Okay, I'm really really sorry for the lack of updates these days, in compensation, here's updates today in ALL my bechloe fanfics. Now, what happened is that last week on Tuesday I finished my exams, that kept me busy for the whole January and so last week I was writing and relaxing on my own. Then on Monday this week I got really sick with a cold that ended up being a horrible thing to have at least Monday, because it didn't seem like a normal cold, I was having chills then being too warm, headaches, stomachaches, sneezes, throat pain, coughs, over sensitivity to light, watery eyes all the time… well, I was a mess and went to Theatre at night to rehearse something I'm doing in May-June and the rehearse ended at night and I came back dead, but couldn't miss it because exams already made me miss two rehearsals so… and then Tuesday I spent the whole day in bed and didn't went to class, which was good because thanks to that yesterday I was a lot better and today I'm really recovering, so all good. You gotta know that I care too much for Emotionless, Lost and Found, Unstoppable and The Last Battle to abandon them and I'm ALWAYS writing new chapters (well, all of the stories are already completely written except for Lost and Found, and even that one has like ten chapters written or more) I only need time and energy to update because I like to update them all at once in order not to forget any behind. So if you see I'm not updating either you missed something I said before some chapter explaining my absence, either I'm sick, dead, or busy as hell.
Again, thanks for always being such great readers and reviewers. I love you all like crazy. I will answer all reviews once I'm completely OK because it's four stories with reviews and I want to take a good time to read them and answer them. Please leave reviews. Love you!
About this chapter, is a really long chapter with a great bunch of answers and bechloe.
Chapter 12: New beginnings.
May 2nd 2016 was the day elected for the military trial against Major General Brandon Morrison in New York City, by the Air Force Court of Criminal Appeals. That day Beca was more than nervous, but as days of trial passed, she grew more confident. In the previous week, since Beca had 'resurrected', she had quit her job at the FBI and Shepherd had restored Beca's reputation in the military quite fast, getting to the temporal agreement that she would be considered Captain again, that meant she was a soldier but on the other side, she wasn't in active duty. They had done that because it was considered the way Beca had been treated deserved being ripped away from her rank and depreciated like it happened, so they restored her place until court said otherwise. Now, it was May 4th, and they had been at the trial for the past couple hours. Beca had just been called to testify. They had already proven the culpability of Morrison against everything but Beca's particular case, that had been left to the end, which Beca kind of appreciated, because she rested more comfortable after hearing in court how everybody seemed quite confident of his culpability towards everything is.
"Captain Rebeca Mitchell, or Special Agent?" the defense attorney asked Beca with a kind smile. It was weird to Beca being treated with the kindness than man had so far showed towards her despite he represented Morrison, but she guessed even he was horrified by what his client had done.
"For now, Captain, sir." Beca replied with a little smile. She was quite confident and calm, compared to the first days, and Chloe smiled at her from her seat.
"Perfect." The attorney nodded "Can I ask was what your rank when Major General Morrison did to you what you've accused him of doing? Only to clarify that he was in fact your superior."
"Yes, sir. When Major General Morrison and I first met, I was an Airman and he was Staff Sergeant. When he started attacking me, he was a Colonel and I was a Captain, so he has always been my superior." Beca replied.
"You have said in previous occasions he sometimes sent your troops to missions without proper justification or valid explanations, how can you tell when missions aren't for you and your troops?"
"The books, our training." Beca replied matter-of-factly "Sir, if a technician is sent to the kitchen, they know that's not their job. The same way I was instructed to know when certain things were for other departments and teams in the Air Force to do, and not for us. To put an example, we did jobs that corresponded to the Air Force Coast Guard and that we weren't trained or capacitated to do, which caused several deaths. It's like if you were sent to do divorce trials, when you're on the job, you just know when you haven't been trained to do certain things."
"Did Colonel Morrison know, in your opinion, he was sending you to do something that according to books and training, wasn't supposed to be doing?" the attorney asked.
"Of course sir. Even as a Colonel, he was my superior, and he had to know those things, those are basic things, even an airman knows them. If he didn't know them, he… I mean, even the stupidest person without military training would know. Nobody sends a fireman to perform a neurosurgery and nobody sends a Special Operations Command to explore a coast perimeter, for example. That's not what we are trained to do, and that's not our job."
"I understand." The attorney nodded "Could you, Captain Mitchell, explain us what happened between you and Colonel Morrison back in 2011 in Pakistan? Most of us haven't heard more than a small summary. If judge Damaso doesn't mind us stopping a bit on this."
"Sure, proceed." Judge Damaso nodded "It's a key component here too. Please Captain Mitchell I know this is hard to talk about but try to be as clear as possible since it happened long ago and it would help the defense construct a proper defense."
