TW: mentioned child abuse, abuse of adult children
Disclaimer: I don't have rights to anything made by Tolkien.
Chapter 2: Out of the Frying Pan
I was introduced to Dr Head, the physiology professor, who then… got me up to scratch, I suppose. My bones and the muscular warping around them were compared with those of the skeleton, showing that I needed to add a few more pounds of muscle before I can really double in for her.
"You're literally the most accurate we can get if we want to see what Princess could have done, but you're not quite to her level yet," Dr Head told me encouragingly as he showed me comparative scans of her limbs and mine, "Let's see where your baseline is and work up from there until we see something similar."
He showed me the equipment we'll be using (state of the art crap that had to be explained to me) and after a warm up, started me at an insultingly low 80 pounds on the bench press. Even I was rather impressed with the 210 I stopped at, my own weight plus an additional 70 pounds. Legs, biceps, and deadlifts went about as well and by lunchtime I was covered in a satisfying sheen of sweat.
The afternoon was spent running, running, running. Different inclines on the treadmill, with or without extra weight, if they could think of a variation then I was put through it. Not that I minded; being able to keep up with my long legged team under full pack plus medical kit, through rough terrain, was a point of pride for me. Now I had numbers that looked more impressive than doing it felt.
A routine started up of physical training in the morning, and in the afternoon being taught how to safely handle the weapons they were going to test me on. Any necessary scientific tests were done on Tuesday and Friday afternoons. Evenings were spent in the stifling July heat, people watching at bars or doing whatever else I pleased, exceedingly grateful to be in air conditioning during the day. I bulked up like nobody's business and had to buy new tops to fit my arms, eating what felt like everything while the few summer students stared.
One of those scientific bits was explained to me by Dr Fiala and a new professor who studies chemistry and radiology, Dr Baumgartner, as, "Absolutely nuts, but everything about this is ridiculous." They asked to put a tiny dose of cobalt into my femur.
"It's a slow-growing, very strong bone, and both of hers are intact. This is a small enough trace that it won't harm you, and it has a long enough half-life that if by some bizarre chance you end up millions of years in the past, we'll still be able to find it. It doesn't occur naturally, so there would be no doubt that it was made by an advanced civilization," Dr Baumgartner told me, short legs swinging from her stool, "If we put it in your medical records that we implanted this tiny bit of cobalt in a certain location, then we find cobalt in that same location on her femur, it would practically be proof that you're the same person."
The whole thing did sound utterly bonkers. "And what would that basically prove? That I'm going to time travel?" I asked, just to make sure.
"Basically," Dr Sandoval confirmed, completely serious.
"You're sure it won't hurt me?" I asked Dr Baumgartner, just to be sure.
She nodded emphatically. "At worst, you may get cancer late in life," she assured me, "In about fifty years, probably later, if it does happen."
Considering that I was already closer to thirty than not, I figured that wasn't too bad of a risk. It would be a miracle if I saw 80 anyways, cobalt or no cobalt. Again after I read the fine print, I signed the forms.
Just saying, it's painful to get a big ass needle in your bones. They had to tranq me up like a horse and I still spent the next day in a wheelchair before I forced myself back to my feet. At least I wasn't limping anymore by the time the reunion came around.
Lourdes (by now Prof. Sandoval and I were on a first name basis) drove me to the airport. "I got you from this same airport about two months ago, didn't I?" she asked when we entered the departures section.
"Time flies," I replied on a chuckle, "Just like I'm about to do. I'll make sure I have a good excuse if I'm gonna be late back."
"Go on and get your flight, rascal," Lourdes told me fondly, "See you Monday."
I threw my bag on my shoulder and after a brief wave to her car, walked into the airport. The relief from the heat was welcome despite that it made me shiver.
By now I'm used to people staring, so at first that didn't bother me. The scars on my face tend to scare small children who haven't grown up around me. Only when I got into my seat, thankfully the tiny comfort plus section instead of normal cramped economy, did someone finally say something.
The little old lady beside me had a crochet ring out and was busy making what looked like a scarf when she gave me a denture-exposing smile. "Why, don't you look like that princess they dug up?" she told me cheerily.
It felt like that time Martin woke me up with a bucket of water to the face. "Sorry, what?" I asked, praying that this wasn't what I thought.
