A series of one-shots based in the same timeline; loosely connected, canon-compliant, and all about The Parents. Maureen/John. Ratings vary. This one's Teen and Up.
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The Fifth Day of Lazarus
… on the fifth day after he died, Lazarus realised he needed to get on with the art of living. But first he had to decide exactly what that would look like.
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Chapter 1
Maureen knows exactly where to look in her luggage. It's dark - the kids and Don have all gone to bed, Smith is quiet, and the ship is locked up tight for the night. Outside the wind is howling and inside she and John are getting ready for bed. Tomorrow they will start construction on a greenhouse next to the hatch doors and all her childhood memories of crop cycling and soil levels will be put to use like she never expected they would.
But in the meantime, Maureen knows exactly where to look in her luggage, for the small box inside a slightly bigger box, at the bottom of a collection of her most treasured possessions. Photos of the kids as babies, of grandparents, of camping spots when they were still green and the sky was still blue. A necklace from her great-grandmother. And inside the smallest box, a ring; a simple platinum band in its cushion.
John notices her pensive mood but he gives her time to sort her thoughts out while her back is to him. He knows she will tell him when she's ready, and his quiet confidence in their newfound steadiness makes her smile as she looks at her wedding ring and knows this is right. He's still watching her from the bed when she stands and faces him again. Her short black nighty, usually worthy of at least the slightest of glances, doesn't get a mention as he searches her face for an answer to a question he doesn't know how to ask.
She steps to the bed in two strides and sits next to him. She holds out the box for him to see what's inside. His eyes widen at the ring, gaze glued to the way it sparkles in the dim light of their single lamp.
"You brought it with you", he says. There's a tinge of awe in his voice.
"I couldn't leave it behind", she replies.
She's a bit startled when he throws back the corner of the covers and spins out of bed to his own pile of stuff. It's a lot less organised - they are still in the process of rearranging the master bedroom to accommodate both of them - but he seems to know exactly where to look too. In a couple of heartbeats he is back at her side, sitting canted towards her, their knees flush against each other.
He holds a little velvet pouch upside down and tips its contents into his palm. Straight away she recognises the shape of his dogtags on a metal chain, their unmistakable clank familiar no matter how long it's been. There are some things that time and torment will never change, and as sure as Maureen is that she will always be a scientist, she knows John will always be a soldier. Maybe he left the Navy in a heartbeat, and maybe he regrets it being his priority for so long, but she's not as shocked as she expected to be that he brought his old dogtags with him. Probably for the same reasons she brought her lucky whiteboard.
From the pile of metal in his hand his fingers grasp at one piece, and as the chain and tags fall away, all that's left, pinched between his thumb and forefinger, is his own platinum wedding band, a little more battered than hers but still unmistakable.
"Neither could I", he says.
She lets out one choked huff of laughter and tries not to let sudden tears fall.
"So much… wasted time", she mutters, shaking her head, staring back at her own ring and all it means to her.
"Maureen", he says. He spins off the bed and onto one knee in front of her. She tries to protest, but the words don't come out, and his free hand takes hers to silence her anyway. "We are no longer who we used to be", he says.
She looks up at his face and cups his cheek with one hand. Her thumb runs patterns over his scruff.
"I can't promise you the same things I did before", he continues, and she realises what he's doing with such a shock it nearly winds her. "But this time I promise, I will always fight for you. I will always protect our kids. I will be patient on the hard days, and I'll remind you how brilliant you are on the low days. And every day in between I'll do my best to make you smile. Because all I want-"
His voice cracks a little. She wipes away his stray tears with her thumb on his cheek, but doesn't take her hand away. "All I've ever wanted, was to make you happy"
Maureen tries to ignore the lump in her throat as he takes her ring box from her hand, pulls the ring gently from its cushion, and then hold it up to her. "May I?" he asks.
She holds out her left hand and her tears fall unnoticed as she watches him slide the ring onto its rightful place on her finger, the echo of the first time they did this whispering against the reality of this being a fresh start to get it right. The weight of the ring on her finger feels strange; she hates that she somehow got used to not wearing it, but she also knows it's never coming off again. Maureen takes his face between her two hands and kisses him with such promise that they don't need a piece of paper to tell them what they mean to one another. But it's nice that she has that too, buried somewhere in her box of treasures.
When she pulls away, her hand immediately finds his - the one still tightly clutching his own ring - and she takes the tangled mess of tags and chain between her fingers. She finds the latch in the chain and methodically and unhurriedly untangles it so she can slide the ring off. When it's free she drops the chain and tags to the side on the bed, and they both stare at them for a moment, the symbolism not lost on either of them. They are not the people they used to be. These tiny pieces of metal, once his connection to identity and purpose, no longer have a place in the ashes from which they are trying to phoenix their lives, except perhaps to inform the expertise he acquired along the way.
John scoops them up and bundles them back into the velvet pouch, and then turns and tosses the little package on top of the bedside table. They will end up forgotten in a draw somewhere, buried where all their hurts and betrayals will go, never to be revisited so long as they build a new life for themselves away from Earth.
Maureen turns his face back towards her with her palm on his cheek, and then holds up his own ring.
"May I?" she mimics.
"Please", he whispers. It is more of a plea than permission.
She takes his left hand in hers and cradles it for a moment.
"I will never shut you out again", she says softly, and John is startled that she's doing this in return. He didn't expect that she would. "I will fight with you, and I will fight for you. I will support you, and let you support me. I will protect our children by your side, and I will come to you first, about anything"
Maureen takes a deep breath to clear her throat and blink back tears. "And I will never stop loving you", she finishes on a whisper. She knows she can promise that, because she tried - for over two years, through separation and heartache and deception and misery, she tried to fall out of love with him and it didn't work. She never could file those divorce papers, and she's honest enough to admit it's because she never stopped thinking of herself as John's wife.
Maureen slips the ring onto his finger, grinning a little as she struggles it over his knuckle, and when it's in place she lifts his hand to her lips and kisses the back of it, right over the top of the band, her head bowed as if in benediction to him where he genuflects at her feet.
Like a wave surging against a rock, John pushes himself up and around her, shifting between her legs and folding in so close they can't tell where one ends and the other begins. She can feel him everywhere, her body attuned to the warmth of him and the smell of him, to the sense that she can feel herself become more alive at an atomic level when they are this close, and she wonders if it's possible for two people to break the laws of entropy. Her arms circle him and their lips land on each other's shoulders, necks, behind her ear, under his chin, anywhere they can reach where they don't have to unlock their hold. Perhaps they are both a little afraid to let go just yet.
But then his kisses find her lips and one hand cups the back of her neck. One of hers threads into his hair, the way it's done a thousand times before, her other hand keeping him firmly against her without any spacesuits or equipment between them, and this was always her favourite place to land. She has no idea what's coming next, or how to fix the engine, or how to get them back where they came from, or how to make the air breathable or the water drinkable. Every problem has a solution, and this might be her biggest one yet. She has no idea if she will be able to keep her family safe, which is all she's ever really wanted.
But loving John, and being loved by John – this she knows how to do. This they will get good at again. And so she kisses him like this one moment might fix all the others of uncertainty, because if they can find their way back to each other, they can do anything.
