-12-
"Kaellen Quinn-Donovan."
The words were a whisper into the dark emptiness of a silent ark.
"My name is Kaellen."
…Interesting name…
…Tah'! It means mighty warrior in Gaelic…
…Mighty warrior?...
…Tah', e'er'one at me Kelly. I s'ppose its easier…
Phoenix was sprawled on the fancy chair with her feet up on the console. She chuckled to herself. "My name was Kaellen."
...I think Kaellen's a beautiful name…
…Why'd your parents name you Reaper?...
He laughed…they didn't. That's what they call me in the marines…
…why?...
…Grim Reaper?...
…Oh. John Grimm. I get it…
"John Grimm," she whispered. "I don't get it."
A tear rolled down from the corner of her left eye down to her cheek. "After all these years…I don't."
----
"How old was she?"
"Fourteen, I think…maybe fifteen."
"She was young."
"It was amazing she survived, then, Sam. She lost a lot of blood."
"What about her father's research?"
"I don't know what happened to it."
"No other surviving family?"
"No, she had an uncle. We were basically trying to get to him. She knew the way through the woods. I'm glad she forced me to take her through that path – I'd have probably ended up dead like the rest of the team, if we didn't."
"I'm glad she did too, John. I don't understand. How could you just forget her?"
"I didn't. I just kept her locked into my mind and threw away the key."
"Like you did for Mars?"
"It's not the same."
"I know you too well, John. This is what you do. Something must have affected you deeply about your mission to have shut it out!"
"I was just a year into the marines, Sam. You can't expect me to have seen what I've seen and be all happy and cool about it."
"And you can't expect her to be the same either, John. We lost our parents to an accident; she lost hers to a madman. We had each other; they killed her siblings. In front of her eyes."
"I never said I expected her to be the same – I just said, she's changed a lot. I'm sure I didn't help."
"What do you mean? You only told me she wanted to be a marine because of you! You must have given her something to depend on."
"I promised her, Sam." John said, sighing. "I promised her I would keep in touch with her. I didn't. I mean, I guess to some extent I was all she had back then."
"She doesn't blame you for that, does she?"
"No…at least, I don't think she does. It's just that…"
"Just what, John?"
"I don't know!"
He did know. It was on purpose. I was getting too involved.
---
She was back to her ice queen routine again.
John watched her intently as she went about explaining some rot about electromagnetic fields. She kept her eyes cold and distant, if she met his eyes, all he saw was a wall; but he could tell she was uncomfortable, because she avoided meeting his eyes as less often as possible.
"Two days!" he heard Hobbit mutter. "Two goddamn days and we're still stuck here."
"Son, you are free to leave if you fucking want it!" Genghis barked at him, when he heard. "But I'll be damned if you leave without a fucking court marshal, if you, for saying that."
"You think you're the only one who's tired here, Hobbit?"
"Sir, I was just…"
"You're the only one who wants to go home, is it?"
"No sir, I do not."
"You have a girlfriend waiting for you, son?"
"Er…sir…"
"Answer the question!"
"Yes sir, but I…"
"Well Smith's got a little girl and Sandman's got a fine-assed wife. I suppose you don't think that's important, do you?"
"Sir, I…"
"Oh yes, I'm sure you think," Genghis said, sarcastically, "'Sarge's a half-assed prick, who doesn't have any family, I'm sure it doesn't matter to him that we are rotting out here like a bunch of…'"
"Stop badgering him, Sarge." Gamgee cut in. "He's only thinking what we all are."
"GAMGEE, HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU THAT YOU DO NOT INTERRUPT YOUR COMMANDING OFFICER WHEN HIS MOUTH IS OPEN!"
"What the fuck Sarge! He's right!" Gryffin spoke up.
"You're out of line, soldier."
"You're the one out of line, Genghis!" Gryffin jumped up.
"You wanna repeat that?" Genghis stepped forward.
"I said," Gryffin said, coolly, taking a step forwards himself. "You are the one who is fucking out of line, sir!"
Genghis took two steps forwards and swung a right hook at Gryffin. Gryffin fell backwards and toppled over a table.
