Chapter 33


"I want to go home." Larrin said breaking the silence in the room, she let the tears run down the sides of her face, letting herself feel the guilt and grief she constantly pushed away come forth. Kara and she had been laying in the double bed of Andrea's guest bedroom in companionable silence. Though on Larrin's side her thoughts had been consuming her completely. She had been trying to think of how she could just get away and keep them all safe. But her brain was a blank and frankly all the escape and evade training her father pounded into her as a little girl hadn't involved any scenario like she was in right now.

"I know, we'll get you there. I don't know when but we will." Kara promised her, though she didn't know when as she could feel the pain Larrin was in. She was so broken with grief, it was only natural Larrin yearned to want to go home to Australia.

"I don't know why you're here. You know the truth, I wasn't just running all that time with no contact with other people. Everyone knows and you know what's funny. My dad would be so proud of me but Wolf, he's going to be angry at himself like it's his fault when it's all mine." Larrin said with a humourless laugh, she knew that Kara found out about her dark secret.

"Larrin, we've all done things we're not proud of to survive. We've all trusted the wrong people. You're no Robinson Crusoe." Kara told her, trying to get her to understand that they all made mistakes and bad things happen.

"Yes, but you joined the military knowing one day you might be in that position where you'd have to kill someone. You trained for it and spent months becoming accustomed to the reality so by the time you find yourself in a situation like that, you'd made up your mind how you feel about a lot of things." Larrin argued.

"Not entirely true. Yes, we are trained and we do make up our minds about how we feel about our work in the general sense. But they don't prepare us for every possible worse case scenario." Kara told her as she thought of Baltimore and the Avocet labs. She propped her head up on her elbow and looked to Larrin.

"I've been in the Navy for a few years and let me tell you. Majority of my career has been inside the CIC where our goal is to take out a target which in most cases is a marker on a computer screen." Kara said, it was more complex than that but she felt she needed to simplify it for Larrin so she understood. "It's easier to have a sense detachment because you're really a cog in a well oiled machine. You're following orders and doing what you're trained to do. You trust the people in the room beside you and the person at the top to be making the right decisions at that time with the information on hand." Kara told her.

Larrin stared at the ceiling, Kara knew she was listening as she wasn't the kind of person to push out or ignore different opinions. She took a deep breath and continued.

"There's a comfort in working in a crew because you have people surrounding you in the same situation. We all back one another but I also know what it's like to be scared and alone. To have to fight for your life and do things you'd never expect you'd have to. Just to survive." Kara admitted, she had never told anyone what she was about to say. But she trusted Larrin enough to share with her as she felt it would help her just as much as it'd help Kara to share it. "The first time I heard my baby's heartbeat, the first time I saw my baby in an ultrasound; I was a prisoner in a laboratory." Kara told her.

Larrin looked to her not sure what to say but Kara gave her a sad smile and continued. "We trusted the wrong people and lost control of the situation. Luckily for me, I wasn't on my own and I had helped. You didn't have that luxury. I know you hoped you could forget about it and move on. We all want that but now your chickens have come home to roost. But this time you're not alone. You have Wolf and a lot people to help you. You just have to let us in." Kara told her.

"You can't help me. Val said it, I can give a zone 6 months of freedom. It's why the cops are trying to find me. To hand me over to them and they will because I can't hide here forever." Larrin told her.

"We'll figure this out." Kara assured her.

"Julian hunted me for weeks. The only reason he stopped was that I stabbed him in the neck. But I didn't do a very good job as I didn't check to make sure he was really dead, so it just slowed him down. It's why this is so hard, because I'm going to have to go back out there." Larrin told her.

"No you won't." Kara promised her as she wished she could convince Larrin that she was safe. But the young woman was already certain her fate was sealed and nothing they said could sway her otherwise. It made Kara wish Wolf was here as she felt maybe he'd be able to reach Larrin.

"You can't guarantee that and I barely beat him the first time. So I doubt my chances are good with this." She said being practical and a defeatist in one go as she held up her broken arm.