"Sure." Beca nodded. That hadn't been explained yet, and Beca hadn't talked about it in detail in her life "I was, along with the rest of my team and other teams, deployed to Pakistan for the second time in my life in April 25th 2011, not a month yet after coming home from Afghanistan, which was weird because normally we get to be a bit longer home, like a few months. The normal thing is years, but since I was in the SOC, we were used to having just a few months, because we weren't usually deployed for as long as the others either. We went when they needed us." Beca explained.
"The first morning in Pakistan, Colonel Morrison came to me during breakfast and told me to go to his office right afterward. When I went, he started a lecture about how I was supposedly failed in other deployments, which was completely out of place and highly uncommon, and he told me he would be watching me close and make sure I didn't mess up things again.
"Again?" the attorney asked "What had you done?"
"To this day, I still don't know sir." Beca replied "I guess he made it out. I was never notified not by my Major, or any other of my superiors of any failure, I'm not conscious of having made any failure, and my troops never complained against anything I did or told them to do. I've asked other superiors, and they didn't know what Colonel Morrison was talking about back then."
"Alright, continue."
"During the first couple months, I didn't notice anything particularly different. Colonel Morrison watched more what I did, he was more rude, firm, and strict, but not too much. Then, weird missions started, gradually, and when my team and I stopped to think about it, around four months after being there, we realized in common talk that all of our missions so far had been or completely silly stuff, or things that weren't our job to do, or very risky and dangerous things that weren't justified, like flying, with the excuse of 'keeping an eye close' over enemy bases at night, which pissed them off quite a lot and often lead to us suffering attacks from them, Second Lieutenant Casper died because of it around August 2011." Beca explained.
"After that one, he came to me, which wasn't his job because he wasn't my direct superior, demanding explanations, aggressively. He slapped me in rage, but I stood motionless because he was my superior and if you superior slaps at you, you kind of shut up and put up with it, even if its disrespectful, and not a normal thing to be done or allowed. But I was careful not to do anything that would keep me away from my then three year old and my wife longer than strictly necessary. When my team and I realized of this, we thought we had no other chance but to put up with it. However, I talked with Major Estevez, and he was kind of pissed off against Colonel Morrison because he also said we were right and that he needed us doing more important and useful stuff, not risking our lives stupidly. He promised he would speak with his superiors, try to find a solution, but a few days after doing so, we got into the aircraft in an emergency and a rush, and he didn't had time to see his gas container had a hole and he was running out of gas. He tried an emergency landing, but it turned into a disaster, and he died. By then I had already realized I should strictly not complain about Morrison. It wasn't the first suspicious dead of a person I had asked or complained to about Morrison shortly after doing so, and it wouldn't be the last one, so I tried to be more careful. Colonel Morrison turned more violent from then on."
"I knew from my father and all the years of experience to be careful and never trust the Colonel, so I put up with insults, being pulled out of bed by him at four in the morning during months everyday to do jogging and other exercise for an hour before breakfast, or doing mechanical stuff or paperwork for him. The worst was probably the exercise part before breakfast, not only because of how dangerous it is to stand an hour of intense military physical training without having eaten anything in seven hours, but because I'm asthmatic and also as a member of the Air Force, is not that I ran much every day, other than from wherever I was to the aircraft and vice versa."
"Isn't it kind of absurd that an asthmatic goes into the military?" the attorney asked.
"No, sir." Beca replied "I received special training to know how to breathe properly while doing exercise since I was a kid, and I had always been into practicing sports, I'm actually a blue belt in Taekwondo, so never in my mind would have think I didn't have what it takes to be a soldier. And as I was telling you, Air Force isn't supposed to be running around, but flying around. Anyway, the big problem with this training I was talking about with Colonel was that I didn't have a chance to warm up before doing exercise. And when soldiers train they always warm up because we can't afford having people in time off because they didn't warm up properly and ruptured a tendon or a muscle, the only difference between me and non-asthmatic colleagues is that I use my warming up for more than just muscles and tendons. Without that, my airways are in huge risk of inflaming and impeding my breathing."
"Did that ever happen in those four in the morning training sessions?" the attorney asked, and Beca nodded.
"More than once. Usually, I stopped no matter what he yelled or that he would hit me afterward for being a rebel, I wasn't going to risk asphyxiating for it. But one time, around the start of autumn, the session was particularly rough and it got so bad my inhalator was useless and I collapsed. When I woke up, I was in the infirmary, and they let me go shortly after, that's when Colonel Morrison found me and took me to another room where he beat me up until he thought if he punched me more nobody was going to believe I had fallen or something, so he had to stop." Beca explained.
"What else did he do from that on?" the attorney asked.
