Well, here it is, the last chapter. I hope you all enjoyed reading and please review cos I wanna know that people liked it. Thanks to all my faithful reviewers thus far (Lornein, Brennan Mulwray, Fiery feral, Laily, Thir13en ghosts, Carrot6, Redhead2, Coca, LucyGoosey, Peepeeteepee, Meg and Jill) you all rock and I'm currently working on a new Mutant X story, this time a different version of the first episode so look out for it if you liked this one.
Have a nice day.
***
'Shalimar? Shalimar?' The voice broke into her subconscious. She wrinkled her forehead and opened her eyes. As the world came into focus she saw Jesse standing over her, his sandy blonde hair flopping over his eyes.
'Hey, you back with us?' he said with a smile.
'Yeah,' she replied, her voice croaky. She held out her hand and Jesse took it and pulled her up to stand in front of him. 'How long was I out for?' she asked, slightly ashamed that she had even lost consciousness in the first place. She hadn't been hit that hard.
'Ten seconds at most.'
She looked straight into his eyes and smirked. 'Liar.'
'You guys mind if we get out of here yet?' Lexa's desperate voice floated towards them. They both looked at her and Brennan and they rushed forwards to help him.
'You okay to walk?' Shalimar asked.
He nodded and stood up. He groaned as he was hit with head rush and he felt Shalimar's arm circle his waist as she supported his weight. He looked down at the blonde head and breathed out, suprised at how natural being that close to her was. He was always suprised by his reaction to her proximity to him. Whenever they sparred he felt exhilarated by her presence and whenever they were sitting next to each other, watching a movie or just...sitting he couldn't stop his eyes from wandering over to her and taking in every curve of her body, every inch of her face.
Lexa watched the couple as they supported each other. She had never seen two people so in love and yet so far apart. It was like there was an invisible barrier between them and it wasn't that they couldn't penetrate it, neither of them wanted to try. She didn't need to be a psionic to read their minds.
Jesse looked around him. He was nervous about the whole thing. They had been captured once already that day and he didn't want to risk another run-in with the GSA especially since he, Brennan and Shalimar were hurt. They weren't ready to take on another group of agents. He walked to the other side of Brennan and lifted his arm over his shoulder. He wanted to hurry the whole situation up. He wanted to leave the GSA building and never come back to it unless it was to burn the place down to the ground. Anger bubbled up inside him as he thought back to what Emma had looked like before the paramedics had covered her up and taken her away. Everyone always seemed to assume that he was the calm, rational one of the group, that he would never lose control with regard to his emotions. And Jesse had learnt how to deal with his anger, with the rage that had initially wanted to consume him. But that did not mean that he didn't want to pummel Eckhart and every GSAgent that got in his way, and despite his emotions towards Shalimar, Nicholas Fox as well. He had contributed to the outcome of that fateful couple of days and Jesse couldn't bear that he was related to one of the only people Jesse referred to as family.
Lexa looked over Jesse's shoulder and saw the doors opening at the end of the corridor, revealing a group of atleast ten agents.
'Guys, we have to leave now.'
They all started making their way towards the front door and freedom. The agents footsteps pounded down the hallway towards them and just as they seemed to be right on the teams heels Lexa turned around and drew her hands together, creating a blinding flash of light. The agents staggered backwards and the team turned, their efforts renewed. Jesse and Shalimar reached the front door first but it was, predictably locked. Jesse rested his free hand against it and the door phased silently. Lexa went through first, now more used to Jesse's abilities than she had been. The rest followed and they were finally all out in the open air.
***
Shalimar leant back against the pilots chair of the Helix and breathed deeply. She hadn't been through an experience like that since the last time they had all seen Emma. And she had, without even knowing missed it all. The tight situations which made her heart rise into her throat, the times when it seemed like there was no way out and that it was the end were just one of the many things she had enjoyed about being a part of Mutant X but her feral nature made her relish them even more. For the past month she had been on some kind of auto pilot, not paying attention to what she had been doing. It had been like she wasn't in her body anymore, like she had exited herself and left her body to get on with the everyday stuff just so she didn't have to deal with anything.