"Why would you lie to me?" Michener demanded of Senator Pierce as the man came completely clean on everything that had happened in St Louis and how he'd managed to maintain control over the zone. Commissioner Holliday remained silent but Tom hated how unrepentant h and Pierce were. They actually felt their actions were justifiable.

"Please, you're judging me as we speak but I've saved over 100,000 lives, I have a working economy and our people are flourishing. I've accomplished the impossible. Just the other day you were cheering my efforts." Pierce argued.

"How many people died for you to have this Utopia?" Michener asked the man as he felt he should have told Tom to keep sailing to Norfolk instead of staying in St Louis.

"It was negligible." Pierce answered in a pragmatic manner.

"Which means you stopped counting after a number. Did you reach double digits? What were you going to tell the families of the people you sacrificed." Michener scoffed at him, he sat back in his seat as he thought of the implications it meant to his presidency and how their international allies would never forgive them for their actions. Sacrificing tourists and anyone with proper identification to monsters.

"They died from the virus. Honestly these are people who weren't going to be missed." Pierce said defensively, it was clear he'd settled this situation with his conscience as he knew what he did was wrong but decided it was worth it because he saved thousands of lives.

"My God." Michener said in disbelief.

"Why don't you tell the President why Larrin Taylor is so important." Tom prompted, the Senator looked at him with disgust as Tom had been prompting the man to fess up to his crimes. But otherwise he'd remain silent throughout most of Senator Pierce's confession.

"She will earn us a 6 month reprieve from having to supply Julian and his scavengers with sport. It will save lives." Pierce told Michener.

"You peddle flesh to save your own skin." Michener said scathingly as he thought the rhetoric of the immunes being a superior race chosen by God was bad. He'd thought it had made him a horrible person for believing it to be true but this was much worse.

"I kept this pocket of society alive. If we don't hand her over, he'll come in with his men and destroy this zone. For a woman who is indeed a murderer. She's no innocent." Pierce argued as if it was ok to let a psychopath take Larrin and do what he wanted with her as long as thousands of lives were saved.

"She acted in self defence." Tom told Pierce, not that it made her innocent but it meant the deaths of those men was a necessary evil for her to survive. Something he couldn't begrudge her as he'd want Darien or his Daughter Ashley to have done the same if they had been in Larrin's shoes.

"Clearly." Michener said in agreement with Tom, he looked to the Senator not sure what to do with the man. "Also she would be considered a 'Killer' given she hasn't been convicted though I doubt anyone would convict her given the circumstances." Michener told Pierce.

"Well, you're condemning this city to death by protecting her." Pierce told him, Michener looked to Tom as he was at a complete loss as to what to do.

"We can try to tackle this problem head on but you need to stop jamming our comms; so I can liaise with my people in Norfolk and Chicago." Tom told Pierce.


"Larrin," Miller said in surprise as he came into the kitchen for a coffee, he smiled glad to see her up but when she turned around his smile slipped for a moment as he took in her injuries. Anger boiled in him at seeing her injuries. Kara had left over half an hour ago to check in with Danny at the hospital before going back to Tex's.

"Hey, ah- when did you get here?" She asked him, feeling a little awkward as she saw the flash of anger and understood it wasn't directed at her but still she didn't want him seeing her like this. Her face and body were aching, her eyes bloodshot from crying. She was a mess and not the hot kind either.

"A couple hours ago. What happened to you?" Miller asked her, Larrin waved a dismissive hand as she moved to the cupboard and pulled out a glass to get herself some water.

"My past caught up to me." Larrin said as she filled the glass. She flinched at the sound of a loud snore erupt from the darkened lounge room.

"It's Cruz." Miller told her as he saw her flinch and wanted to assure her that the only danger Cruz possessed was to one's chances of a goodnight's sleep.

"Ok." She said trying to calm her frayed nerves. Her hand shook as she lifted the glass to take a drink making her wish she could just keep it together.

"Larrin, who did this to you?" He asked, she gave a pained smile and shook her head.

"I don't want to talk about it. Did you find your Mum?" she asked as she leaned against the kitchen sink and looked to him.