"A month later, in October, I was in town and I was going to visit the Arshad, a marriage with three daughters that my team and I had in my anterior time in Pakistan, rescued from a warzone and found a home. We had become kind of friends ever since and they had taught be a bit of the language and stuff. When I was about to knock at the door, I heard yelling inside, women crying begging for help. I recognized it was the voice of the middle daughter, a back then, fifteen year old girl. I was armed, so I took my gun and went into the house. When I carefully entered the house, in silence, I found the parents lying on a pool of their own blood, dead with bullet holes that matched the ones the guns we used caused. On my way to the noise, I found the little sister, a ten year old, also dead just like her parents, and shells of the bullets we used were around. Then, I found the older sister, a nineteen year old, just like the rest of her family. When I found the middle sister, she was leaning against a table, she had blood on her legs and between them, and…" Beca gulped, staring at the floor while remembering, seeing it like if she was living that again.
"Colonel Morrison was anally raping her with his member." She looked up to Chloe, who had tears in her eyes, and mouthed a sorry "I was in shock and stood without doing anything. That was my fault. The Colonel saw me, put his member back into his pants, and shot the girl on the back of her head, killing her. My shock grew, and he laughed at me, which woke me up and I pointed at him with my gun, about to take my walkie-talkie and ask for backup. The Colonel laughed and mocked me, and I shut up, I couldn't believe what was happening."
"You couldn't believe it even after having been investigating that man for so long and knowing he raped your father?" the attorney inquired.
"There's a line between knowing stuff and seeing them. Seeing that shocked me and stopped me from acting fast, he was my superior, and the man who I was, despite everything, still trying to trust somehow. I was still trying to convince myself maybe I was wrong about him. But I wasn't. He shot me on the leg, but purposely shooting only the edge of it, so it barely ripped the muscle and I could walk. But my gun fell from the pain, and he beat me up right there and then he moved me to some abandoned military bunker, where he forced me sexually. He raped me, sodomized me, and showed me photographs of my family, photographs of them in the market or my son in kindergarten, during all the months prior, that I knew they hadn't authorized because were from afar, or could be seen they had been taken from hidden places. He used those photographs to blackmail me, saying if I dared to say anything against him, he would get my son or my wife, my mother or my friends killed and then he said something like just like I did with… followed by Freesser and others. If I made a sound, a complain, or let a tear go during his sexual assaults or the beatings, they would die." Beca breathed deeply.
"When a week later Colonel Morrison said he had found the Arshad killed, and made this report saying it looked like the Pakistani killed them, and a bunch of lies... I shut up."
"Don't you think by shutting up you were as guilty as him?" the attorney asked.
"Yes." Beca nodded looking down, a tear falling down her nose "I shut up. I shut up for fifteen years, and with that I facilitated the killing of other people even after leaving the USAF, and that's on me. But the only reason I did it was because I choose my family wasn't going to be killed for this, or my friends, or anybody else around me, that I wouldn't make them pay my decision of investigating this. And in fourteen years my wife even divorced me because I was so traumatized I treated her with hate, when she's the woman I love the most in the world, and she has always been, and I spent fourteen years dying to tell somebody everything I know and I was blackmailed to keep my mouth shut. I didn't mind risking my life, but not theirs. And I'm talking now."
"It's alright Captain Mitchell, your integrity isn't being doubted in this trial. Proceed please." The judge said.
"Well…" Beca breathed in "The rapes got more frequent, and he tended to force me to impale myself on him, or look for his touch myself as part of the torture." Beca sighed "It traumatized me so much it affected my job, and therefore, by November I was sent home. I tried to leave the army for years, multiple times, but for that I had to write petitions to Colonel Morrison, that he always dejected with poor excuses. I tried sending them to others, only to be told it had to be Morrison who authorized that. I went to therapy, but since I couldn't talk, it was kind of wordless. I was afraid that even the slightest thing I said would get somebody killed, since I still got emails or calls and messages with threats, photographs… I was kept away from deployments for five months, when I was sent to Libya. Colonel Morrison was waiting for me there, and for the two months I spent there, he wouldn't stop abusing me. Insults, raping me, hitting, making me exercise for hours until I was hyperventilating, and he would laugh at those things and mock me. Insulted my family, my friends… my dead father… my mother… everyone." Beca's voice lost strength and she breathed deeply to recover it. She looked at Morrison, who sat close by. His arm was up in a cast, he had a pillow under his ass because it still hurt, his lip and nose were broken, and he was bruised everywhere.
"Two months after being back home, I was sent to Afghanistan for another three months. There, at first I didn't have Morrison. It was August 2012 when I came there, and by October, someone was killed on duty and Morrison was sent there, and then he just kept treating me with the same disrespect and abusing me as he had been doing for months already. Then suddenly I got infected with tuberculosis, and my life almost went with that, but for the few days I spent ill in Afghanistan until they realized what I had, Morrison never stopped attacking me. If I couldn't get out of bed, he would kick everybody out of the common bedroom, and use me himself, or kick me out of bed. Then I was diagnosed and sent as fast as possible to a hospital in New York City, where I got cured in a few days, since I had been diagnosed impressively quick. By January I was back in Pakistan."