But in that moment when she had seen the GSAgents walking towards her she had come back to life. Every move she had executed had made her feel more and more like herself.
Brennan watched Shalimar. She had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply like she was meditating or something. She looked exhausted but he wasn't suprised, they were all out of practice. But she looked happy, which was something he hadn't seen in a long time.
She looked across at him and smiled.
'You wanna get us out of here or should I?'
Brennan smirked as he waved his hand signaling for her to take complete control of the Helix.
'Go ahead.'
***
Adam looked across at the team. Lexa had gone to get some air, having been understandably freaked out by the events of the past couple of days. The team were in the lab with him and he could see how angry they all still were.
'You'll be fine,' he told Brennan as the scan finished and the results were shown on the screen. Adam didn't have any idea what to say. He had never been the type to get lost for words but he had no idea what he could say to them to make everything better.
'I'm sorry I left...' he began, hoping that once he started the sentences would form themselves.
'Adam,' Jesse said. 'We get why you left,' he said, an edge to his voice that Adam recognized from when Jesse had been dealing with his father. He knew when he came back that it wouldn't be easy for them to accept why he had left but he had hoped that it would be a little easier than it was turning out to be.
'You can't expect everything to go back to the way it was before you left,' Brennan said.
He smiled as he realized that they were accepting him back into the team. He had simply been hoping that they wouldn't beat the crap out of him but yet again he had underestimated them. They were so much stronger than he was. He looked across at Shalimar. She had been avoiding his gaze up till that point but she raised her eyes to meet his. Her look told him that though he was forgiven she would never forget that he had left her when she most needed his help.
***
Lexa rested her chin on her hand. She was tired, too tired to move, too tired to speak, too tired even to return the smile that Adam had thrown at her as he dragged the rest into the lab. He was checking them over for any major injuries and she was glad she had the chance to escape for a little while.
She had never used her abilities in that kind of situation before, where life or death really was an option. Her abilities had always been this ambiguous force that she knew she had but wasn't quite sure how to harness. It wasn't that she didn't know how to use her powers, she just wasn't sure for what kind of purpose. And now she had one.
But she had no idea for how long. Shalimar still wanted her out of Sanctuary as soon as possible, of that Lexa was pretty sure. The feral had impressed and scared her with her ability to kick ass without so much as a frown. If Shalimar wanted her out of there then Lexa was not gonna be the one to argue.
She didn't think she knew Brennan well enough to make that kind of judgment about him. She wasn't sure how to read him, he seemed to hide his real emotions beneath a facade of masculine strength and she assumed he only ever opened up to a few truly close people.
Jesse was the only one of the group who she knew didn't hate her. He was nice, and she could definitely see herself being some kind of friend towards him. But she understood where his loyalties were.
She resigned herself to the idea that she was leaving. It wasn't such a bad thing. She had some friends...not very many and none of them that close but they were still friends. She had an apartment; it was spacious and she really didn't mind cockroaches that much. And a job, one that she was good at. So what if it was boring?
'My life sucks,' she said under her breath.
'Oh come on,' came Shalimar's voice from behind her. 'It can't be that bad.'
'You really have to stop sneaking up on people,' Lexa said earnestly.
Shalimar smiled as she walked towards where Lexa was sitting. She lowered herself to the ground, clearly still hurting from the mission.
'Its not that I don't like you,' Shalimar said after a pause. 'I don't know you.'
'So its not me, its you.'
'Something like that. When Emma died we didn't just lose a teammate, we lost a friend, a sister. So if Brennan had been the one who showed up a month after that I wouldn't have trusted him either.'
Lexa looked across at Shalimar. She could never know how hard it was for Shalimar to admit all this, or how difficult and heartbreaking it had been when Emma had died. But she was glad that the feral was finally coming round to the idea that she wasn't the enemy.
'I'm not promising you an easy time. You might go the way of Emma. But I'm offering you a chance for a new start.'
'You're offering me a job,' Lexa asked the suprise evident on her face.