"The princess they dug up in the New Mexico Valley of the Kings, as they're calling it these days," she answered happily, "I love looking out for new things in history, I taught history in high school, so when they found this woman's tomb, I was so excited. Watch everything I can on it, and last night they put up a recreation of the princess's face! And she looks just like you, dear."
My shoulders slumped and I wanted to bury my head in my hands. "Oh, that. I didn't realize it was such a big deal," I confessed. Who even keeps track of archaeology anymore when the world has gone to hell?
"It's turned the entire planet's history upside down," the little old lady assured me, "It's a very big deal."
Thankfully the safety demonstration started and that was it for the rest of the flight. The horrible horrible flight that brought back far too many memories of a crash I shouldn't have had to be anywhere near, and this time I didn't even have terror of the unknown to steady me. At least when I got off the plane in Denver's horribly designed airport, I knew why more people were staring than usual, and my legs weren't too obvious when they shook.
At the arrivals gate I was greeted by a blur of pink, screaming, "Auntie Cass! Auntie Cass!" Easier than anything I plucked Rosie off the ground and swung her around, laughing at her delighted shrieks.
"Cass, put her down!" Cressie scolded, even though she was laughing. Her bright copper curls were pinned back from a pointed, freckled face with rectangular glasses. Her small, soft hands were sort of curled up under her substantial bust, like she was restraining herself from snatching her daughter back.
Despite Rosie begging for a piggy back ride, I put her back on the floor. "I need a hug from my favorite eldest sister, after all," I said, and sauntered forward for a quick one.
The whole time Aunt Libby had stood back, patiently watching the rest of us unite. Laugh lines were starting around her mouth and they only looked to grow deeper as she came forward for a hug of her own. "Wow, you look…" She smiled proudly at me. "You look strong."
To ham it up I flexed a bicep and winked at a nearby young lady.
Cressie poked my arm and was visibly puzzled when there was only a tiny bit of resistance. "I need to hear about what prompted this," she declared.
"For right now, how about we get to the cabins?" Aunt Libby suggested, "Dad and Electra shouldn't take too much longer to bring something back for dinner, and I'm hungry."
My stomach growled in agreement. "Mind if we make a stop at that sandwich shop before we go?" I requested sheepishly.
Fifteen minutes later, several of which were spent lost in the airport, we piled into Aunt Libby's SUV and were off. In the back seat beside Rosie, I entertained her with stories about the crazy doctors and students I'd met on the university campus, as well as the few child-friendly exploits I got up to in Afghanistan.
Of course, that was between Cressie's chatter about her boyfriend Tom and questions about Murphy, Martin, York, and all the rest. Of course with the implication that I must be dating, or at least sleeping with one of them.
Aunt Libby was mostly content to keep playing her steampunk mix in the background, until she saw me getting ready to snap at my sister. "How was New Mexico?" she asked, butting in bluntly.
Gratefully I smiled into the rearview mirror. "Hot, arid, a lot like Afghanistan but with booze," I answered happily, "When the reunion is over I'm set to go back and continue with the university for a few more months, and then I'm taking some time off. Or going right back to the Middle East, who knows."
Aunt Libby's clever green eyes found mine in the rearview mirror for a second. "That would depend on the results?" she guessed.
I made a non-committal humming sound. "In a way. Either way I still need a little more muscle before the tests will be as accurate as they need to be, so I've got time to decide," I reasoned. At the very least, I needed to send pictures to my mates back in the Middle East. They were going to shit bricks.
"Even more muscle?" Cressie asked incredulously, eyeing my arms.
"I think I'm gonna wait on this conversation until we get to the cabins," I told her, "That way I only need to have it once."
Cressie looked downright offended.
But Aunt Libby started giggling, covering her mouth with one hand while she drove with the other. "Oh, your mom is going to have kittens," she said gleefully.
"She was so angry when she woke up in India and didn't know how she got there," Cressie added nervously, "Called all of us, screaming."
"Mommy cried for two days," Rosie piped up factually.
The mere mention made Cressie wince. "Sorry, but she found out you were the one who took her there," she said briskly.
I wonder who broke down and told her, I thought darkly.
"If she's still pissed, she can say it to my face," I said, grinning. It made the scars on my face twist unpleasantly and I knew it.
Unnerved, Cressie turned in her seat to face the front.
I ignored the little pang of hurt in my chest.
Aunt Libby picked up the conversation, telling me about what she had been doing in Indonesia and the wildlife she had seen there. From there she went to her son Stevie and his wife Anahera, who, "Is giving me a grandchild!" she outright squealed.
