Hawke had spent the past two weeks quarantined in the DSO medical wing and she still had another two weeks to go just to be sure. She hadn't shown any signs of infection lingering so far which was a good thing, but the DSO wasn't willing to risk it just yet.
"Oh, thank God, a real human being!" she exclaimed happily when she saw Helena enter the room separated from the area Hawke had been living in by a thick plexiglass.
"Hey, Hawke. How are you doing?" Helena smiled and took a seat on the chair placed opposite to the room, the situation kind of reminding her of certain scenes from Silence of the lambs, the plexiglass with holes (covered by heavy-duty filters and biohazard detectors of course) in the middle and a dead ringer for Doctor Lecter's cell.
Only difference was Hawke's "cell" wasn't a cell as much as it was an apartment that made Helena think of a movie set too, the dwelling cut open in the middle so that the audience could see in, only in this case the audience was a medical team that came by to check Hawke's vitals, and take blood and tissue samples.
"I'm so bored. The only DVD they have here is Homeward bound. Can you believe that? It's very difficult to masturbate to."
"I'm glad to see your sense of humor is intact," Helena chortled.
"Was I joking?" Hawke smirked. "I'm so glad you came to visit, I'm going nuts here. So, how have you been? Willing to spill the beans about Hunnigan yet?" Hawke then asked and Helena rolled her eyes.
"Why are you so obsessed with this? I didn't realize that DSO stood for 'Department of Sex Orgies'," Helena said and Hawke laughed heartily for a long moment.
"Oh, I wish! I'm 'obsessed' because I don't have a love life of my own and you're the only lesbian in my inner circle so it's either gossip about your love life or listen to straight people drone on about all that 'his and hers matching', and who the hell needs more of that in their life?" Hawke ranted and Helena laughed.
"You have a point."
"So if I tell you that Hunnigan told me she's the big spoon, will you finally admit it's Hunnigan you've been sleeping with?" Hawke drawled.
"I wasn't lying about it to be a dick, I just didn't know if I was allowed to talk about it. You know how private Hunnigan is, and I didn't want to get her in trouble at work because of me. But it doesn't matter now since I don't work here anymore, so," Helena shrugged.
"So you guys are really a couple?"
"Actually, we're more than that," Helena said and held up her left hand.
"Oh, my God, you two are engaged?" Hawke gasped.
"Yes, for all the wrong reasons," Helena chuckled and explained the situation.
"Regardless, congratulations. I love being right," Hawke smiled and reached to grab a tissue from the box on the table. She blew her nose loudly and made a face in disgust when she looked at the tissue afterward.
"Sexy, huh?" she chuckled and showed Helena the tissue stained with black mucus.
"Gross! Are you okay?"
"Yeah, it's just a side-effect of the fungal infection," Hawke assured and neatly folded the tissue before placing it in a container that had a yellow biohazard-symbol on it.
"You saving those for something?" Helena quirked an eyebrow.
"As a matter of fact I am. Doctor Cassia insisted on it, I guess she believes there's something to be learned from whatever I expel. Having people this interested in my bodily fluids isn't as flattering as one might think," Hawke smirked and Helena chuckled.
"I do not envy whoever has to sort through your used tissues," she commented and they laughed.
"Hey, uh...I wanted to apologize to you about what happened at my place, I didn't mean to scare you or make you worried, but it was...so fucking weird, you know?" Hawke then said seriously.
"You don't need to apologize, I know it wasn't something you had control over. What exactly happened anyway?"
"I'm not sure how to describe it. It started as hallucinations, like, I was certain I heard someone talking to me even when I knew I was alone. And I don't mean like the internal voice we all have," Hawke began and Helena nodded. She knew all about that type of voices in one's head.
"Then it escalated from that, I'd see this little girl in the corner of my eye but when I turned to look, she wasn't there, you know what I mean?"
"Yeah," Helena nodded again.
"I started losing time, like, I'd wake up home in my own bed, everything was normal, but when I checked the date, I realized I was missing several days. I don't know what I've been up to. Hunnigan said the bio-weapon was designed for mind control so could be that whoever was doing it was using me to try to dig more information about the agency," Hawke shrugged.
Helena exhaled deeply, wishing she could help. Unfortunately, all she could do was hope that Hawke hadn't done something that would land her in prison for treason. She didn't think the mind control-defense would do greatly in court if it came to that.
