Leonid
Without
05:22, November 30, 2065
It would take some getting used to, if it kept up as it was.
He just didn't understand how Jane wasn't bored. He was bored, at least half the time, and that was when it was his job. Although, he did enjoy having someone to talk to while he worked. The rest of the time it wasn't so bad, either, but for that he couldn't comprehend the change. If it was her way of trying to make him feel guilty, it was working, even though he didn't know what he was to blame for.
And whatever the reason, it was beginning to crawl under his skin.
He couldn't ask anyone, because Jane was there every second. He couldn't ask her, because, well… because was the best he could come up with, the same he used for why he couldn't tell her to go away.
Five minutes was all he needed… a little time to think; the reprieve came in a form he hadn't imagined – a public restroom in a government building. It wasn't the idyllic bastion that would have made a true romanticist giddy, but he wasn't going to deny the refuge. However, as he found to his dismay once he was finally apart, his mind seemed not to focus on a solution to the problem; he couldn't bring up anything at all.
A shoe passed him, scuffed along the heel in a familiar way. It didn't notice him, on its way out, but the only person he knew to wear such shoes was an answer to whatever prayer had made it out of his mental impediment. He wasn't going to let it get away.
Unbeknownst to the fact, the wearer passed the man crumpled between the basin setup and a motionless, yet translocated, garbage bin. The hapless individual, prey to the sudden weight on his leg, looked down and stared with an expression befitting the incident.
"Neil; get the hell off me before I kill you," not spoken in a convincing tone, it proved it didn't have to be – the threat instantly caused the desired reaction. Neil fell back under his hiding place, triumphant in the attempt for notice. Ryan only maintained his own confusion, "What are you doing?"
"I'm hiding," desperate to explain his problem so that he might get the solution in return, Neil recited a biased account of his recent life, ending with a second-old assumption that he failed considered before.
"She doesn't hate you," Ryan scoffed, unable to imagine the contrary to what he was used to. The shred of hope he instilled faded briefly to the cool of insight.
"Prove it."
"I don't have to," Ryan said, though it must have been unconvincing, as he found himself tack on, "She's loved you for longer than I've known her."
"Then why's she scaring me?"
Close to coughing up a most valid reason, Ryan instead took to the safer alternate route, "Well, let's go ask her, shall we?"
"But she's right outside!" Neil cried, not daunting the sergeant in the least, and following closely despite the protest. He stopped at the door, as Ryan ever so boldly stepped out of the niche and surveyed the chamber. With great anxiety did the technician dare to peer around the corner, "Where'd she go?"
"Like I'd… hold it!" Ryan snapped, catching the younger man as he dove forward at a run, "Now where're you of to?"
The plaintive whine, something he was not expecting, left him as confused as when the strange encounter began.
"Why'd she leave without me?"
"Maybe she got bored…" the sergeant grumbled, letting go before risking hurt to either of them – be it by accident or by intention via irritation.
"I gotta find her!" the quick justification and the scampering off ended Ryan's resolve to even try. He had more important things to do with his life, anyway.
---
06:03, November 30, 2065
Random discoveries could make a day bright, despite times as a whole. Finding a survivor of the old days, forgotten until the sudden recognition brought life back to the memory, wasn't an event to be ignored.
Captain Hallows, only once the second lieutenant Jane knew him to be, had changed drastically; it might have been to her surprise that he saw the same discrepancy in her. It had been a long time.
"I heard about the Rochester event; you must have had fun with that."
"If you call being crushed fun, then yeah, I guess so," the slight defense didn't hold long, as Jane grinned, "I got a new eye out of the deal, though."
"Really? Let me see," Hallows examined the woman critically, "It's the right, isn't it? Optrics sure didn't do a very good job…"
"It's the left, actually," Jane corrected, smirking superficially at the mistake. There was no depending on his left or hers; she knew which he was looking at.
"Er… like I said: it's truly a flawless replication."
"As long as it works like the old one, it doesn't bother me," the corporal determined, "So far it has, and I can't complain."
A hint of recognition appeared in the captain's smile, similar to that she had recognized him by in the first place. She didn't catch it in time to not be ambushed as Neil caught up to her on the bustling streetside, but she managed to keep her composure and balance under the sudden and unexpected weight.
"Good morning," Jane mumbled, not surprised so much as startled, neither a reaction that she would have entertained for longer than the brief seconds it took to be aware. Just because he could sneak up on her didn't mean she couldn't pretend otherwise.
"Hello," Neil snipped over her shoulder, exceptionally reserved in a familiar, if troublesome, way.
