gulps of air.
"Nothing much happened, but I think we should stay away from the couch, the woman who comes up here is a smoker," he added the last bit in a stage whisper, which made Lily, Heran and Taj giggle. Did I mention he was a lifesaver when it came to those unbelievably cute kids?
"Ooh, I've got an idea. How about Phee and Annie take this lot over to the water tanks? It might be warmer, 'cause one of them has gotta be the boiler," Maxxie said enthusiastically, talking with his eyes to the twins.
"Sure," they replied in unison, and carefully herded "this lot" over to the giant water tanks. We waited until their shrill happy shrieks and giggles had faded a bit before I turned on Maxxie.
"Okay, spill."
"There's a woman who comes up here on her break. She's called Sarah, I'll show you..." Maxxie took my hands and pulled me over to touch the couch. The weirdest feeling came over me. It was like falling during a long flight and drowning in the deep sea all at once. And then... there she was. I vaguely noticed that my vision had become blurred, a little hazy around the edges. The clearest thing in sight was her- Sarah.
A young woman who couldn't have been much older than eighteen stumbled out of the steel grey fire escape door. She pretty in a California beach babe way with very tanned skin and big, loose blond curls. Sarah was crying as she staggered over to the couch. She scrambled for two things and got them out her pocket, a cell phone and a packet of cigarettes. She swore loudly when she obviously couldn't find her lighter, and began punching in digits on her phone.
"Hey," she said in a broken, hollow voice. "No, no, no, please don't hang up! Jeff! Please, no, nooo," she started to sob, as 'Jeff' clearly had hung up. Huge, painful sobs, as if her heart was breaking. Maybe it was. She phoned again, and he didn't pick up but she left a message anyway, choking the words out through her tears.
"Jeff, oh, I'm sorry. Sorry I lied. S-sorry I lost the baby. The doctors said I got too stressed out. When I had that panic attack, I killed the baby... The Hudson baby. That's what they called it. They wouldn't tell me anything. Oh, Jeff, please talk to me."
Sarah sniffed loudly. "God, if you're even up there, if you care please give me some sort of miracle. I just need a sign, to show that there is a light at the end of this tunnel that is my life. And could you maybe toss in the will power to stop smoking? Cheers." She smiled humourlessly and curled up in the corner of the couch. She found her lighter after scrabbling in the cushion of the battered black leather. She lit a cigarette and smoked it, and slowly, the tears stopped.
"Oh my god!" I whisper-shouted, my mind reeling from the information overload I'd just received. Hudson was Maxxie's real last name.
"I know! Isn't it just the saddest story you ever heard?" Maxxie said sympathetically before studying me critically. "Char, open your wing out for a sec."
I did what he said without thinking. Stupid of me. A second later the cheeky bugger plucked out one of my feathers! It was an underside one so it bloody well hurt! I was about to start yelling at him but then I realised why he had done it. Sarah had wanted a sign from God, and a pure white fluffy feather seemed like a pretty good one. If it had been just a regular person, I might have got mad, but her last name was Hudson... Then I realised she was way too young to be Maxxie's mom. So, that theory was trash. They did look quite similar though...
"That was nice, Maxxie," I smiled warmly at him.
"Well, I just hope that's enough. Don't want her jumping off here or something," he blushed. He was saved from me lavishing more praise and embarrassing him by the arrival of Sephy, Jet and Sid. Maxxie hurried over to the great water tanks, to stop the kids and twins from knocking Sid over, who was carrying the two bags of tonights food. I watched them all scramble, then sit down, eating like they hadn't been fed in a week. My was happiness dulling at the sight of Sid again. Why did I kiss him at the beach? And the harder question: Why didn't he kiss me back?
The questions looped around my head while I pretended everything was fine and laughed along with the flock. I had adopted a watch position near at the brick tower, near the grey door I had seen Sarah stumble out of. Jet, Sephy, Maxxie and the twins were at different corners of the water tank where the youngest were actually falling asleep! It was coming up for ten and we had had a long, tiring day. But no run ins with Erasers or labbies. A good day. Or it would have been, I thought grimly, glancing around for Sid who had been standing at an edge of the building. Who was now standing right near me.
I sucked in a breath I hadn't realised I was holding, and the questions looped around faster in my head.
"Can I sit down then?" Sid asked bluntly.
"Why didn't you kiss me back?" I blurted out. Shit.
"What?" Sid was taken aback. But there was no backing out now.
"Why didn't you kiss me back?" I repeated, half-afraid of the answer. But I needed to know.
"It doesn't matter. I can't tell you," he shook his head and it infuriated me.
"Hell you can. And it does matter. It matters to me! Is that not important?" I demanded.
