The next morning I wake up later than I thought I would. I would guess it was about nine to ten. I get up and Jimmy's not here. I'm already dressed since I fell asleep with my clothes on. I get up and wonder the halls looking for him when a lady comes up to me. She's wearing a vest and has a gun so it's safe to say that she's a fighter.
"Captain Weaver needs to talk to you in his office," she says.
"Ok," I say, not really sure what to say to that.
I follow her to Weaver's office where Weaver, Tom, Dai, Mike and Hal are standing around the room.
"Hal, your back," I say, sort of surprised. Hal looks up, but doesn't meet my eye. Now I'm starting to get suspicious.
"What's going on?" I ask nervously since none of them want to meet my eye. Weaver hands me a picture.
"Is this your sister?" he asks.
I look at it. "Yes… why?" I say keeping it.
"Hal told us that when he and Karen we stunned by the mech, he woke up and saw the mech kill the other kids in Rick's group," Tom says sadly. I close my eyes, already knowing what that means. I feel the tears come to my eyes. Not here, I think.
"My sister, she's, she's…" I stutter, not able to say it. After my father, mother, and now my sister; I don't think I'm going to be able to hold it together. Mike steps towards me.
"I'm so sorry-" but he doesn't finish because my hand slaps his face so hard he stumbles back. I make no move towards him, but someone still grabs my shoulder.
"You have the nerve to… we could've gotten all of them, your son, Ben and my sister, but you just had to… Now I have to go tell Jimmy that his sister, his best friend is dead," I can't go on because the tears are falling. I run from the room, I think I ran into Hal on the way out. I'm lucky my room is close because I don't want people to see me like this. I reach the room and sit on the bed, crying into my hands. I stay like this for minutes before I notice someone in the doorway.
"What do you want?" I ask him.
"Nothing, I just… wanted to know if you were alright?" he asks.
"No, no I'm not," I answer.
Hal sits beside me.
"Is it wrong for me to blame Mike?" I ask, staring at the ground.
"I don't know, but I think that right now you need someone to blame," he says and I look at him.
"Do you blame yourself?" I ask.
"Oh, I blame myself for many things," he says, his eyes glazed over.
"So do I," I say.
"I have to tell Jimmy, oh my god," I say, knowing that he's going to take it hard, really hard.
"Were they really close?" Hal asks me.
"They were twins, can't get closer than that," I say, looking at him.
"You don't have to do it alone, you have friends here," he says and he places his hand on top of mine.
"No, I have to do this alone," I say, taking his hand, "But thank you."
He gets up, "If you ever need to talk, you can always come find me."
"Same for you," I say as he leaves, closing the door behind him. I sit for a minute, trying to think of how to break the news to Jimmy. I can think of a hundred different things, but none of them seem good enough. He's so young to have to deal with this, so innocent. And Marie, oh god, she was too young to die. I hate the skitters, I hate what they've done to us. All the pain and all the hate they've caused. True there was already pain and hate, but now there's even more, it's just directed at skitters and not at other humans.
Two fighters come into the room and snap me out of my thoughts.
"Oh, sorry. We just came for the cot," the female fighter says.
"Oh," is all I can say.
"I'm sorry… about your sister," she says.
"Thanks," I murmur.
They go and pick up the cot. I guess that they need every bed they can get.
I try to clear my mind as I get up and head to the gym, since that's probably where Jimmy is.
I'm walking down the hall when I see Tom talking to Matt through the glass doors. Shouldn't Matt be in class? I walk through the doors and stand next to Scott, or as the kids call him, Uncle Scott.
"But I can fight too; some of the other kids are learning how to load guns, even shoot," Matt says.
Tom rubs his eyes and says, "Well that's the other kids."
"But dad-" Matt protests.
"Matt I said no," Tom says tiredly. "We'll be back soon, go on, go back to class. Scott will you take him?"
"I can do it," I say, deep down I know that I'm doing this to stall from telling Jimmy about Marie's death. Tom looks at me.
"You sure, I know you, um… got some things on your mind," he says, struggling to find the right words.
"Yeah, it's fine," I say, "Come on Matt."
Matt walks to me and I put my hand on his shoulder. I open the door for him and he mumbles a thanks.
"What do you think?" he asks suddenly.
"I think, I think that what I think doesn't matter. He's your father, not me," I say.
"But really, what do you think?"
"I think that it's between you and your dad. But if you must know, I think he's right, you're too young," I say and he starts to protest.
"BUT," I say, quieting him, "Things are different now and you have a point, you might need to know how to use a gun, just in case. But it's not for me to decide, you have to talk to your dad and work it out. Make a deal, like he'll teach you how to load a gun and then you have to wait a year before he teaches you how to shoot it," I say and we come to the classroom.
I open the door and push him through.
"Matt, there you are," the teacher says.
"Thank you Laura," she says.
"No problem, just trying to help," I say.
"Matt, what do you say?" the teacher says in tone that I've never liked.
"It's ok, he already said thank you," I say and close the door before she can say anything else.
I'm walking down the main hall towards the gym when I see him talking to Lourdes in front of the missing kid's board. He has a gun; Weaver asked me earlier if he could give Jimmy a gun. He said Jimmy wouldn't be doing anything extreme, just patrolling the halls. I agreed and Jimmy was happy and I was happy. I wait for Jimmy and Lourdes to finish their conversation before approaching him.
"Hey sis," he says cheerfully. His smile disappears when he sees my face.
"What's wrong?" he asks.
"Not here," I whisper, "Come on."