"GODDAMN YOU!" Gamgee lost it and charged at Genghis. Genghis was pushed back towards the wall as the two engaged in a boxing fight. Gryffin as soon as he recovered sprang onto Genghis and it became a two against one match.
"STOP!" Sam cried. The others sprang up to separate them, but it was a task keeping two huge men apart. John did not interfere; he just sat back and watched the scene.
"John!" Sam cried.
He shrugged. "It's their own goddamn problem."
"It's not going to help us get this over with, ohn."
"What am I supposed to do?"
"Stop them, somehow!"
Finally, Phoenix who was the smallest managed to wrench her way between the two pugilists, keeping her back pressed against Genghis to keep him from lunging at the brothers. Bazooka held Genghis by his elbows. The others kept the struggling brothers in check.
"Motherfuckers, both of you!"
"Goddamn tyrant!"
"Bastard!"
The swearwords flowed freely as the three men were contained by their colleagues as though they were raging bulls behind a fence.
"ENOUGH!" Bazooka hollered. It was no good.
"Stop it, you three!" Phoenix said.
"What are you tellin' us for? He's the one barking senseless orders. Stupid egotistical prick!" Gamgee yelled.
"You don't like my orders, you get off the team!"
"Why should we? You'r the one with the stick up his ass!"
"You little cunt-sucker, I outta blow your brains of for insurrection!"
"If you call this insurrection, wait till we actually skin you alive!"
John had had enough. He gave a huge sigh and then gave a bored sneer and said, "Are the three of you done blowing off steam? Or do you need a little more game time?"
All heads were in his direction, there were similar expressions of annoyance and surprise.
"Don't look so surprised!" He drawled. "If your not done get one with it, 'coz this ain't TV and I can't change the channel!"
"You think this is some sort of joke, Reaper?" Genghis barked.
John sighed and said, "Well it must be, because I'm wondering why you three are fighting?"
"You're crazy, aren't you?" Poet said, suddenly.
"Well I must be, Poet," John said in a mock sing-song tone. "I mean, I am the one who wanted to get my ass dragged down here, a long way from decent food, good drinks and fine pieces off ass to spend my waking minutes in a godforsaken abandoned science project, with a whole lotta Martian demons up my ass…" His tone voice elevated to a shout as he stood up. "WITH A GROUP OF BICKERING SOLDIERS!"
Everyone fell silent.
"Looks men, this is not a training mission. This is the real thing. UAC does not give a fuck about your guys and if they're hiding something, they won't shed a tear if anything happens to us in this mission, so it's important that we all STICK. TOGETHER!"
He glared at Genghis and said. "And that specially applies to you as the CO, Genghis."
Genghis returned his burning gaze, John expected him to confront him but he didn't. Him and the brothers stopped struggling. When the others were confident they let them go. John observed that Phoenix had her hand on Genghis' shoulder in a comforting way. Genghis patted hand, as if to let her know he'd be fine. She nodded and went back to her position in front of the main screen.
"Stay cool man," Hobbit said to Gamgee who swatted his head. Hobbit yelped and whined. "What was that for?"
"This is your fault, dipshit!"
"How's it my-"
"Hobbit!" Poet snapped. "I think its best you shut up now."
Hobbit mumbled a 'Sorry' and nodded.
The tension was tangible in the room for a few minutes until Phoenix started talking again.
John kept his eyes on her cold face as she talked, not hearing one word but wondering only one thing. Why did her relationship with Genghis make so much of an impression on him? Was it only curiosity?
----
"So, you gotta boyfriend or something?"
Phoenix frowned and looked at Sam as she packed her kit. Three of them were going to the surface to search for anything that might lead them to the source of the field.
"Look," Sam said, realizing she had annoyed her. "I'm not prying or anything…I just asked."
Phoenix gave her an unaffected expression.
"Okay." Sam said, giving up. "You're not one to talk, I get that. Sorry, I'll just shut up and go do my thing."
Sam turned around with the immense desire to drown herself in a formalin jar when Phoenix suddenly made her stop. "No," she said
Sam turned around, surprised the girl had actually spoken. Sam smiled at her nervously and then said, "I was just…making conversation I guess…I didn't want to…"
Phoenix nodded cutting her off. She put on her gloves and was about to pull the bag of the desk when Sam unable to find a way to unobtrusively bring up the topic, suddenly burst out. "I – John told me."
