Author's Note: No, I'm not dead. Just hit a particularly dry patch… for those of you reading my other stories, I'm really sorry for the wait, but I am working on them, I promise. Don't give up on me yet? Thanks… anyway, this is nothing special. It was a 15minuteficlets piece for livejournal, hence the shortness, and the… lack of anything happening really. I kinda like the result anyway. The prompt was 'routine'.
WEAK LINK
Snapping the chamber of the six-shooter open with a flick of his wrist, he glanced down at the empty slots that presented themselves to him, almost invitingly. His guns weren't normally unloaded like this, but when being cleaned, it helped it there wasn't the added risk of their going off while you were turning them this way and that, and effectively taking them apart to make sure they were useable.
Tom Sawyer made no sound as he went through the motions of making sure it was clean and more or less immaculate within the chamber of the Colt — or as immaculate as it could be given that they were fired a lot, and making them completely spotless was more difficult than getting Skinner to stay out of Mina's room — and his eyes never left the task. His mind laid out the task before him, leading him through the stages like a plan or a map. It was routine. He'd done it so many times that he never faltered or stopped to think about the next step.
He finished the Colt pistol, clicking the chamber back into place after checking it was done, and then spun it effortlessly in his hand, fitting it snugly back into its holster at his side; he heard the sound of leather against the metal, and released the grip when he was confident it wouldn't slip from its place. He was never without them, and he knew he would feel… alone, if they weren't there, at his side, within reach. He didn't have what the others had… he needed the guns.
Tom wasn't a vampire; he didn't have a beastly alter-ego; he wasn't invisible; he didn't know martial arts…
He didn't have any of that, and it left him vulnerable. Too many times, he had been targeted because he was the proverbial weak link in the chain that was the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. The League couldn't afford a weak link…
In some ways, they couldn't afford a completely unremarkable, mortal member of the team.
A heavy sigh disturbed the quiet of the room, even as he pulled the Winchester onto his lap, going about opening it up where he could, and taking apart what was made for disassembly… which wasn't very much. His mind kept running; never stopped.
He knew what Allan Quatermain would say to him if he were still alive. A faint smile touched Tom Sawyer's face as he thought about the other man… the other vulnerable, mortal man, remarkable only in his legendary experience.
Quatermain would tell him he couldn't be so negative. The optimist of the team couldn't be replaced, could he? Tom chuckled quietly to himself, and then sighed again, shaking his head. True, he had a little more cynicism in him nowadays than he had in the past, but for a good reason. He just had to know how to weigh the bad against the good… he had to balance it out.
The team could afford a weak link…
After all, they hadn't been broken yet.
Fin