Drew sat down, looking at her both expectantly and somewhat lost. For once since they had met again, he really looked as though he was at the end of his thirties and not as young as just having turned twenty-five.
"You wanted to talk to me?" North asked cautiously, snapping Ala out of her thoughts again.
Right. She couldn't ask him over and then say nothing. She would have to end what she had started.
Letting out a long sigh, she thought about what she wanted to say. All the phrases and speeches she had been putting together over the last several hours flew out the window the moment that Drew had knocked on the door. So, Mac would have to improvise again.
Closing her eyes, she rubbed her flesh hand over her face in an attempt to somewhat keep calm. However, with her flesh hand trembling as she rubbed it over her face, it was pretty evident that she was horribly nervous.
"Yeah, I…" Ala stopped, thinking about what to say to not sound rude, "I know my behavior during the last several weeks and months hasn't been the best and I apologize for that." She started, seeing a sad smile form on Drew's lips though he seemed to have decided on giving her space to say what she wanted to.
"After everything that went down, I wanted to at least talk everything out with you and come clean. You deserve honesty, at least."
Looking down at her hands, she could see her human hand starting to tremble harder. She put her cybernetic hand over it and grasped it tightly, trying to calm herself.
"I can understand your reaction to this situation. You always had been one who preferred figuring things out yourself."
That was a pretty diplomatic way of saying that she was a coward who preferred running over talking things out.
"However, I also wanted to talk to you and apologize for not having told you about the whole business with my clone." She could see how his hands trembled too and there was an uneasiness visible in his eyes that she rarely ever saw from him.
"The point is, I never really thought that it would be necessary to tell you that. I honestly thought that this would work out and that my real body would be staying in cryo forever. That I would die with my clone, since this body here," with that, he gestured down his own body to illustrate what he meant, "Aged along with the other to match the time difference."
A crooked but sad sort-of smile appeared on his lips before he continued, "I don't want to talk myself out of it. I just want to try to explain why I never said a word to you about this whole Avatar thing. It probably would have sounded idiotic anyways."
"Not much more than having an AI implanted into your neural system." North threw her an incredulous glance to which she smiled at sadly.
She couldn't even bring herself to show her trademark lopsided grin.
"When you first came up with that I thought that you were bonkers and that you had something akin to a split personality until you introduced Theta to me." She explained, looking over at North, "Anyways, where is the little guy? I haven't seen him around in a while."
"He prefers staying in the background since he thinks we have a lot to discuss." North explained quickly, his expression turning contemplative which showed Mac that he was talking with Theta in his head.
"I think it's better that we talk about this with him around. It affects him as much as us, at least." She muttered, bracing her elbows on her knees and staring at the ground.
A violet flicker a moment later indicated Theta's arrival.
"Hey there, little guy." She threw him a small smile.
The Fragment looked obviously uncomfortable to be in this situation.
"Hey Al—Mac." The hologram corrected himself immediately.
"It's okay, you can call me by my old nickname." She smiled softly at Theta, although her smile still looked sad, "I will tell North the same things you know so you don't need to hide things from him anymore. Okay, buddy?"
"Okay…" although still looking uncomfortable, Theta took a seat on the little carton box containing Ala's pain medication on the nightstand.
Theta looked as much like how Ala felt. Small and frail, feeling horribly lost and uncomfortable… not knowing how to overcome the huge mountain that she had decided to attack in a moment of bravery.
She sighed again, deciding to go step-by-step. She couldn't do much besides that, anyways.
"I can understand your reasons, Drew." It sounded weird, hearing North's real name coming from her lips once more. She had always tried referring to him as North in an attempt to distance herself from the pain that his real name evoked in her.
"Sure, I am hurt and feel somewhat betrayed that you never told me… but I got over that during the last few days. I am not holding a grudge against you because of that." She explained, feeling Andrew's surprised glance on her.
"I came to understand that you didn't mean any ill by not telling me and, for me, that makes it okay." She swallowed around the lump forming in her throat.
"Then why…?" North didn't continue, but Ala knew too well what he wanted to ask. Why are you being so reluctant and cold? So withdrawn and angry? So sad and distanced?
"There are eleven years between the day you died and today. At least for me, and that's a long time." She began telling him, "I had a really hard time coming to terms with your death and the loss of almost everything I held dear. If it wasn't for Tucker, I don't know if I still would be here to talk with you about that."
That was true. If it hadn't been for Tucker talking with her, keeping her company, or simply taking her in his arms and showing her that she wasn't alone when she felt like breaking down for good, she probably would have shot herself long ago.
Looking up, she could see North's sympathetic glance. The sadness was evident in his eyes, along with the self-reproaches for not having been there for her during that time.
Drawing a shuddering breath, she exhaled slowly. She was clinging to the last bit of self-control she could bring up.
"You couldn't have done anything anyways since you had been dead then." She threw him a sad-yet-understanding smile, "It's normal to grieve someone's death, even more if you loved that person dearly."