"That was your last deployment, right?" the attorney asked, and Beca nodded.
"Indeed."
"What happened there?"
"Morrison was there, abusing me like usual, that didn't change."
"I wonder, if he abused you so much, how come you never got pregnant?" the attorney asked. Beca breathed deeply, her eyes moving to her hands, intertwined on her lap, as she played with her rings.
"I thought I couldn't. When my then wife and I started talking about having children, before having our son in 2008, we first tried for me to get pregnant, and that was impossible. Apparently, according to the doctors, I had been hit somehow and my ovaries were damaged to the point they couldn't produce good ovules, and to add to the problem, I was told I had what they called hostile uterus, which means being pregnant would be dangerous. It wasn't much of a surprise, since my period had been going on very irregularly for a long time, but it meant trying for me to get pregnant, and spending so much money on that, would be worthless." Beca explained "They got to take some ovules from me that were good enough, and in a laboratory they mixed with men stuff and my wife carried the child and it turned out fine. She wanted me to be the biological mother so she would have a reminder of me when I was out, you know, somebody alike, and for me it didn't matter who the biological mother was, and that way we both got to be his moms biologically. But, and here's where I actually answer to your question, little before November 2013, I was having nauseas, and I had seen enough of my ex-wife's pregnancy to at least suspect what was going on. I went to a nurse I trusted and that is a good friend of mine now, and she took a blood sample and confirmed it. I…" she breathed deeply, trying to avoid her friends' gaze, and mostly Chloe's "I was pregnant. For a month and a half, I was pregnant without knowing so. I guess I was too busy to realize I was slightly fatter, or hungrier, or throwing up a lot, I thought it was stress and never think it twice until a friend asked me if I was still sick, and I realized I had to be pregnant. Also, since my period hadn't been normal in ages, when it stopped coming it didn't even seem weird to me, so… But yeah, despite having been told the chances of me getting pregnant were like 15%, I got pregnant and Major General Morrison was the father. But when I was two months and a half pregnant, it was November, and I lost it. With the attack."
"What happened that November, what is your version of your attack?"
"In November 6th 2013." Beca changed position in her chair straightening to be more comfortable "Colonel Morrison sent me alone to Gaddani beach, in the Arabian Sea cost, because apparently some American troops needed backup. It was night, and there was a huge storm going on, we had orders to stay in land, but Colonel told me somebody would die if I didn't go, and I wasn't sure if he was talking about soldiers or my family. Anyway, I had to go, orders from a superior, right? So I went there, and nobody was where the coordinates said, I flew around just in case I was missing something, but I had the feeling since Morrison told me that it was trap. Then I see in my radar there's a missile coming to me. I tried to avoid it, but it was one kind that detects your aircraft and follows it, so I tried to maneuver and make it crash against something else. The visibility was horrible, there was wind, there was a storm with lightnings and everything, and the missile crashed against my Lockheed Martin, and next thing I remember is waking up in a hospital in New York City after three weeks in coma. My nurse friend in the army was keeping the secret of my pregnancy, and she has for all these years, and when I woke up I hadn't taken any ultrasounds by then, I didn't know how the baby was, if it was okay, if it was a girl or a boy, nothing. All I knew is that it had been there, because my blood said so, a nurse said so, I had a belly that I knew was a pregnant belly, easily to hide with the uniform, and I had the symptoms, I had seen my ex wife and friends pregnant to recognize them. However, when I woke up from the coma and asked my doctor for the baby… later I proved, you all have it in the folders, that Morrison and my doctor studied together in college and were good friends, and that my doctor received a bunch of money from Morrison during my time in coma. My doctor asked me 'what baby?' 'what are you talking about?' and I understood I had lost it and I was being told lies because when the doctor realized I was pregnant and the baby had died the first thing he did was tell Morrison, who understood it was his, and asked him to lie."
"Did you ever think that doctors killed your baby?" the attorney asked. Beca shook her head, and shrugged, with a sad smile.
"I knew the baby was going to die the second I got into the aircraft, you know? I knew Morrison maybe suspected it, but thankfully, my friend had been very careful, and I had been, so she would never be blackmailed or hurt, I knew Morrison didn't know for sure. But when you're in war, you develop the gut feeling that tells you your life is in great danger or not, it becomes super sensitive. And I knew Colonel Morrison wanted to erase me from the map, that he knew I was asking to retire too much and he couldn't let me go because then he wouldn't be able to control me that much, so I entered the aircraft suspecting things would be bad. I tried to avoid it at all costs, but orders are orders, and I obliged myself to think maybe it wasn't all lies, maybe I really had to fly there…" Beca shrugged "I knew the baby wouldn't survive if something happened. When I saw the missile after me in the radar, I knew if that thing hit me the most probable thing was me dying, I understood right there that had been how my father had died, and I knew even if I didn't die, things would be too bad for a baby to keep going. And I was right. When I woke up from the coma I couldn't breathe by myself, I couldn't move, not because my spine had been hurt, that it miraculously hadn't, or because of brain damage, that miraculously wasn't as big as it should have, but because I had too many fractures, broken bones, ruptured tendons and muscles… moving a finger hurt like hell. Just lying without moving an inch hurt like hell, breathing hurt like hell. And when I felt like that, and I was told my injuries and that it was hard to understand I was alive… I knew the baby had died. I got a blood test as soon as I could, far away from the city, thanks to a friend, and confirmed it."
