Chapter 19

Lexa cradled Shalimar's head in her hands. She met the blond woman's eyes with her own, searching for something, anything. All she found was a dying light filled with despair. She watched as her lips moved. She bent down to hear better. "What is it, Shal? Tell me what to do."

"You…should've…"

Shalimar's head became a dead weight in her hands. "No, no, no…Shal, wait! What should I do?!" Desperately Lexa looked around the room of the main cave. "Brennan!"

She raced over to the sofa, where she saw Brennan lounging with his feet up. "Brennan!" Shaking his shoulder, she tried to wake him. He wouldn't move. She slapped his face, trying to get a response. Sliding her fingers to his neck, she felt for a pulse. There was nothing. He was gone. Shattered, her emotions cascaded over her. They were gone. But where was Jesse? Frantically she scanned the room. She didn't see him! She moved from the sofa to search the room but stumbled across something lying on the floor.

"Oh, no, no. Not you, Jesse, love." She bent down to stroke his cheek. His eyes were open, but unseeing. He was dead. She was empty. She was alone. She had known that the separation would be hard, but this was so much worse than she could have even imagined. This was worse than Leo. With one hand, she closed his eyes. Then she cradled his head and shoulders in her lap, rocking back and forth. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"You shouldn't have forced him. Now they're gone. All of them."

Lexa looked up, tears streaming down her face. Katie was standing in the doorway. She moved toward Lexa, her eyes furious. "You shouldn't have forced him! My family was taken away once before. Now it's been taken away again. It's your fault! You shouldn't have forced him. It killed him. It killed all of them!"

"No, no. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for any of it to happen. I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry, so sorry, sor…No!" Lexa awoke violently from the nightmare. It had been so real. What had she done?

It took several minutes to recover from the horrifying images that still lingered in her mind. When she had recovered enough for her breathing to return to a semblance of normalcy, she stood up from the terminal where she had been working. She stretched her body, trying to rid it of both the kinks of sleep and the adrenaline from the nightmare.

After her conversation with Katie earlier, she had calmed down somewhat, but was still angry with Jesse for not telling them – not telling her – that he had found their expiration dates. Because she was so angry, she had decided not to seek anyone else out. Instead, she had gone to one of the computer terminals in the corner office and pulled up the files she had downloaded from the disc Kellogg had given them. She remembered decrypting them, but must have fallen asleep at the terminal before decoding them. No wonder she had a nightmare – the terminals were a damned uncomfortable place to sleep.

Lexa reached over and turned of the computer. She would never be able to concentrate on decoding the files tonight. She turned off the light and left the room.

Rounding the corner, she thought back to the last thing Jesse had said. Don't ask me to kill you. To her, having him experiment with his new abilities on her didn't seem like such a risk. Hell, she was going to die in three days, anyway. But for him, she realized, he was risking everything. Not only her life, but his. As well as his hope. If he couldn't do anything to help them, and they never found Adam, he would be the only one to survive. He'd have Katie, but he'd be losing a family a second time. Although she was still upset with him for not telling her about finding her expiry dates, she better understood, with Katie's help, that he was hiding it to protect her from the anguish of knowing she was going to die because he couldn't do anything. She should have realized – he was an open book after all. Instead, she had let her temper get the better of her. She let out a deep breath. She should find him and apologize. She redirected her steps toward the medbay, hoping he was still there.

A few seconds later, there was a loud clang above her, followed by a grunt. Looking up to the catwalk running alongside the wall, she saw Jesse. He was hopping to his feet and dusting himself off. When he turned towards the stairs at the far end of the hall, he saw her and stopped. She blinked, making sure her mind hadn't conjured him.

He was real. She heard his voice when he spoke. He flashed her a sheepish half-smile and said. "I was up in the mansion talking to Katie." He pointed to the ceiling. "Decided to take a shortcut. I should really install padding here or something. But hey, it's not like I couldn't take care of myself if I did hurt myself."

She continued to stare blankly at him.

He looked down at his feet and stuffed his hands into the back pockets of his cargo pants. "Yeah. Guess it's not the time for bad jokes."