Phoenix kept the bag on the table and then looked at her curiously.
Embarrassed, Sam came forward and said, "I- I- mean…he told me, how you two know each other."
Sam couldn't even begin to imagine what Phoenix was thinking when she just stared at her. Sam assumed the worst and then decided to make this as fast as possible. She nervously started wringing her hands and fumbled as she spoke hurriedly. "I mean, I don't want you thinking that he blurted your personal thing or anything, it's just that…there's really little he can hide from me. I mean, we're twins. I….I…I can't hide anything from him. I mean…there was this time I didn't want to tell him I was dating the Principal of the school I work in, so I hid it from him. He's against the whole fraternizing at work thing and the Devlin's was so sweet and I couldn't say no…so I just went out with him, but I couldn't tell John! But I was feeling so awful! So awful!" She shook her head. "Eventually one evening I just burst into his apartment and came out with the whole thing!" She broke off to breathe and found that Phoenix had a peculiar expression on her face.
"I'm rambling, aren't I?" She said, sheepishly. "Anyway, the point is we can't hide anything from each other…so…John didn't purposely mean to tell me."
Phoenix looked down and then gave her an amused sneer and said, "So was he okay with it?"
Sam frowned. "With what?"
"You and the Principal. Was he okay with it?"
"Oh!" Sam snorted nervously. She chuckled, feeling some tension dissipate. "Oh yeah! He was cool! I think he figured out I was pretty worked up over it. So…besides I mean, I don't think he could really argue. I'm not really getting any younger and I guess Devlin's the best bet around so…" At Phoenix's seemingly disapproving expression she corrected herself. "…No! I mean, Devlin's a great guy! You won't get him in a million years! But I…I meant…"
Phoenix gave her an amused nod of understanding.
Sam took a deep breath and said, "I…what I wanted to say was…actually I wanted to say this before I found out about your past…"
Phoenix raised her eyebrows expectantly.
Sam shrugged. "That was my brother whose ass you covered out there. It means…I mean, your history apart, I'm really grateful."
Phoenix nodded, urging her to go on.
"I…I wanted you to know, how…how sorry I was, about your…past. Your loss?"
Phoenix's expression became colder. Sam went on. "We lost our parents as kids too…it hurt John more than me. I mean, he was good student you know. He'd have been the best…like our Dad. So, although, I can't imagine what it's like for you, but I guess what I wanted to say is, I understand a little bit. I'm not patronizing you or anything, oh crap! I'm ruining this, aren't I?"
Phoenix did something Sam wouldn't expect in a million years. She gave her an understanding smile. Sam couldn't believe the wonders that smile did to her oval face; it made her look totally different.
The redhead suspended the kit in her hand and finally said, "I understand. Thank you."
Sam nodded. Phoenix turned slightly and then stopped and looked at Sam. "I know this probably doesn't seem important now, but…back then. In Philadelphia?"
Sam nodded for her to continue.
"He told me about you," Phoenix said. "He missed you terribly. Like, being apart from half of your soul – those were the words he used."
Sam smiled.
"I suppose it must be the case with all siblings, but with John…I suppose it's a deeper bond with twins." Phoenix said. "You were very important to him, not that you're any less important now, but back then – things were different."
Sam nodded. "We didn't get along so well."
"Yes," Phoenix said, "he told me." She shrugged. "I best get on."
Phoenix turned to leave and then Sam stopped her again. "Phoenix?" Phoenix turned around.
Sam debated on whether to say it or not but then she finally went ahead. "John doesn't open up about his past to just anyone, you know."
Phoenix frowned.
Sam knew she was pushing her luck but she continued. "He's very reserved about what he lets on about himself. More so then than now."
Phoenix's expression was unreadable.
Sam sighed and then said, "He always keeps his promises, Phoenix. If he hasn't then there must be some very, very good reason."
After a long silence, Phoenix said, "Why are you telling me this?"
"Because he never forgot you."
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(A/N: Short and sweet update. Please review or the chaps will get shorter!)