"Hunnigan's hopefully checking my activity to make sure I didn't leak anything. Other than it was just...okay, you know how sometimes when you're falling asleep in front of the TV and whatever you've been watching kind of starts seeping into your dream and you're not sure what's real and what's not?"
"I have some idea, yes," Helena nodded.
"It was kind of like that at times."
"What about the little girl? Who was she?" Helena frowned and Hawke shrugged, reaching for another tissue.
"I have no idea, I've never seen her before in my life," she said before once more blowing her nose.
"That's weird."
"Everything about this is weird," Hawke chuckled. "Anyway, enough about this, what are you up to now that you've abandoned the DSO?" she then changed the subject and Helena inhaled deeply, shrugging a little.
She told Hawke about her plan to become an EMT, and that she was off to a good start. It would be a while before she would have all the necessary hours and certificates, but she was working on it. Most importantly, and contrary to what it had felt like recently working for the DSO, she felt a sense of purpose.
There were days when all she did was help move patients from location A to location B, sometimes deliver flowers to them, or give directions to the cafeteria, but even that all had a meaning. She couldn't honestly say she'd felt that way at the DSO because no matter what she did, it never ended.
She could take down an arms dealer, she could help take down corporations responsible for providing terrorists the viruses and equipment they needed to carry out their attacks, hell, she could help take down a crooked national security advisor, but it never changed anything. There was always another player ready to get in the game, probably only grateful to the DSO for getting rid of the competition for them. And then it was just a matter of the cycle beginning again.
It was pointless, there was no sense of accomplishment and purpose, not the way she needed it anyway. She agreed that if it weren't for agencies like the DSO and the BSAA, things would be even worse. Most of the time they couldn't prevent the initial mess, but they stopped the next one, and Helena didn't dismiss the importance of that. The problem was, she wasn't happy with having to settle for looking at the big picture when doubt overshadowed her thoughts and she found herself needing to look at what she'd accomplished so far for encouragement to keep going.
"And then from EMT I might go ahead and try to become a registered nurse or something later, but that's for much later, if ever," Helena summarized.
"I won't lie, I can't imagine you as a candy striper," Hawke chuckled.
"Hey, I rock those stripes," Helena smiled.
Truthfully there were no stripes, and with her background the process of applying had been a bit complicated, her saving grace being she hadn't been convicted of anything in her life despite having been in all kinds of trouble. That, and the letter of recommendation praising her profusely, signed by someone with an impressive title like "Head of Field Operations for Division of Security Operations", co—signed by Deputy Director John Shepard of Division of Security Operations. Helena didn't even dare to guess what Hunnigan had told Shepard to get him to vouch for her. The one good thing about having worked for the DSO was that dropping the agency name was a sure in ninety percent of the time.
"What about you, what are you gonna do when you get out of here?" she then asked.
"Find the asshole responsible for infecting me and make them regret messing with me. And when that's done I think I'll take a vacation and work on my standup comedy."
Thursday, October 9th 2014, Consol energy center, Pittsburgh. Hunnigan hadn't been entirely certain if this would be a hit or a miss, she'd gone and purchased the tickets to the hockey game on a hunch based on the fact that she'd seen clothing featuring the team's logo among Helena's belongings when she'd moved her things from her former apartment.
She hadn't personally expected to enjoy watching the game much (she wasn't the type who particularly enjoyed watching other people play), but there was something about being in an arena full of people, cheering for their team, that was enough to sweep her away, and she found herself cheering right alongside them despite not being a hockey fan.
But even more than that, she enjoyed watching Helena. It made her happy to see Helena so passionate and excited about something (even if that something happened to be two guys punching each other bloody at the moment), and while the game was merely a distraction that wouldn't last longer than a couple of hours, it was a much needed break, and it made Hunnigan glad to see she'd been able to provide that for her.
The long weekend they were taking was doubling as their "honeymoon" and while they both had known their marriage would be nothing more than paperwork for the sake of insurance, the very informal ceremony of simply signing papers in front of witnesses (namely, Nolan and Hawke) had still felt rather anticlimactic. Hunnigan wanted to do everything properly, but there hadn't been time for any of it. But on such short notice, she figured that maybe this would do in lieu of a proper getaway, maybe once the current mess was cleaned up she and Helena could take an actual vacation.