"Wow, uh, congrats," I said awkwardly to my glowing aunt, who had thankfully pulled off the highway. By now we were well into the mountains and it was wildland that passed the windows for the most part.
Pulling up to a small group of log cabins seemed sudden. They were nothing special, just a group of vacation houses around a large fire pit where I saw several members of my family sitting. Off to the side, Gran and a woman I didn't know were skinning something large while three corgis and a fluffy black puppy panted for scraps.
My stomach turned in knots when I recognized my mother, chain smoking with a can of cola at her side as always. Something like fear flooded me and I broke into a sweat.
I was terrified, even more scared than I had been when I thought I was going to die with her on that plane four years ago. At least then I was only facing death. Now I have to face my very angry mother.
With wooden movements I climbed out of the SUV and grabbed my bag from my feet. The door closing seemed far too loud and made me jump.
"Cassie, is that you?" Stevie called, waving from his place at the fire pit. His blonde hair was ruffled like he had run his hands through it a minute ago, but he always looked like that; though when he stood up, I don't remember him being quite so tall.
I opened my arms in a show. "That's me!" I confirmed, grinning as I skipped forward to squeeze around his ribs. "How's my favorite cousin?" I asked.
"Your only cousin is absolutely fabulous," Stevie answered, rubbing his ribs, "Damn, what have you been doing? I've never been able to build up like that."
"Professional coaching, it's complicated," I waved it off.
"Have you met my wife yet?" Stevie asked brightly, "I don't think so."
I shook my head. "I was on my last tour," I answered, following him over to where I saw that it was a deer being skinned.
The woman assisting Gran with the butchery was a pretty, petite Pacific Islander in a Navy t-shirt. "Hello," she greeted me as she quickly boned the pieces she was passed, "I'm Anahera, Stevie's wife. I would shake your hand, but-" She pointedly looked down at her blood-covered hands.
"You're just fine. I'm glad to finally meet you, sorry I missed the wedding," I told her, watching her hands move expertly.
"It's alright, Stevie and I get that you were in- Afghanistan, right?" Upon seeing me nod, she continued, "I was just flown in from Australia the other day, the ship was out but I'd already arranged for this weekend off so…" She shrugged one shoulder and threw a large bone over her shoulder.
I watched it fly and then land, rolling to a stop with two enormous black dogs arguing over it.
"When my hands are clean, I want my hug," Gran threatened, gesturing to me with her cleaver.
Even without the implied threat, I would have agreed. "How's Grandpa doing?" I asked; last I heard, his liver was getting a bit fatty.
"Still well enough to hunt, if not enough to actually make the kill," Gran answered serenely, adding proudly, "Electra brought this big boy down with one bullet. She's done so well in the army, we're so very proud of her." Coming from a naval family like hers, that was the ultimate compliment.
Pointedly I talked to everyone else I saw, before I finally made myself face the source of my dread. First I greeted my step-father though, grinning as he swept me up in what to him must have been a hard hug. Affectionately I squeezed the life out of him until he asked me to put him down.
Pitaajee brushed my cheeks and traced a couple of my facial scars with his fingers. "What happened here?" he asked, concerned, black eyes taking in all the damage I'd taken in the four years since we last saw each other.
"Grenades. Don't worry, I'm fine now," I assured him.
He shook his head with a look somewhere between pride and distress.
Finally I looked down at my mother, disgust welling up in me the more I saw. She looked like she was in her 70's instead of her late 50's, liver-spotted with thinning hair that I wasn't sure was gold or silver. Her legs were sticks interrupted by ball-like knees and nobody had managed to convince her into clothing that actually fit, oversized hoodie and jeans swallowing her broad but skinny frame. Her nails were yellow from tobacco and adjusted her large glasses before she looked at me with cold eyes.
"Hello, Mother," I said in the same voice I use when I'm on patrol, cool and in control.
"Why did you kidnap me?" Mother demanded. To anyone else it would sound like a quiet question, barely more than a whisper.
It set more alarm bells to ringing than any shout. "You weren't exactly protesting," I told her, "Not unless it involved putting a seatbelt on." She had wiggled and whined and acted just like my now two year old nephew, the whole way from Seattle to Goa where I foisted her off on poor Pitaajee.
"You didn't have my consent," Mother pointed out.
"Alright," I said with false agreeableness, "You've got me there. That being said, you were incapable of even walking to the bathroom by yourself. You had no business living alone and even less-"
"Stop lying," Mother cut in coldly.
