Disclaimer: I own the idea of the Shark, but I don't own his real identity, nor do I own the League.
Feedback: I'll still write this if I don't get any of it, but I would like it.
LotRseer3350: Glad you liked Seeqe; he'll be appearing a bit more in the future, but only in the really BIG problems...
Clez: Good thing; I was a bit stuck for something that went well with 'Hartdegen', so I just chose Seeqe as a compromise.
Niani: Who knows? Maybe people just think being invisible is enough torture for him. Plus, it'd be a bit difficult to torture someone when you can't see the person in question...
funyun: The analysis was Hyde letting Jekyll work out how badly Sawyer was injured. As to the love triangle suggestion, well... You'll have to wait and see.
Sean Malloy-1: I have got a plan to have the League visit this time, but that's not going to be for a while; I need to introduce a couple of other League members for this League, and the future League has to go through a couple of other missions. But don't worry; I'll get round to it eventually. However, if you like the idea of the League getting future help, check out my story 'Worlds at War'- it's not much, but the League do get Hartdegen to go into the future and pick up a weapon they need.
Resurrection
Two hours later, the League all sat outside the Nautilus's medical bay, waiting for news about the wounded American.
After they'd arrived back at the Nautilus, Hyde and Seeqe had reverted back into Jekyll and Hartdegen, both managing to quickly get dressed before rejoining the League. Jekyll had then examined Sawyer's injuries, and confirmed Hyde's earlier diagnosis; Sawyer's only physical injuries were a couple of bruised ribs, although he was suffering from a loss of blood as well. Both Nemo and Skinner had volunteered to donate theirs, although Jekyll had only taken Nemo's; he wasn't sure what the effects would be of Sawyer having the blood of an invisible man running through his veins, but he wasn't exactly eager to find out.
The League had then left Jekyll alone to remove Sawyer's bullets and get his ribs into a position where they'd be able to heal properly. The only member who'd stayed behind was Terry; due to his 'detailed files on human anatomy', he was the only other League member who could help Jekyll perform major surgery without the doctor needing to tell him what to do.
Right now, the three of them had been in the medical bay for almost an hour, and the rest of the League, along with Becky, were starting to get stiff from waiting around. They knew they should probably just go to bed, but they couldn't. For their own different reasons, each of them had to know for sure that Tom Sawyer would be all right.
For Mina and Becky, the reason was the same; Tom Sawyer was the man they loved, and they weren't going to leave until they had some news of his well- being, one way or the other.
In Skinner's case, he partly felt responsible for Sawyer's state- after all, if he'd been faster the American probably wouldn't have been shot-, and wanted to ensure that his slip-up hadn't led to the deaths of one of the few men he could actually call a friend these days.
For Hartdegen, it was because he'd like to be assured that he hadn't turned into Seeqe for nothing. That hadn't been the most pleasant of experiences he'd ever had, no matter what Seeqe had told Skinner, and he didn't want that to have been for nothing.
And for Nemo... well, it was his simple dedication to his friends. He was always concerned about the well-being of every one of his crew, and even though Sawyer was his unofficial superior, he saw no reason not to be as concerned about him as he would be about his crew.
After they'd been waiting for a while, Mina turned her attention to Becky.
"So, Miss Thatcher, would you care to enlighten us as to the identity of the Shark?" she said, looking curiously at the young woman.
"What?" Becky asked, slightly surprised at that comment. "Wh-what makes you think I know anything about him?"
"The fact that you called him by name," Hartdegen said, looking over at her. "Coupled with everything you said to him before I turned into Seeqe, I think we're entitled to know exactly who the Shark -or 'Huck', as you called him- really is."
Becky sighed. "Well, all right," she said, as she looked around at the remaining members of the League. "As I mentioned down in the cave, Tom and Huck were best friends all the way through childhood." She smiled a little at a fond memory. "You should have been there when the two of them and Joe Harper were thought to be dead and showed up for their own funeral; that was rich!"
"Really?" Skinner said, cocking one invisible eyebrow at Becky. "What was that about?"
Mina looked over at the invisible man with a piercing gaze in her eyes.
Skinner gulped. "Shutting up now."
Mina smiled and turned back to Becky.
Becky continued. "Anyway, Tom, Huck and Joe always got up to those kind of pranks; some people called them 'the Troublesome Three' in certain circles." Then she stopped and sighed. "Then, after Joe died, it dropped to only two..."
Mina remembered Tom mentioning that to her; according to him, Joe's death was the reason he and Becky had broken up. Not wanting to force Becky to dwell on that, she waved her hand to get the young woman to move on.