He surprised her, then, when he took a breath and phased through the catwalk to the floor below. As he landed, he was already taking steps towards her. "Lexa, I'm sorry I didn't tell you. And I'm sorry I yelled at you. If you want –"

Lexa silenced him, holding a hand up in front of his mouth. "I should apologize to you too, Jess. I shouldn't have put that kind of pressure on you, especially so fast and with all that's been happening."

"Well, you were probably right. It's your only chance right now. And I should have told you about your date. The whole trust issue goes both ways, and I forgot that."

Lexa shuffled her feet and rubbed her arms. "You were probably right too. It's just that over the past couple of weeks I've really started to think of Mutant X as my home and my family. I'm not ready to give it up. I thought I could, but I can't." Her eyes were filling with tears and she scrunched her nose in an effort to hold them in.

"Oh, Lexa. Come here." Jesse reached out, grabbed her shoulder and pulled her into his arms. He rocked her in his embrace, running a hand along her shoulders and back, soothing her as he had the last time she cried. "Shhh…it's okay. I don't know how yet, but it will be okay. I promise you." He took comfort in the fact that she trusted him enough to hug him back. He felt her breath and the hot drops of fresh tears on his neck. He ran his fingers through her hair, savoring its silky length. "I understand. I'm scared too. Mutant X is where I belong; it's my family too. We've both lost families before. I'm scared that I won't be able to save this family, the one I want more than anything to save. I'm scared of my new ability, that it will do more harm than good." He pulled back so he could look her in the eye. "But we've got each other. And we've got Shalimar and Brennan and Katie. And we all care about each other. That's going to be the difference."

She nodded, and leaned back into his arms, wanting to return to his soothing embrace, but he stopped her.

"I'll do it. I'll do it for you."

She paused, not understanding what he was talking about. Then she remembered. He was talking about trying to use his ability to save her. He was willing to take the risk of losing her to save her because she wanted him to. "Thank you," was all she said.

He stared at her eyes for a moment. They were so light. Such a contrast to her dark hair. They acted like a chasm, pulling him to her, where he would fall in, and never be able to escape. He didn't want to. Because they were more than that. They were the windows that let him see her, to see what she was really feeling. And he saw something there now. Something he had almost seen before, but saw clearly now. He didn't know if she knew it was there, but he saw it. He bent his head down, angling his head so his lips would meet hers.

For a moment, it was a simple kiss, one of promise. Somewhere in the back of their minds they both noted that it was the first time that he had kissed her, rather than the other way around. The soft kiss quickly turned into something else all together. Simultaneously, they both deepened the kiss, opening their mouths, their tongues dancing. They tasted, nibbled and felt. She moved her hands to his head, so she could pull him closer, make the kiss deeper if it was possible. He let himself fall into her, reveling in her taste, her texture and her scent. Their lips parted, not to breathe, but to change position, and learn more about each other. She felt his hips unconsciously leaning into hers. It lasted forever, but not nearly long enough; eventually he pulled away so they could both breathe.

"As much as I want this," he said, nudging her hips with his own and taking gulps of air, "it's not time." He dropped another kiss on her lips, this time making sure to keep it light. "Come on. We need to get some sleep." He laced his fingers around hers and started toward the door.

She stopped him by tugging on his arm. "Not to the mansion. Katie and I fixed my room."

"Lexa," he warned.

"Just stay with me. Please?"

He closed his eyes and nodded. He followed, letting her lead him into her new room. He spared a few seconds to look around at the spartan setup, but quickly trained his eyes back on hers. He hoped to God that she didn't do anything to tempt him. Pulling away the last time had been hard enough. There was no question that both of them wanted it. But he knew it couldn't be now, not while they were both in such unstable emotional states.

She pulled back the covers and began to strip down to her underwear. He followed suit, leaving his boxers on. Silently, they crawled into the bed, settling down together. She lay with her head tucked into his shoulder, her right arm slung tight across his lean waist. He let his own right hand rest on her hip and tucked his left behind his head. Once his body lay flat on the mattress he felt the emotional strain of the day pull him toward sleep. He could feel Lexa's own body relax against him.

"I love you."

Jesse looked down, surprised, knowing what it took for her to say those words. "I love you, too, Lex. And I swear to you, I'm going to do everything in my power to save you."

Lexa nodded, snuggling closer. She heard his heartbeat slow, felt his breathing become deep and even.

"You already have," she whispered to his slumbering form. Then she closed her eyes and let sleep claim her.