"Did Colonel Morrison ever contacted you again?"
"Not until I entered the FBI in May 2014, after having been kicked out of the military for having what they called an schizophrenic outburst that lead me to my almost death, and then threats came with photographs. Until the day I faked my dead, several days ago, there hasn't been a week or a month without receiving those threats."
They went on with all the things Beca had compiled about the people that followed her, the proofs, and many other stuff, until Gwen was called to the stand to confirm as a doctor Beca's medical file presented when she was removed from the military had been manipulated.
"As far as me and her therapist can tell, and at least I have known Captain Mitchell for sixteen years now, she has never had a psychotic disorder. The only mental problems she has had have been depression and anxiety, and those were all explainable after all we've been hearing these days. Those are also common problems in people with asthma and she had medication when needed and dealt with it pretty well." Gwen said "She had to deal with certain disability in 2014 after the attack, and she equally did it bravely and without further problem."
"So you would never doubt her judgment?" this time it was Beca's lawyer asking.
"Never." Gwen replied "The jury also has the files from Beca's therapist if they don't trust my professional opinion."
"Alright. Thanks, you can go back to your seat." Beca's attorney said.
"I'd like to call to testify Chloe Beale, your honor." Morrison's attorney asked. Beca frowned, but Chloe went there without blinking "Miss Beale, I believe you've known Captain Mitchell since college."
"In September it'll be nineteen years since I first met her, sir." Chloe nodded.
"How long have you been involved with her, romantically speaking, if I may ask?"
"We started dating seventeen years ago sir."
"So you were with her through her whole military career."
"That's right." Chloe nodded.
"And you have never, ever put in doubt her mental stability?" Chloe frowned slightly and Beca's frown deepened. The attorney was starting to put the claws out.
"There have been times in our life together when I have briefly worried about her mental stability, but knowing she had a therapist and my sister for medical and mental support, I was never too worried, and I always ended up realizing it was nothing."
"What did she do to worry you?" Chloe bit her lip.
"Well, as doctor Beale here has said" Gwen never changed her last name to her husband's "Beca had episodes of depression sometimes. During the last years of her career, while she was being abused and threatened, she barely slept, which made her moody and having a son that worried me, even more then when I had no idea what was going on and she refused to speak to me. Now I understand everything, and I doubt it would have been too difficult to deal with if she had been able to talk with me." Chloe explained calmly "Also, she's asthmatic, which sometimes got worse when she was experiencing anxiety, and had her a bit mentally unstable, but that never stopped from attending her son like the awesome mom she is, and from attending me like a good wife, she always kept her things for herself, so it didn't usually affected the rest of us."
"Then, why did you divorce her?"
"That's not relevant for the case." Beca's attorney intervened.
"Accepted." The judge said "Unless you have more questions…"
"I don't, your honor." The attorney said.
"Then miss Beale you can go back to your seat, thank you."
The trial ended and they all stood up to hear the jury's verdict. The jury proceeded to read it.
"The jury finds Major General Brandon Morrison guilty of all charges he has been accused of."
Beca almost passed out just from hearing that. Her mouth fell open and her eyes watered and widened, her hand grabbing her attorney's arm for support, feeling lightheaded. She couldn't believe it was finally over.
"This court" the jury proceeded "therefore sentences Major General Brandon Morrison with the retirement of all his medals, ranks, and honors from the military, expels him from the United States Air Force, and sentences him to the maximum penalty here in the state of New York, life imprisonment without parole in a prison of high security."
As celebratory noises were heard, and Morrison was arrested and put away, Beca felt numb between her attorney's arms, and they hugged. She wasn't conscious of the tears running through her eyes or that she was walking really fast despite wearing heels, towards two impossibly blue eyes filled with tears that grinned at her shamelessly. She practically jumped to those open arms and Chloe was laughing beautifully against her ear as they hugged like if they wanted to become one, Beca was crying hysterically and at the same time she had never felt that kind of whole satisfaction and fulfillment. Her greatest nightmare was over.
Later that night, after putting Noah to bed, Chloe prepared a warm, bubbly bath, with candles and bath sales, and even bought champagne, all for Beca.
"This is amazing, thank you babe" Beca smiled entering the bathroom with Chloe.