I made sure that my scars twisted frighteningly when I smiled. "If you don't want to believe you've got a problem, fine," I hissed at her, "But I will never regret getting my little siblings out of your house the moment I could, and even though we both nearly died on the way there, I somehow don't regret sending you to India. You wouldn't have survived on your own." It felt so good to repeat her own words to her, if slightly altered.
Abruptly, she pushed me.
The heat was apparent immediately, even over the ache from my calves hitting stone and more rough stone pulling at my hair. Shouts erupted from all over, though I could barely hear them over my own shrieks of alarm and pain.
On instinct I jumped out of the fire pit, rolling on the floor to put out the flames that were all too quickly consuming my clothing. A bucket of water did the rest. "Fucking hell!" I shouted, once I felt the heat die down to a dull throb, "What the fuck was that for!"
Like she hadn't just pushed me into the campfire, Mother kept smoking her cigarette. Completely unconcerned.
My unlikely savior offered a hand to help me up. "What just happened?" Matt asked, discarding the bucket in favor of using both hands to haul me to my feet.
Over his shoulder I saw the twins skid to a stop by the cars, Mackey discreetly tucking away a glass pipe before she rushed to her fiance. "I heard you screaming," she told me breathlessly.
"Matt, get the first aid kit!" Aunt Libby barked, rushing over with a sleeping bag, "We're taking Cass to the ER."
Gratefully I pulled the smooth fabric around me; the fire had left the back side of my clothing in tatters. "I think I'm fine," I told her, only feeling a bit of throbbing on my back, "I don't need the hospital, really."
"Mackey, what do you think?" Aunt Libby asked, not willing to deal with my bullshit.
Luckily for me, that particular twin happens to be a pararescue with decent medical training. She ushered me into one of the cabins and made me take my clothes off so she could see the burns, occasionally touching somewhere with freshly washed hands and asking what I felt. "They're only first degree, you'll be fine as long as you keep your back and bum clean," she eventually judged, "Let's get some black tea and aloe gel on these, and you can rest for a while."
I went limp with relief. The last thing I wanted was to ruin Nan's birthday weekend by being sent to the hospital.
Outside, lots of shouting echoed through the clearing. Even Gran had gotten in on it and together with Andy was reaming Mother up one side and down the other.
"That was so awful of her," Mackey said, devastated, "I knew she doesn't like you, but I didn't think she'd hurt you." Her hand lingered in my singed hair.
"Not the first time she's tried," I admitted glumly, "Just the first time she succeeded."
Gentle hands applied oversteeped, cooled black tea to my back. I hissed at the touch to my tender skin, but there's no denying that the chilled liquid and hands felt good.
The door slammed open and Aunt Libby quickly pulled the sleeping bag up to cover me.
"I don't know what the hell she was thinking, but she's not allowed near Cass anymore," Grandpa huffed, "If Mum weren't insisting she stay, I'd tell her to hit the road right now."
"Pitaajee can stay though, right?" I asked anxiously, "And Aditi and Madhav?" So far I hadn't met my step-siblings but I wanted to, and Mother's behavior wasn't any of their fault.
Grandpa's voice gentled slightly. "They're fine, they can stay as long as they want." Changing his target, he asked, "Cass is going to be okay, right?"
Mackey reassured him and he left, stomping down the stairs and hollering Mother's name as he went.
"I didn't have this on my disaster weekend bingo card," Aunt Libby commented.
I snorted out a laugh.
When Aunt Libby and Mackey finally left so they could add their condemnation to the group verdict, I cried my broken heart out.
That night I swore I heard whispers on the wind. The cabin was silent and still, Brise and her boyfriend, and Electra and her son, all asleep in the bedrooms while I tossed and turned on a sofa in front of the fireplace. Yet I could hear voices all around me, voices so beautiful that they couldn't be earthly, and yet terrifying for that fact.
"Don't be afraid," one voice said.
"You will find your place," assured another.
"Your time has come," said a final voice, "Now sleep, young one… Sleep…"
It was like being sedated, muscles slowly relaxing and the feeling of gradually falling into myself, before suddenly nothing.
For reference, don't trust anything science-y that I've included here. Anything at all. I've tried to make it accurate, but the plot comes first.
Sorry to anyone who expected fluff, that will come but not for a very long time. First they all must suffer. And possibly die.