Shalimar laughed at the look. 'Yeah, and a home, and hopefully a less sucky life.'
'Thank you,' Lexa said, the genuine happiness something that she hadn't felt in a long time.
'We don't have a room for you yet,' Shalimar continued. The whole team had debated the idea of giving Lexa Emma's old room, but it was too much, too soon. 'We'll have one of the spare rooms cleaned out for you by tomorrow but tonight its the sofa.'
Lexa laughed, knowing how much all the gestures were costing Shalimar. Shalimar smiled in reply before pushing herself off the steps and walking in the direction of her room.
***
Brennan looked up at the sound of Shalimar's door sliding open. He had been hanging around outside her room trying to work out whether he should talk to her or not. He knew she had taken everything pretty hard and he had probably not made matters any better leaving her alone for such a long amount of time with Lexa and Adam.
He turned around as he heard a slight sound and came face to face with the woman he was so scared of confronting. She was leant against the door frame of her room with her eyebrows raised.
'Was there any reason why you've been dancing around in front of my room for the past half an hour?'
'Avoidance tactics,' he said with a smile. 'You mind if I come in?'
She stepped back into her room and he followed. Shalimar made her way towards her bed and dropped down onto it. Brennan looked around for a seat which didn't have a huge pile of clothes on but when he found none he decided to sit on the edge of the bed.
'I owe you an apology. I thought I knew best, leaving you with Lexa and Adam. I thought that if you were forced into it you would deal with stuff. I was wrong.'
'Yeah, well I'm pretty sure we're even. You put me in an awkward position and then you saved my life. So we're square,' she said.
'Okay,' Brennan replied. He nodded slightly, stood and started walking towards the door. He turned around to say good night but saw tears rolling down Shalimar's cheeks.
'What's wrong? Why are you crying?' he said as he walked back towards the bed and sat down next to her. He brushed the tears off her skin with his hand and lifted her face till she was looking at him.
'I miss her,' Shalimar managed to get out. She was ashamed that she had fallen apart in front of someone. She had been doing such a good job of keeping her feelings inside but she had finally been worn down to the point where she couldn't hide her emotions any longer.
'I know, we all do,' said Brennan as he wrapped his arms around her slim frame.
'And I just keep on thinking about how if I hadn't gone to see Nicholas none of this...' but she was cut off by Brennan grabbing her shoulders and looking deep into her eyes.
'Shal, you cannot blame yourself for this. None of it was your fault. You didn't wanna see Nicholas and we all convinced you to go against your instincts.'
'You can't blame yourself, Brennan.'
'I'm not, that's the point.' He pulled Shalimar back into his arms and felt her relax into him, her head under his chin.
'Emma would be so proud of you.'
***
The door slid open and light shone out onto the hallway floor. It quickly disappeared again as she shut the door behind her. She made her way silently down the hallway, holding her boots in one hand, her jacket in the other and the keys to the Lexus in her back pocket. She walked through the main area of Sanctuary and glanced at Lexa, sleeping, peacefully unaware that anything was going on around her. Both she and Adam had been there for two nights and although Lexa didn't have her own bed (the spare room was taking a lot longer to clear out than anybody had first thought) she seemed to have settled in well. She was probably just too tired to worry about where she was sleeping.
Shalimar carried on to the garage and made her way straight towards the car. She opened the front door and climbed in. She stuck the key in the ignition and fired it up, hoping that nobody could hear.
She drove the car out onto the empty road. She loved driving at that time of the night. At 1 in the morning not many people chose to travel anywhere, but Shalimar was a creature of the night and she had somewhere to be. She wound down the window hoping to try and relieve some of the stale air that had built up in the car. She felt it sweep through her hair and heard the landscape whistling past as she sped along the road, paying no attention to any driving laws.
***
Half an hour later she pulled up outside a house in the suburbs just a few miles from the nearest city. She pushed the door open and walked up the driveway towards the front door. She lifted her hand to knock but before she could bring her knuckles into contact with the wood the door opened in front of her. She blinked from the sudden and slightly unexpected light.