"You're welcome." Chloe kissed her "Go and enjoy it, but don't break the glass. I'll wait for you in our bedroom."
"No." Beca shook her head with a little smile and Chloe stared at her confused "Why don't you go get another glass and then come and join me? It'll be twice as fun."
"Are you sure?" Chloe smiled kindly "I haven't even seen you nude since we got divorced."
"I'm sure." Beca nodded "I'm ready. I want you here with me."
When Chloe came into the slightly cracked open room again, Beca had already removed her clothes and was standing in front of the mirror removing the piercings from her ears, and her watch, and leather bracelets. Even if between her legs she wasn't waxed, Chloe didn't find watching her any less amusing. She stared by the door, as Beca turned to look at her, and looked at Beca from head to toes shamelessly, and then smiled when her eyes found Beca's again, and Beca smiled too. Beca was still as beautiful and sexy as she had always been for Chloe.
Their smiles faced and, as their eyes sank in the other's, Chloe approached Beca, her finger tips barely touching Beca's bare hips before caressing them fully with her hands, their lips meeting again and their eyes closing as Beca's hands cupped Chloe's face tenderly, their lips meeting time after time. Chloe's fingers traveled through Beca's outline from her hips to her scalps, and then her fingers pressed pushing Beca closer against her, Beca's arms surrounding Chloe and stroking her back softly as their tongues danced together. The only sounds that could be heard were her kisses and their breathings and some moan that escaped sometimes. Chloe pulled apart, smirking when she saw Beca's confusion in her face, and as her light blue eyes reached Beca's stormy ones, her smirk faced and her expression turned into lust, her fingers fidgeting with the buttons of her own blouse, and when Beca saw what she was trying to do, she smirked, and helped her unbutton her blouse faster, placing it carefully beside the sink while Chloe removed her skirt.
"Wait." Beca said when she saw Chloe was about to remove her bra, and turned her around to face her back. Beca's hands travelled to Chloe's hips, and smiled as she contemplated Chloe's incredible body, her hands travelling up her back, and to her shoulders, grabbing her to push her against her front, and kiss her neck. Chloe's eyes closed and she tilted her head to the side, as Beca softly, lovingly, kissed and bite her neck, slowly, while her hands traveled to Chloe's freckled abdomen, and Beca's eyes, that had been almost closed, saw the mirror in front of Chloe and smirked, contemplating themselves as she kissed the back of Chloe's ear, moving her hand just for a moment to move the ginger hair away "Open your eyes." Beca whispered before softly gripping Chloe's ear lobe with her teeth, and Chloe opened her eyes just a bit, contemplated themselves in the mirror, and her lips curved into a dumb smile, before turning around and cupping Beca's face between her hands, kissing her deeply on the lips, while Beca's hands quickly went to Chloe's back and removed her bra, pulling apart to remove it completely. Then, her hands found Chloe's panties, and quickly pulled them down, then squatted to remove them completely, as Chloe's supported herself with her hands on Beca's shoulders. Then, Beca laughed, seeing a drop of fluid fall from between Chloe's legs and to the floor "You're as horny teenager as ever, right?"
"I can't help-uh" Chloe's reply turned into a long, throaty moan, when Beca's tongue trailed her labia, with her hands on Chloe's ass cheeks and Chloe's hand burying into Beca's hair.
Beca left a tender, full of love, kiss, on top of Chloe's vulva, and then made a trail of soft kisses traveling through her abdomen, between her breast, through her neck, chin, and finally a full kiss on the lips, while all along her hands travelled through Chloe's back too. Beca pulled apart and their eyes met filled with lust and love.
"I'm in love with you." Beca said. Chloe's eyes curved into a little smile.
"I'm in love with you, too. And too much."
Beca smiled, kissing the ginger again. Then Chloe's hands found Beca's, and with a smile, guided her to the bath tube. Chloe sat on the tube first, and after her, Beca sat in front of her, Chloe's arms hugging Beca at the same time her lips found her neck.
"You know I still find you as gorgeous and sexy as the first time I made love to you?" Chloe whispered against her ear, kissing the back of it.
"Nuh" Beca smirked "I have more scars."
"Yeah, like any pair of eyes would pay attention to them with all the material surrounding them. Have you seen that six pack? And those muscles? Arms? Hands? God, have you seen those legs? No wonder how you run so fast." Chloe whispered "And don't get me started on these Goddesses…" Chloe added cupping Beca's breasts lovingly while kissing her neck, and Beca moaned "Plus, your scars doesn't make you ugly. Make you twice as interesting, like your tattoos. So many stories to tell all you've lived…"
Beca smiled when Chloe hug her tighter, kissing her temple lovingly as she leaned the side of her face against the side of Beca's.