Florence in September would be wonderful. Warm days and cool evenings, and we could go to all the Fall festivals, Hunnigan mused, abruptly woken from her thoughts when the crowd erupted in loud cheers. Apparently, the home team had just won the game.
After leaving the arena, they stopped to have something to eat before heading back to their motel room. It wasn't a fancy one, barely had three stars, but it served its purpose, and there was something oddly enticing about the rustic and homely room.
Charlie, who had been waiting in the room, lifted his head and turned to look at the women as they entered, stood up from his napping spot and went to greet them. Helena showered him with pets and scratches and they took him for a quick walk before returning to the room where Helena gave him his dinner and repeatedly told him he was a good boy before telling him to go lay down.
Helena then took off the Penguins-jersey she'd worn to the game and began undressing, letting Hunnigan know she'd take a shower. Hunnigan nodded and decided to check her emails while Helena did that. Her inbox was full of unread messages, but fortunately most of them weren't relating to anything she was working on, just things she wanted to be kept up to date on. She closed the laptop when Helena emerged from the bathroom a few minutes later.
"Thank you for today," Helena said, pausing to stand behind Hunnigan and leaning down to plant gentle kisses along the side of her neck.
"Anything for my wife," Hunnigan chuckled, tilting her head to the side to encourage Helena to continue.
"Hmm, wife," Helena hummed into the spot between Hunnigan's neck and shoulder. "I can't believe we're actually married," she chuckled and stood up straight.
"Believe it," Hunnigan smiled, got up and peeled off her outerwear, getting ready to go to bed.
"How's the arm?" Helena asked, the tone of her voice saying more than her words, letting Hunnigan know she'd noticed very well that Hunnigan had skipped her exercises and that Helena had no intention of letting her get away with it.
"It's good," Hunnigan assured. The incision had healed, she no longer needed to wear the brace, the bone was as good as new (possibly better after being reinforced by titanium plates). The shoulder was still rather stiff and she hadn't regained full mobility, but as Helena would've pointed out had it been in her nature to do so, Hunnigan had only herself to blame for that.
"Oh, really?" Helena smirked. "High five me," she then challenged and Hunnigan narrowed her eyes.
"You're mean," she pouted. Hunnigan ground her teeth and worked to raise her arm, pushing through the discomfort but stopping before it turned into full blown pain, managing to bring her hand up as high as her ear was, but had to stop there when the shoulder protested to the movement.
"Ta-dah!"
"Proud of you," Helena chuckled.
"I'll do the exercises now, it's just that it's so boring," Hunnigan sighed and got to work. "So, what's our agenda for tomorrow?"
"I was thinking we'd go to Westwood. It's where I used to live as a kid, and I'd like to see the house I grew up in. Then from there continue to the cemetery and look up my grandma's grave and...I don't know, dance on it, and go day drinking afterward," Helena shrugged.
"Okay, sounds like a plan," Hunnigan smiled.
About fifteen minutes later they were in bed, Helena moving to rest her head on Hunnigan's shoulder, her arm over her midsection. Hunnigan turned to kiss her forehead as she held her and closed her eyes, but Helena wasn't quite ready to go to sleep.
"Ingrid?"
"Yes?"
"Why do you love me?" Helena asked and Hunnigan smiled in the dark.
"What kind of a question is that?"
"I just don't get it."
"I love you because you are one of the bravest and strongest people I know. You're loyal, you're trustworthy, you're passionate, and I love your fire. I love how you make me feel when I'm with you."
"How's that?"
"Safe. Cared for. Loved. Alive. Beautiful, because when you look at me I feel like you see something more than I probably do when I look in the mirror."
"When I look at you I see a goddess who should be worshipped," Helena interjected in a whisper.
"You really are a mushy romantic, aren't you?" Hunnigan chuckled quietly.
"Maybe, but it's how I feel."
"I love you because you're an amazing woman, and being with you makes me feel all kinds of good. Now, stop fishing and go to sleep," Hunnigan said gently with a smile in her voice, wondering what exactly would it take in the end to convince Helena that she was worthy of love. She didn't have an answer but decided she'd figure it out sooner rather than later; she needed Helena to feel it, to believe it because Helena Harper was a woman who needed to be loved more than anyone Hunnigan had ever known.