'Hello.'
She looked up towards the source of the voice.
'Hi,' she replied.
'You coming in?'
'Yeah, but I haven't got very long.'
She walked past the figure into the house. Nicholas looked up and down the street before closing the door behind them.
Have a nice day.
***
'Shalimar? Shalimar?' The voice broke into her subconscious. She wrinkled her forehead and opened her eyes. As the world came into focus she saw Jesse standing over her, his sandy blonde hair flopping over his eyes.
'Hey, you back with us?' he said with a smile.
'Yeah,' she replied, her voice croaky. She held out her hand and Jesse took it and pulled her up to stand in front of him. 'How long was I out for?' she asked, slightly ashamed that she had even lost consciousness in the first place. She hadn't been hit that hard.
'Ten seconds at most.'
She looked straight into his eyes and smirked. 'Liar.'
'You guys mind if we get out of here yet?' Lexa's desperate voice floated towards them. They both looked at her and Brennan and they rushed forwards to help him.
'You okay to walk?' Shalimar asked.
He nodded and stood up. He groaned as he was hit with head rush and he felt Shalimar's arm circle his waist as she supported his weight. He looked down at the blonde head and breathed out, suprised at how natural being that close to her was. He was always suprised by his reaction to her proximity to him. Whenever they sparred he felt exhilarated by her presence and whenever they were sitting next to each other, watching a movie or just...sitting he couldn't stop his eyes from wandering over to her and taking in every curve of her body, every inch of her face.
Lexa watched the couple as they supported each other. She had never seen two people so in love and yet so far apart. It was like there was an invisible barrier between them and it wasn't that they couldn't penetrate it, neither of them wanted to try. She didn't need to be a psionic to read their minds.
Jesse looked around him. He was nervous about the whole thing. They had been captured once already that day and he didn't want to risk another run-in with the GSA especially since he, Brennan and Shalimar were hurt. They weren't ready to take on another group of agents. He walked to the other side of Brennan and lifted his arm over his shoulder. He wanted to hurry the whole situation up. He wanted to leave the GSA building and never come back to it unless it was to burn the place down to the ground. Anger bubbled up inside him as he thought back to what Emma had looked like before the paramedics had covered her up and taken her away. Everyone always seemed to assume that he was the calm, rational one of the group, that he would never lose control with regard to his emotions. And Jesse had learnt how to deal with his anger, with the rage that had initially wanted to consume him. But that did not mean that he didn't want to pummel Eckhart and every GSAgent that got in his way, and despite his emotions towards Shalimar, Nicholas Fox as well. He had contributed to the outcome of that fateful couple of days and Jesse couldn't bear that he was related to one of the only people Jesse referred to as family.
Lexa looked over Jesse's shoulder and saw the doors opening at the end of the corridor, revealing a group of atleast ten agents.
'Guys, we have to leave now.'
They all started making their way towards the front door and freedom. The agents footsteps pounded down the hallway towards them and just as they seemed to be right on the teams heels Lexa turned around and drew her hands together, creating a blinding flash of light. The agents staggered backwards and the team turned, their efforts renewed. Jesse and Shalimar reached the front door first but it was, predictably locked. Jesse rested his free hand against it and the door phased silently. Lexa went through first, now more used to Jesse's abilities than she had been. The rest followed and they were finally all out in the open air.
***
Shalimar leant back against the pilots chair of the Helix and breathed deeply. She hadn't been through an experience like that since the last time they had all seen Emma. And she had, without even knowing missed it all. The tight situations which made her heart rise into her throat, the times when it seemed like there was no way out and that it was the end were just one of the many things she had enjoyed about being a part of Mutant X but her feral nature made her relish them even more. For the past month she had been on some kind of auto pilot, not paying attention to what she had been doing. It had been like she wasn't in her body anymore, like she had exited herself and left her body to get on with the everyday stuff just so she didn't have to deal with anything.
But in that moment when she had seen the GSAgents walking towards her she had come back to life. Every move she had executed had made her feel more and more like herself.