Becky smiled in thanks. "Anyway, around that time the two of them were approached by a representative of the newly-formed American Secret Services; their high jinks were some of the more interesting pieces of information about this town, and it attracted the Government's attention. They had a few interesting missions, such as dealing with the occasional mad scientist, but never anything major." Then she sighed. "I never really heard any of this from Tom. He and I stopped talking after Joe's death, and pretty much all of this I found out from Huck. We were never... you know... romantically involved or anything," she said, looking around at the League to ensure they understood that. They nodded, and she continued; "but we were still good friends, and, well, Tom and I hadn't parted on good terms. The last time I heard from Huck, they were tracking down the Fantom, and, well, then I got a message from Tom saying that Huck was... was..." She lowered her head, and the final word came out in a sobbing choke. "Dead..."
The League looked around at each other, each of them understanding the pain Becky was going through. After all, Allan's death was still a touchy subject among them even after several months had passed, and they'd only known him a few days. However, the fact that Becky had only recently nearly been killed by a friend that she had believed to be dead could also be the cause of her fragile emotional condition, which none of the League felt like interrupting.
After Becky had stopped sobbing quite as loudly, Skinner broke the subject.
"So," he said, trying to sound fairly casual, "stupid question, I know, but if Huck's dead, how come he was trying to kill us all a few hours ago?"
Becky sobbed into her hand a little at that, and Mina looked over at Skinner with her eyes flashing red. Skinner gulped, and didn't say anything else.
Just before the situation could get any more awkward, the door to the medical bay opened, and Jekyll and Terry walked out. Jekyll had taken off his jacket and waistcoat and had rolled up his sleeves, and Terry had, for a change, removed his coat and glasses. Their hands had some small bloodstains on them, but it didn't look like anything serious.
"How is he?" Mina asked, looking up at the two of them.
Jekyll smiled at her. "Nothing serious," he said reassuringly. "His ribs should heal in a couple of weeks, although I wouldn't recommend him going into action during that time. The blood transfusion took a while- I've never really tried that kind of operation before- but with Terry's help, I managed to make some progress. He'll be fine."
Mina sighed in relief. "Thank you," she said, leaning in and kissing Jekyll on the cheek before running into the medical bay. The League knew she would have done the same for Terry, but as a machine it wouldn't have meant anything to him. They dashed in after Mina, Becky briefly stopping to pat Terry on the shoulder and whisper 'thank you' before joining the others.
Looking at each other, Jekyll and Terry shrugged and walked in after them.
Once they were in the medical bay, the League noticed Sawyer almost at once. He was sitting up in a bed off to one side, with a large curtain draped around the area where the operation had been performed. He didn't exactly look like he was in excellent shape- there was still some dried blood on his lip and his chest, from what could be seen of it under his now- torn shirt, still had a couple of scars on it- but at least he wasn't bleeding anymore. He was currently reading one of the books he'd recently acquired from the Nautilus's library; 'A Study in Scarlet', by Doctor John Watson, and edited by his literary agent Arthur Conan Doyle.
As the League entered, he looked up at them with a smile on his face.
"Well, good to see you guys were waiting for me," he said, trying to sound casual, as he put the book down on his bedside table and smiled up at them. His voice still had a slight edge of pain in it, but other than that he appeared fine.
Mina, who had sat through the entire operation with no idea what has happening to him, looking as still as a statue, just broke down. She gave a small sob, and then her arms were wrapped around Sawyer, her face buried into his shoulder as she cried.
Uncertain what else to do, Sawyer just put his arms around Mina and hugged her.
"Shhh..." he said, trying to sound soothing. He knew that telling Mina to do something like that was risking her anger, but he felt like it was appropriate. "It's okay, Mina... it's okay... I'm alive. We're all alive..." he said, as she pulled away and looked him in the eyes, her own eyes now slightly red. Not the usual red of vampirism, he noted, but the red of tears. He briefly felt flattered that he could get that kind of response from her, but then just went back to being concerned about her, and hugged her again.
"I'm sorry," Mina whispered into his ear. "If I'd been there, maybe... maybe..."
"It wasn't you," Sawyer replied, trying to console while the rest of the League just stood back and watched them. He briefly noticed Becky looking slightly annoyed, but dismissed it; that didn't make any sense to him. So he turned his attention back to Mina. "I don't blame you, Mina. Huck wanted me dead more than he wanted to target anyone else; he'd have gone after me even if the entire League had been with me." He pulled back from her, and looked her in the eyes. "I love you, Mina. Nothing you could do could stop that, and certainly not something that you didn't have any control over."
Mina smiled. He may be young in some regards, but sometimes Mina felt like Tom was the immortal one in this relationship, rather than her. Leaning in, she gratefully kissed him, a tender, soft kiss that conveyed her sorrow more than any other kiss could have done. Becky looked almost furious, but Tom and Mina parted before anyone else could notice.
After the spy and the vampire had been staring into each other's eyes for a couple of minutes, Becky finally broke the silence.
"Sorry to interrupt this tender moment," she said, sounding slightly sarcastic, "but, Tom, we need to focus on one point."