"You remember that time, though?" Chloe whispered "After seven months dating, you lived in a little apartment, and we went there after class on a Friday, after days without seeing each other because you were in that military college, and I was at Barden, and we started kissing…"
"And you said you wanted to see my abs." Beca chuckled "So I removed my t-shirt and you became a very horny ginger."
"I never heard you complain when I was eating you out and you had sweat dripping down your face, and those beautiful eyes closed, and your back was arching so bad…" Chloe smiled kissing her neck.
"And I gripped my sheets as you gave me the freaking best orgasm of my life so far. Yeah, I remember." Beca smiled.
After twenty minutes or so in the bath, just giving each other light kisses and strokes, and drinking wine, Beca was quite comfortable lying with her back over Chloe's front.
"I heard you talk about a baby." Chloe said suddenly.
"What?" Beca asked confused.
"You were in the hospital, a couple days after waking up from the coma. And my brother in law, my sister, Aubrey, Jesse and I were doing turns so somebody was always with you, because the doctors said you couldn't be alone and we didn't want you to be alone either, and even less with some nurse in charge. So we made turns." Chloe explained "And one night, I was sitting next to your bed while you slept, you hadn't been sleeping well, so it wasn't weird for me to hear you murmur intelligible things and grunt in your sleep, but then I heard you whisper something about a baby, like 'not my baby' or something. And I shrugged it off thinking you were talking about Noah, because he was five and we still called him baby, we still do, so…" Chloe shrugged "When I asked you in the morning, or anybody did, because I wasn't the only one to hear things, you said you didn't remember, and I guess that's true because you were with many meds and so tired all the time… but…"
"It wasn't Noah." Beca interrupted "It's true, most of the time I couldn't remember my dreams or nightmares, it was like if I was never completely awake to a point that I couldn't tell what was really happening or had really happened and what had been dreams, I remember since I couldn't tell anybody about the baby, because I knew I had to make up some story about having had some affair with another soldier that died or something, and I simply didn't have the energy and it that moment, not even the capacity, of making anything up, I was always worried about what happened to it, and I was never alone to ask the doctor, so sometimes I remember waking up knowing I had been dreaming about it."
"Would you have had it?" Chloe asked.
"I don't know. I didn't know what I was going to do. For weeks, since I figured out I was pregnant and until I lost it, I was constantly worried that something would happen to it, worried about hiding it, and crying while hiding because I knew I was screwed and the baby was screwed and I didn't know what to do. I knew that deployment was being one of the longest and I had no idea when was I gonna come home, I knew my letters were read before they reached, the ones that did, America, and I couldn't tell nobody. The nurse asked me who was the father, but I told her I couldn't tell, and I think she knew and understood. I spoke to her the other day and she told me she suspected it so…" Beca shrugged and breathed deeply. Chloe kissed her shoulder "I knew if I didn't come home soon, people would start making too many questions, and they would find out, which would probably result on Morrison going against it or blaming and destroying some soldier's career saying he had raped me, knowing doctors would see I had been raped. And that every day I stayed there it was a risk to the baby. I didn't have time to think what I was going to do because it was hard to imagine coming back home alive, all I could think was that as soon as I was pregnant enough to notice, or that somebody noticed, because the nauseas were so bad maybe the baby wasn't okay already, Morrison would kill us both. I thought about taking an aircraft and running away, hiding in Europe, getting and ultrasound, maybe changing my identity and just hide with the baby or give it up for adoption or something. I thought if I wasn't considered a traitor, I would be considered fallen in combat. But I never did because I was afraid you, or Noah, my mom, our friends… I thought if I tried to run away Morrison would kill you all." Beca's voice trembled, and she sniffled "And also, if I ever came home, what would I do? Raise a child alone, lying everybody about their father and hiding away forever, trying to protect you while trying to protect it, and trying not to be deployed again? Knowing that one of your workmates would probably put the child away from me as soon as it was born because I knew for who I was, how I was being to you and Noah, there was no way I could have Noah's custody, even less another baby's?" she sobbed.
"Beca… my sweet child…" Chloe hugged her tightly and let Beca snuggle against her, kissing her cheek or temple "I'm so sorry love… I'm so sorry."
"Chloe" Beca said after a bit, having moved to be sitting in front of Chloe, with her legs surrounding Chloe over her hips and her arms hugging her, her face leaned against Chloe's clavicle while Chloe's arms wrapped around her, and her legs crossed behind Beca "Why didn't you fight for me?"
Chloe frowned.
"What?"
"If you knew I was treating you bad because I was hurting" Beca said while pulling apart just enough to look at her, and Chloe saw her eyes were filled with tears again "why did you divorce me instead of trying to understand?" Chloe stared at her for a second, and then shook her head.