Brennan watched Shalimar. She had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply like she was meditating or something. She looked exhausted but he wasn't suprised, they were all out of practice. But she looked happy, which was something he hadn't seen in a long time.
She looked across at him and smiled.
'You wanna get us out of here or should I?'
Brennan smirked as he waved his hand signaling for her to take complete control of the Helix.
'Go ahead.'
***
Adam looked across at the team. Lexa had gone to get some air, having been understandably freaked out by the events of the past couple of days. The team were in the lab with him and he could see how angry they all still were.
'You'll be fine,' he told Brennan as the scan finished and the results were shown on the screen. Adam didn't have any idea what to say. He had never been the type to get lost for words but he had no idea what he could say to them to make everything better.
'I'm sorry I left...' he began, hoping that once he started the sentences would form themselves.
'Adam,' Jesse said. 'We get why you left,' he said, an edge to his voice that Adam recognized from when Jesse had been dealing with his father. He knew when he came back that it wouldn't be easy for them to accept why he had left but he had hoped that it would be a little easier than it was turning out to be.
'You can't expect everything to go back to the way it was before you left,' Brennan said.
He smiled as he realized that they were accepting him back into the team. He had simply been hoping that they wouldn't beat the crap out of him but yet again he had underestimated them. They were so much stronger than he was. He looked across at Shalimar. She had been avoiding his gaze up till that point but she raised her eyes to meet his. Her look told him that though he was forgiven she would never forget that he had left her when she most needed his help.
***
Lexa rested her chin on her hand. She was tired, too tired to move, too tired to speak, too tired even to return the smile that Adam had thrown at her as he dragged the rest into the lab. He was checking them over for any major injuries and she was glad she had the chance to escape for a little while.
She had never used her abilities in that kind of situation before, where life or death really was an option. Her abilities had always been this ambiguous force that she knew she had but wasn't quite sure how to harness. It wasn't that she didn't know how to use her powers, she just wasn't sure for what kind of purpose. And now she had one.
But she had no idea for how long. Shalimar still wanted her out of Sanctuary as soon as possible, of that Lexa was pretty sure. The feral had impressed and scared her with her ability to kick ass without so much as a frown. If Shalimar wanted her out of there then Lexa was not gonna be the one to argue.
She didn't think she knew Brennan well enough to make that kind of judgment about him. She wasn't sure how to read him, he seemed to hide his real emotions beneath a facade of masculine strength and she assumed he only ever opened up to a few truly close people.
Jesse was the only one of the group who she knew didn't hate her. He was nice, and she could definitely see herself being some kind of friend towards him. But she understood where his loyalties were.
She resigned herself to the idea that she was leaving. It wasn't such a bad thing. She had some friends...not very many and none of them that close but they were still friends. She had an apartment; it was spacious and she really didn't mind cockroaches that much. And a job, one that she was good at. So what if it was boring?
'My life sucks,' she said under her breath.
'Oh come on,' came Shalimar's voice from behind her. 'It can't be that bad.'
'You really have to stop sneaking up on people,' Lexa said earnestly.
Shalimar smiled as she walked towards where Lexa was sitting. She lowered herself to the ground, clearly still hurting from the mission.
'Its not that I don't like you,' Shalimar said after a pause. 'I don't know you.'
'So its not me, its you.'
'Something like that. When Emma died we didn't just lose a teammate, we lost a friend, a sister. So if Brennan had been the one who showed up a month after that I wouldn't have trusted him either.'
Lexa looked across at Shalimar. She could never know how hard it was for Shalimar to admit all this, or how difficult and heartbreaking it had been when Emma had died. But she was glad that the feral was finally coming round to the idea that she wasn't the enemy.
'I'm not promising you an easy time. You might go the way of Emma. But I'm offering you a chance for a new start.'
'You're offering me a job,' Lexa asked the suprise evident on her face.
Shalimar laughed at the look. 'Yeah, and a home, and hopefully a less sucky life.'
'Thank you,' Lexa said, the genuine happiness something that she hadn't felt in a long time.