Determined to keep her old friend safe from the impending tantrum, Jane condensed a goodbye as she shrugged off the overbearing technician and followed the street. No destination in mind, she chose a direction randomly, waiting for the inevitable. It took a couple of second for Neil, suddenly unsure, to spring after her, avoiding the brief wave that could have been intended towards either of them.
"Who was that?" he demanded, and earned little more than a roll of the shoulders for his effort.
"You should remember him," Jane said, simply enough to shock him into stopping.
"I should?"
"Yes."
"Oh," Neil glanced over his shoulder, only to find that the stranger had disappeared, along with any trace of who he might have been to have been memorable.
---
17:30, December 01, 2065
The uniform drove her insane, but it wasn't the horror she was officially obligated to wear. Unofficially, she had spoken to Gray about it; his rushed turnabout ended that he didn't care what she wore, if anything at all, so long as she arrived for publicity's sake. Fortune favored him that she wasn't feeling particularly vindictive.
The green Class A jacket didn't completely match the complimentarily colored trousers. The differentiation between them was slight, in color tone and style, but she didn't care. For a moment, she had considered the alternate – all her own clothes of a lesser class, say… battle dress; not just for shock value, but to give certain officers another lame reason to complain about ethics.
The entire stratagem was driven from her mind as the glint of her reflection in mirror demanded attention. A full inset into the closet door, it depicted the room in opposite; the light, dim enough to see by, brought forth an illusion that couldn't rightfully be ignored. She tugged her undershirt, slightly revealing the nothing that she hadn't expected. Nothing new… not even the old scars she had once expected graced the pale skin beneath the white vestment – it seemed science was a wonderful thing in restoring the human body.
"Aren't you done yet?" oblivious, Neil inched around the door, obscuring the view of the mirror in the effort.
"Yeah…"
"You don't look done," he snorted, earning a not-quite-blithe glare in return. Within half a minute, the woman had re-tucked the shirt and was finishing the last of the coat buttons.
"Happy?" Jane asked, displaying her hands in a show of conclusion. Neil remained unconvinced.
"I could'a done it faster,"
She stared, at him as he was in her way. He didn't move; she didn't make him as she pinned her hair to the back of her neck.
She felt detached, as they finally left. The room, one half of home, seemed sad.
---
18:07, December 01, 2065
Publicity for publicity's sake was a dangerous tactic, but it was among the last available without a full military state. The Phantoms seemed content, only attacking when there was a venture into their territory. The only problem was that Phantom territory blanketed the Earth, except for those few pockets of humanity left.
The effort of publicity lauded the efforts of the military, while glossing over the uncertain accidents and simple failures and loss that were certain to happen under the siege. It was for the general public; the enlistees, and a majority of the officers, were rarely treated to the same level of reverence on any given day, and so had a tendency to enjoy events as they came.
Ryan held to the convention spirit. As soon as he was able, he slipped away through the assembly.
Divergent, Gray stuck to the fringes. He was depressed, for several reasons, and he wasn't interested hurting others through sympathy, or further depressing himself likewise.
A quick glance caught the last sight of his corporals as they vanished; the captain considered this as he watched a shoe pulled under the veiled table. No one else noticed, or didn't care if they had, so he pretended not to – they rarely caused enough trouble at these things to be concerned about, and he knew exactly where to keep an eye on.
Under the table wasn't as interesting as some of the reception, but it held its own appeal. The table itself sat in a quiet corner against the wall; complimented by white tablecloth, it provided secrecy and solitude befitting the crafty and serene. It was like and unlike prior under-table ventures; both tired to begin with, they dozed against the wall and one another, relaxed, not sleeping, though not far from it.
Trapped in the trance between the worlds, Jane stared at the translucent shadows that were left on the spread from the intermittent passersby. She was afraid; she didn't know why, but she knew she didn't like the affliction.
In one moment, everything changed.
Neil shifted, and his hand brushed against her belly; one gesture so haphazard, seemingly meaningless in the scheme of eternity – such that the odds seemed to favor otherwise – set the course of result for a panic…. And panic comes in many forms…
Jane, robbed of her blissful ignorance, knew her fear. She detested it, and so suddenly its cause.
"I tried," distant, feeling very much the simple observer of her own life, she thought she had, "It's so hard…"
Emotion was a memory, or, worse, a fantasy – pure imagination.
Neil blinked, drowsily curious, as she slid away from him. She stared, irresolute or certain, and as indifferent towards either as she was to the end result.
"It's over."