It was silent for another long while, although Mac couldn't help but notice the surprised glimmer in his eyes and the slight darkening of his cheeks at her admission.
"I know, but I could have prevented that by telling you about the project that York, Tex, and I started during Freelancer." He muttered, glancing down at his hands.
"It would have only delayed the grieving in a way." The black-haired woman didn't look up to see the surprised glance from North at that.
"You would have been hoping for him to show up at some point and would have had to admit at some point after months of him not showing up that he probably wouldn't be finding you, hadn't woken up, or didn't want to see you anymore." Theta finished Ala's train of thought, to which she only nodded at with a sad smile.
"Exactly. I would have waited and hoped fruitlessly. I would have been devastated too, later on." She concluded.
"But there would also have been the chance of you not having to go through that." North protested, fixing her with his pale blue eyes.
Ala wasn't able to look at him, so she again stared at the ground at her feet.
"Think about it, Andrew. You were gone for more than ten years. A month or two, okay, I could agree with you. But after a year I would have realized that you probably would never return. The odds of you returning weren't in your favor, no matter how you like to spin it." She replied to North's protest, to which he closed his mouth and stared at his hand sadly.
She knew that he knew this was true. The odds were simply stacked against them in a time of stellar warfare, with soldiers being drafted and shipped out all over the galaxy.
The odds of meeting again after having departed under such conditions were so very small. It was like they had won some sort-of universal lottery with meeting each other again on this planet after all those years.
Sighing, she again rubbed a hand over her face. Being at this point, she might as well keep on talking and tell the rest of the story.
"Well… I guess you know pretty much everything from the point I met Tucker on, I suppose?" Mac decided to ask to see what North knew and what gaps she would have to fill.
"The important parts. About you having been stuck with him and Junior in the temple, about facing an old friend of mine and getting injured, pretty much everything starting from your arm," at that he looked at her arm. Ala smiled sadly at the mentioning of his old friend Maine who had turned into The Meta due to the metastability of the Fragments that Sigma had triggered, "Up until you all landed here."
Alaska waited patiently for him to continue, "How you gave Wash a concussion and a two-week bedrest after waking up and learning about him being Recovery One – I also got told about his fate after the Mother of Invention went down." North drew a face at that and Ala knew what he was thinking.
"Listen, Drew. You couldn't have done anything. You had been beaten up yourself and needed the rest urgently. You walking in there would have only caused more trouble for you and Wash than it might have helped either one of you."
There was a small huff from Andrew at that, "Yeah, but I could have gone searching for him after I had healed up."
"And how could you have possibly known what he went through after that?" Ala asked softly, which again gave the male soldier pause. He couldn't have.
Sure, Wash hadn't been pretty well after they separated his and Epsilon's minds, but nobody could have guessed that it was as bad as it had turned out to be.
And besides, for having gone through so much shit, Wash turned out pretty well.
Others would be a slobbering mess in a nuthouse still and yet he was here, training the lieutenants and he had even fooled Price and the Director as Recovery One.
"Stop blaming yourself for all that went wrong when you weren't even there. You can't prevent your friends from being hurt all the time." She smiled at him, a small smile with a note of sadness, but she felt like they were getting somewhere with their talking.
Slowly but surely, they were getting on even ground and she felt a bit more at ease on approaching the heaviest subject of all.
"I know, but I still wish I could." North muttered, dragging a hand through his messy blond hair. It had grown out of army standard regulation, but he didn't seem bothered by this fact.
"Shielding someone from bad things also means shielding them from shaping their own experiences and growing from that. I am the best example of that." She chuckled lowly when she saw the sad-yet-somewhat-understanding smile that appeared on Drew's lips at her words.
"Look," Mac then started, also dragging a hand through her messy and wet hair, "I wanted to talk to you about all of that. However, I can't tell how things are going to go from here. I don't even know if you will want me back…" She trailed of, chewing at her lower lip in uneasiness.
"What do you mean?" This time, the man's voice was full of surprise and a lack of comprehension on what she was getting at. How could he know what she was talking about exactly, anyways?
"I…" Yeah, how should she approach that delicate subject without overwhelming North completely?
Thinking it over, Mac realized that there wouldn't be a way to break this information into North without completely overwhelming him, no matter how carefully she tried to do so.
Then how should she start? Blurting it out would be the worst way to approach the subject, she mused.
She felt her eyes sting and her body starting to tremble worse.
"I…" She started again, but the lump in her throat made it impossible to continue, as the emotions that had been bottled up for so long made it impossible to continue talking.
"I better show you." She muttered in a choking voice and shakily got up on her feet.
Grabbing the photographs on her nightstand, she noticed Theta laying a hand on her ring finger to show that he was supporting her in what she was doing.
She shot him a grateful but watery smile to which the Fragment nodded.