'We don't have a room for you yet,' Shalimar continued. The whole team had debated the idea of giving Lexa Emma's old room, but it was too much, too soon. 'We'll have one of the spare rooms cleaned out for you by tomorrow but tonight its the sofa.'
Lexa laughed, knowing how much all the gestures were costing Shalimar. Shalimar smiled in reply before pushing herself off the steps and walking in the direction of her room.
***
Brennan looked up at the sound of Shalimar's door sliding open. He had been hanging around outside her room trying to work out whether he should talk to her or not. He knew she had taken everything pretty hard and he had probably not made matters any better leaving her alone for such a long amount of time with Lexa and Adam.
He turned around as he heard a slight sound and came face to face with the woman he was so scared of confronting. She was leant against the door frame of her room with her eyebrows raised.
'Was there any reason why you've been dancing around in front of my room for the past half an hour?'
'Avoidance tactics,' he said with a smile. 'You mind if I come in?'
She stepped back into her room and he followed. Shalimar made her way towards her bed and dropped down onto it. Brennan looked around for a seat which didn't have a huge pile of clothes on but when he found none he decided to sit on the edge of the bed.
'I owe you an apology. I thought I knew best, leaving you with Lexa and Adam. I thought that if you were forced into it you would deal with stuff. I was wrong.'
'Yeah, well I'm pretty sure we're even. You put me in an awkward position and then you saved my life. So we're square,' she said.
'Okay,' Brennan replied. He nodded slightly, stood and started walking towards the door. He turned around to say good night but saw tears rolling down Shalimar's cheeks.
'What's wrong? Why are you crying?' he said as he walked back towards the bed and sat down next to her. He brushed the tears off her skin with his hand and lifted her face till she was looking at him.
'I miss her,' Shalimar managed to get out. She was ashamed that she had fallen apart in front of someone. She had been doing such a good job of keeping her feelings inside but she had finally been worn down to the point where she couldn't hide her emotions any longer.
'I know, we all do,' said Brennan as he wrapped his arms around her slim frame.
'And I just keep on thinking about how if I hadn't gone to see Nicholas none of this...' but she was cut off by Brennan grabbing her shoulders and looking deep into her eyes.
'Shal, you cannot blame yourself for this. None of it was your fault. You didn't wanna see Nicholas and we all convinced you to go against your instincts.'
'You can't blame yourself, Brennan.'
'I'm not, that's the point.' He pulled Shalimar back into his arms and felt her relax into him, her head under his chin.
'Emma would be so proud of you.'
***
The door slid open and light shone out onto the hallway floor. It quickly disappeared again as she shut the door behind her. She made her way silently down the hallway, holding her boots in one hand, her jacket in the other and the keys to the Lexus in her back pocket. She walked through the main area of Sanctuary and glanced at Lexa, sleeping, peacefully unaware that anything was going on around her. Both she and Adam had been there for two nights and although Lexa didn't have her own bed (the spare room was taking a lot longer to clear out than anybody had first thought) she seemed to have settled in well. She was probably just too tired to worry about where she was sleeping.
Shalimar carried on to the garage and made her way straight towards the car. She opened the front door and climbed in. She stuck the key in the ignition and fired it up, hoping that nobody could hear.
She drove the car out onto the empty road. She loved driving at that time of the night. At 1 in the morning not many people chose to travel anywhere, but Shalimar was a creature of the night and she had somewhere to be. She wound down the window hoping to try and relieve some of the stale air that had built up in the car. She felt it sweep through her hair and heard the landscape whistling past as she sped along the road, paying no attention to any driving laws.
***
Half an hour later she pulled up outside a house in the suburbs just a few miles from the nearest city. She pushed the door open and walked up the driveway towards the front door. She lifted her hand to knock but before she could bring her knuckles into contact with the wood the door opened in front of her. She blinked from the sudden and slightly unexpected light.
'Hello.'
She looked up towards the source of the voice.
'Hi,' she replied.
'You coming in?'
'Yeah, but I haven't got very long.'
She walked past the figure into the house. Nicholas looked up and down the street before closing the door behind them.