"Of course. But I can't, Char. I just can't."
"Just tell me!"
"No!"
"Sid, why didn't you kiss me back?" I raised my voice a little and he motioned for me to keep it down.
"No, I'm not going to answer that."
"Sid! Just tell -"
"Because Jet is in love with you," Sid burst out. He was livid, but suddenly all the fight went out of him. He looked what he'd never looked before: defeated. "That's why I didn't kiss you back." As for me: knocked for six. There was an awkward silence and Sid sat down a lot further away from me than he normally would have. I have never felt so uncomfortable with myself as I did then.
"That's a beautiful sunset," he remarked simply and I was surprised I didn't kiss him out of relief. His comment had broke the silence, and we were ourselves again. I looked out and wondered how I couldn't have noticed it before. The sun was blazing, a fiery orange ball dipping down in the sky, setting off all the violent streaks and smudges of bright reds and strong pinks. It was as if someone had stolen my feelings and thrown them into the sky.
"Beautiful," he repeated, but he wasn't looking at the sky. He was looking at me. I tried to shrug it off and not show I was higher than the tallest skyscraper you've ever seen in your life.
"Me?" I croaked out. "You've gotta be kidding."
"Oh, yeah, I was joking all along," he said sarcastically. "You obviously haven't seen a mirror in a long time." Then he tried to shrug it off as well, turning to look back at the sky, but it was darkening now and not nearly as wonderful as before. I wouldn't let him away that easy. He wasn't allowed to dismiss something like that, that easily. Not when he had been in my head for what felt like forever.
"So, if Jet hadn't liked me, what would you have done?" I pressed him, even though I knew he was unwilling to pursue the subject- because I knew I would never calm down until he told me. Sid remained silent. I didn't ask again, as I didn't want want him to get frustrated, I just wanted him to bloody well answer me!
"He's my best friend," he said stoutly and that stung. I shook myself mentally, trying to banish ridiculous thoughts. Jet was my best friend too. But I wasn't in love with him.
"He's my best friend too -" I began but Sid cut me off. His voice was hollow and as he looked out at the blackening sky, I knew he wasn't seeing it. When he spoke, it sounded like he was talking to himself as much as me.
"Jet's my best friend. I could never do anything to hurt him. It just, it just wouldn't be right. And, to do what's right, sometimes you have to give up the thing you want the most..."
Oh my god oh my god oh my GOD
Did Sid mean what I think he did? I hoped so.
We stared at each other for a long time, barely blinking, barely breathing. We weren't touching but it felt like we were. The look was more physical than anything I'd ever felt before - even more than the brief one sided kiss on the beach. As his ocean coloured eyes stared at me, of all people, I felt like I was falling insanely in love with him all over again. I tried to stop - it was crazy, reckless and freakish - just like we were. Memories flitted though my head at high speed. Was I dying? Was my life flashing before my eyes? Was I having a Voice attack? No, but I wondered, could you die from, like, an emotion overload? Looking at Sid, I thought, hell yes.
Another lingering look passed between us. I couldn't hold his intense gaze, so I stared down at my worn trainers. The gesture seemed to say: 'Why me?' In answer Sid lifted my chin up and gave me the most confusing expression, one I couldn't read. Then he slid his other hand to hold my head and kissed me, hard on the mouth. WOAH. Was not expecting that. I unwound my arms from my knees to wrap them around his neck, pulling him closer, bridging the gap between us until there was none. We naturally sank down and even though the ground was solid concrete, I hardly noticed and didn't care. My only interest was Sid - the way his fingers were tangled in my hair, the way his mouth tasted, the way he felt pressed so close to me. But even mutant freaks need air, so flushed and breathing more heavily than usual we broke apart.
"So... Have I repaid my IOU?" Sid asked, with his trademark cheeky smirk plastered on his face.
"Stop smirking like a smug bastard," I said lightly. "Yes, you have. In fact, I think I might even owe you one now."
"Well, do you want to settle that score?"
"You bet," I smiled, pulling him down for another kiss. His lips were so soft, a lot softer than I would have imagined. I wound my fingers into his tawny hair, forgetting about the flock, forgetting about the beach, forgetting about our fight. All I could focus on was Sid and the insaneness of being tangled up with him. With every minute that passed, I felt like he was robbing another piece of my heart with his passionate kisses. Maybe that sounds mushy or whatever, but that's what it felt like.
Oh my god...
I was kissing Sid.
Sid was kissing me.
This was forbidden... Jet said he loved me... Sid didn't want to hurt him... But I'd been hurting for the past year, wanting Sid and knowing I could never have him. And now it looked like I was going to stop hurting.
"Charla," said an ice cold, furious voice.
Or not. That was Jet's voice. Shit.