"No, Beca. I tried to understand, harder than I've ever tried to understand anything before. I tried to be with you with all I had." Chloe said "When your father died and you practically vanished without telling anybody, I worried sick, Beca, and we had to hear around what happened. We tried to reach you, I tried, and next thing I know, you've changed universities. And when I finally find you, confront you, and get you to keep your friends close again, you tell us you're going to a military university because you wanna enlist. And I supported you because I thought it was part of the mourning process."
"I told you I thought there was something not right about how my father died…"
"I know. And I wanted you to find out as much as you did. But then, we fell in love, and we started dating, and I thought 'just give her a few years, see what she can do' and you were doing great in the military, you seemed satisfied, and you told me you were right and you were finding out things, and suddenly you couldn't tell me anything, because it was dangerous for me, and you were asking me to marry you. Which I did, of course I did, I was in love with you back then too." Chloe was saying. Beca listening to her closely "And then I could feel things turn darker. And you slept poorly, and you wouldn't tell me what was going on because of how dangerous it was, and war was starting to really affect you more than never. So I thought, let's have a child. I missed you so much all the time when you were gone, I had always wanted kids, I always thought you would make an excellent mother, I knew you wanted too, and I thought maybe it was the perfect moment because then maybe you could stay with me for a year or so, and it would make you feel better. And then that couldn't be either. So I got pregnant, and fool of me, I thought after seven years in the military, when you loved music more, you had taken enough answers and could drop it. But you said no, because you had figured out too much and you had to make justice about things you wouldn't talk about. I believed you when you said it was dangerous to talk about it and never put pressure, but Beca, I was pregnant, and you were only there for three months of that, I was afraid of having to raise a child practically alone, I was afraid you would miss too much just like your father did, and that your child would always feel horrible about your absence just like you did. And I still tried to understand and kept going and held on and stayed. Thank God your mother was there to help out and talk to me and help me understand stuff and stay with you because I was so in love with you Beca."
"I'm sorry…"
"I know you are. And when for the first time I had you for twenty one straight months, with Noah with us, I thought it would be fine, and you didn't need more answers anymore, and you could stay and devote yourself to music or to Noah, I don't know. I stayed Bec. I really tried to understand. But I was and I have been for years, a social worker, you know how many broken families I've seen? How many nights I've heard you talk about how freakin' much, in your words, you missed your dad when he left, and that with his death it was just like he was deployed and you were always waiting for him to come back, eternally? You ever tried to understand me? because I had to think in Noah more than in us, I didn't want a broken family for Noah, or having him miss you always. Raising him without you, and I didn't want you to miss any of that either. So you tried to leave, you decided I was right and your place was with us, and then they sent you for seven months away to Afghanistan. And when you came back I thought if I threatened with divorcing you, you would realize things were going too far. And it wasn't for me and Noah only, Bec, it was for you too, because you were hurting, you were bitter, secrets were eating you alive, and it wasn't healthy or good, and you didn't seem to be able to go. I thought you weren't trying hard enough, I knew nothing, with what do you want me to try and understand, if you gave me nothing Bec? I was your wife, it was my duty to look after you, too. And we went to counseling, and you had your therapy, and I tried so hard, you know I did. But you turned very dark and twisty, and sometimes scary, Beca, and I had seen that in my work, you have any idea of how scared I was? For you? For your family? I was losing you and I knew that, because you were there, but you weren't. And I tried everything, and nothing seemed to work, and I would've fallen with you, but I felt Noah was my responsibility. I couldn't let you keep hurting us, even if fortunately it never got to hands, but…" Chloe shrugged "I was trying to protect us. And trying to protect you from keeping doing something you would later regret. You were changed, you were selfish, you were violent, and so I took Noah and left. And not even for a second it stopped hurting. I was still worried sick about you, and I hated myself so much, but then I watched Noah grow and I just… I couldn't fight alone Beca. I couldn't let a three year old grow up in that carcass of a marriage."
"You're right." Beca nodded, and sniffled, rubbing her eyes "I'm really sorry Chloe, you know that, right? That I will never forgive me for that?"
"Yes, and you should." Chloe said, smiling kindly and stroking her cheek "Now I know what was going on. And Beca, you're the first one you need to learn to forgive. Everybody else has. I have. Today, I felt I had finally forgiven you. Hate and regret only eat us alive, for nothing."
Beca nodded slowly, thoughtful.
"You're right. I hate Morrison though." Beca said, and Chloe smiled stroking her cheek.
"I hate him too. But as long as we aren't obsessed with that, but in peace because he's in prison, I think we'll be fine."
"What if his friends help him get out?"
"His friends are in prison too. Different ones."
"Yeah but…"
"Beca…" Chloe kissed her "Calm down baby. No one will hurt us again. I promise."
"Okay." Beca stared at those bright blue eyes, and kissed Chloe again "I really am lost without you."
"Well, you won't have to be without me anymore." Chloe grinned, and hugged her close, hiding her face in the crook of Beca's neck. Beca smiled stroking her hair.
"I love you dork."