North observed their exchange silently, but nodded slightly towards Theta when they obviously had a short talk in North's head.
Waiting silently, the Freelancer observed how she sifted through the stack of pictures until she found what she was looking for.
The picture looked especially worn and old since she often used to look at it while crying her eyes out. This picture and the one of Drew, Theta, and her were rather badly off given that these were the pictures she most took to looking at when thinking of what she had lost and when she was grieving North's death. She always thought that the smile he showed in that particular picture was one of the most beautiful that he could have ever mustered.
She took a moment to stare at the other picture before she drew another shuddering breath and gave it to North.
If he was smart enough, he would see that there was her name printed in the lower left corner, as well as the date that it had been taken. He was a smart guy and she was sure that he could put two and two together in order to figure out what she wanted to tell him with the picture.
While North was staring at the picture somewhat blankly, she turned around and lifted her shirt, pushing her bra aside a bit to give a clear view of her back.
"I got that some days after you were gone." She explained in a choking voice, closing her eyes to keep her tears in. After all those years, she couldn't remember if it was two, three, or four days after Drew and Sasha had died.
Having her eyes closed, she could hear the man getting up from the bed and walking over to her.
She shuddered when his fingers made contact with her skin, but not because his hand was cold. If anything, it was warm and she would have loved to lean into the touch more. It was more due to the fact that he hadn't touched her for so long save for with her being unconscious and lying in a hospital cot, drugged up to her hairline on pain medication.
And it was the place he touched her at too.
The tattoo was a special place to her and she never liked getting touched there. It was the same with not touching Wash's implant site in his neck. Not even Tucker dared to touch either Wash or Ala at their sore spots. He knew that this was a spot they just didn't like getting touched at.
She could hear him mutter under his breath when he read the lines.
"This is…" North started, but couldn't finish.
Mac could hear the choking note to his voice as he slowly seemed to grasp what this all meant.
"The date of your death." The woman finished the sentence for him, putting the bra and shirt back in place, but not turning around, "And the day of Sasha's death." She added, after having straightened out her shirt.
"Sasha…" Drew sounded like he was somewhat in a daze, not knowing what he should say or think.
Well, this piece of information surely overwhelmed him. You don't get told every day that you would have become a dad if you had survived on a crucial day. If you would have just stayed home and wouldn't have run after your sister to get killed.
"Sasha is…" She could hear paper rustling behind her. Feeling the emotions getting more intense, she hugged herself tightly, feeling horrible and lost right now. She felt like she would explode or something in just this moment.
The first tears began to fall when she finished Drew's sentence, "Sasha would have been our kid if he would have been born." She sobbed silently at the last part.
Saying those words out loud made the dam inside her start to break and the tears start to fall. Her shoulders began to shake even more as she stood there with her eyes squeezed shut.
"You would have become a dad." She continued, not caring if North was listening. She needed to get it off her chest and she felt like she would suffocated if she kept it in any longer, "It happened when I had this awful medicine you got me from the Chinese medic for my bronchitis. It abrogated the effect of the contraception syringe I gave myself regularly."
She sobbed and sniffed quietly, pressing the heel of her flesh hand into her right eye, "I went to a doc in one of the better parts of town the day South called for your help. After the morning sickness kicked in, I got a hunch and decided to get it checked out. I actually wanted to tell you that when I got home, but when I saw you getting suited up I felt like I was going to throw a fit. I tried to talk you out of it, to beg you to stay with me, to not go for fucking once in your life and let South carry the can for the shit she did herself. I tried to get you to stay so I could tell you that I was pregnant. Tried to—" with a strangled sob she stopped talking.
She couldn't anymore. The lump in her throat was simply too big.
She didn't need to anyways, since North already got what she wanted to say and turned her around carefully.
Before she was even able to fight against him, he had her in a strong embrace. One of his arms was wrapped around her waist, while the other hand went up to her head and cupped the back of it.
She felt like the last bit of the dam started to come lose and now she started to break down against Andrew.
She was crying and sobbing helplessly, fisting North's shirt with both her hands, the flesh one and the cybernetic one, as she cried in his arms.
She was crying for the first time in years and was finally able to not only push the emotions aside, to not only suppress the feelings she had been carrying around since North and Sasha died, but to take them and slowly start to process what had really happened back then and what this meant.
She felt how her whole body trembled and how tear after tear fell, sob after sob wrecking her body.
During all this time, there was North holding her tightly and whispering that everything would be fine, that he would be there for her and that he was sorry in her ear. Occasionally, he would press a kiss to her temple, showing that he was there.
He didn't tell her to stop crying, and Ala was thankful for that.
She felt like this breakdown was long overdue and that she needed this time, as much as North would need his time to process and come to terms with what had happened.
But right now, she was selfish and just needed the person she loved the most in this world to be there for her and only her. To catch her and hold her close when she fell apart. To help her piece herself back together again after having broken apart, so that she could move on from there.