"Namely?" Sawyer asked, looking over at Becky.
"Why does... Huck... think you shot him?" Becky asked, sounding slightly scared. Could she possibly think that Huck had been telling the truth?
Then again, Sawyer couldn't quite blame her; Huck had been fairly convincing when he'd been talking to him, and Sawyer had KNOWN what had really happened.
"It's complicated, but I'll be brief," he said, sitting up and managing to look stronger than he felt himself. "It goes back to when Huck and I had apparently managed to trap the Fantom in an abandoned warehouse, when the two of us were put on assignment to stop him."
"Too bad you blew it," Skinner shrugged.
Sawyer looked over at him with an expression that only gave the smallest hint of how angry he was at that comment. Skinner gulped. "I mean... go on?" he said sheepishly.
Sawyer nodded and continued. "Anyway, it turned out that the Fantom had hidden in this particular warehouse because it had sixteen of his men in it. Huck and I almost got killed, but we used our tried and tested attack strategy; attack plan beta."
"Which consists of?" Hartdegen asked.
"Basically, he and I split up and take on certain targets individually," Sawyer explained. Noticing the slightly suspicious expression on Becky's face, Sawyer glared at her. "Don't knock it, Becky; it was often the only thing that helped us get out alive. In most cases our opponents weren't really expecting us to put up any kind of fight when dealing with superior numbers."
"Or maybe they just weren't expecting you to be so insane?" Becky asked, with a very icy tone in her voice.
"So, how'd that lead to Hucky getting shot?" Skinner asked, trying to calm the mood between the two Americans. Quite frankly, he wasn't sure whether to bang their heads together or book a wedding chapel; it was so OBVIOUS to him that Miss Thatcher still loved Sawyer! You couldn't hate someone as much as she seemed to hate Tom and not be trying to MAKE yourself hate the guy in question.
Sawyer got back to the matter at hand. "Anyway, when Huck and I had taken out all of the soldiers, the Fantom tackled Huck and then kicked me in the stomach. I was only out of action for a few minutes, but, in that time, the Fantom..." He swallowed, and then almost appeared to force the words out. "...shot him in the head..." He briefly stared down for a while, before Mina slid her hand into his and gave it a small squeeze. Looking up at her, Sawyer smiled in thanks, and then continued to talk. "Anyway, I got back up in a few minutes, but in that time the Fantom managed to dump off Huck's body and then flee. He'd left the gun he'd used behind when he ran off; it was completely empty, so I assumed that Huck had been shot to pieces." He groaned. "Guess I was wrong. Apparently, since Huck never saw the Fantom's gun, he thinks I shot him with my Winchester for some reason." He groaned. "God, if only I'd looked for Huck's body..."
"You could not have know, Agent Sawyer," Nemo replied. "The Fantom was a very dangerous man, as we all know; there was no guarantee that he would even have left Agent Finn in one piece."
Sawyer sighed. "I know that, Nemo. But, seeing him like that, actually trying to kill me..." He groaned. "I'd... just like to be alone for a while."
"A good idea," Jekyll said, speaking for the first time he'd entered the room. "Your wounds aren't anything serious, Tom, but if you have a rest soon, it should help you to recover."
"Right," Mina said, glancing back at Sawyer with a smile on her face. "Stay safe, Tom. We'll be back tomorrow."
"Right," Sawyer said, lying back on his bed as the other League members walked out of the medical bay. He had a bit of healing to do...
A couple of hours later, he was awakened by the sound of a door opening.
His eyes wide open, he automatically reached for his gun, remembering only when he found nothing there that he was in the medical bay.
Quickly, he went over who might be coming down here. It had to be because of him, since he was the only patient in the bay at present. Jekyll and Terry had patched him up fairly well, and neither of them suffered from a lack of confidence where medicine was concerned, so it couldn't be them. Nemo, Hartdegen, and Skinner were possibilities, but he couldn't think why they'd be dropping in on him late at night, especially after their recent fight. That only left Mina and Becky, and, based on the fact that Becky had no good reason to come down, that only left Mina.
Admittedly, that possibility didn't make sense either. Sawyer wouldn't deny he and Mina had some issues regarding control at times, but there was no way she could get horny enough for him to come down when he was trying to get better. Whatever her other flaws were, control of her instincts wasn't one of them. After all, she could keep her longing for blood under control; she couldn't be having this much trouble with her hormones.
So, who...?
Just as he began to turn his head, Sawyer suddenly found himself with an unfamiliar tongue stuck down his throat. Fully awake now, he quickly looked to see if he could spot any distinguishing features about the person who was now kissing him, and noticed a strand of blond hair hanging down, and realised who this person was.
Becky.
Just as that thought crossed Tom's mind, Becky pulled away, looked him in the eyes, and said the four words he'd never expected to hear again.
"Tom, I love you."