"Yeah, I did. She's safe and sound over at Tex's." Miller told her, a smile gracing his lips as he was so happy to have found his mother alive. He also liked that Larrin had asked even though she was in a mess of a situation. She still cared about those around her.

"That's so good." She said with genuine happiness for him. Though part of her felt a little saddened as she'd probably not get to see her mother again. If Julian got to her soon then she'd probably not see her brother before...

"Yeah, it's great." Miller said, he looked to Larrin to see her smile had been replaced with a crestfallen expression and tears in her eyes. "Larrin." he said softly seeing her pain.

"NNo, I'm ok." She said vainly trying to smile and failing as her emotions swelled up in her. Grief of what she was losing and the fear of her own future. All of it was consuming her to the point her heart was breaking as time was running out for her..

"No, you're not. Come here" he said, he would have asked permission but he felt like she would have said 'no' and his slight order seemed to make something snap in her as she closed the space between them and straight into his arms. He wrapped her arms around her as gently as he could as he was afraid of exacerbating her injuries. "It's going to be ok." he told her.

"It's not," she told him, tears ran down her face as she buried it into his shirt allowing herself to immerse herself in his strength and the comfort of just being held even if she wanted him to hold her tighter. This was going to have to be enough. "I'm being hunted and even if I could beat him. I can't change what I did." she told him.

"Larrin, I don't believe you murdered them." Miller told her.

"Then you're a fool because I did." She said pushing herself out of his arms and turned her back to him. She wiped a hand down her face and shaking her head as she was the fool.

"Larrin, I know you pretty well." He told her.

"They were hunting me and I turned the game around on them. I killed them all. The girl I showed you was just who I want to be seen as, who I want to be." She told him.

"I've killed people too, for basically the same reasons as you. I wanted to survive, I know how horrible it feels and all thoughts that go through your head. Yes, it does change you but it doesn't define you. Just as it doesn't define who I am." He told her,

Larrin closed the space between them and grabbed the back of his neck with her uninjured hand and lifted up on her feet and covered his lips with hers. Miller was momentarily stunned by the move but reflexes kicked in. He wrapped his arms around her drawing her even closer as his lips moved with an urgency, giving it his very best effort.

She kissed him hard, right there in the kitchen. She didn't care who could see them, she simply didn't give a damn anymore. He kissed her just as fiercely, clinging to her as if he were never going to let her go. But a kiss wasn't enough. Nothing seemed enough to Larrin now she could feel everything crashing in on her. She pulled away from the kiss; knowing she had to stop as it wasn't fair to Miller.

They looked at one another for a long moment, ust catching their breath. Larrin moved her hand to face and gave a pained smile as she had the horrible realisation that this was all they'd have. It just felt so unfinished and damnably unfair.

"Thank you for saying that." she whispered to him, she turned and ran back to the guest bedroom. She closed the door and slide down to the floor; tears ran down her face. She dropped her face to her knees and wrapped her arms around her knees hugging herself into a ball as she let her pain get the best of her.


"Wake up, sleeping beauty." A man said shaking Rachel's shoulder. She winced in pain as he jarred her injured side. She opened her eyes, it took a few seconds for her vision to clear but when she couldn't help but gasp in horror.

"You like my note." the man with the most vivid green eyes asked her, Rachel looked to the wall where Emmerson the US Marshall laid dead on the floor, Dr Clarke was standing to the side her face badly bleeding as another man held a gun at her. On the wall he'd written 'STL: Larrin, 3 days' there was a radio frequency written below that she could only assume was the man's phone number.

"What do you want?" she demanded.

"Oh don't worry, you're safe Dr Scott. You're too old for my tastes. I just need you to motivate the right people into relinquishing my little rabbit." he said, Rachel tried to move away from him as he dragged his fingers down the side of her neck in a loving gesture. He just smiled at her revulsion. "You see, I haven't finished with her yet. So let's get you out of here." he told her.

"I can't be moved in my state. If you want me to live-"

"Then I'll need an ambulance to transport you. Yes, I know and how rude of me. My name is Julian and I'm here to see you have the best care until your Captain comes for you with my Larrin in trade." He told her with what she was sure would have been a charming smile in any other situation but right here and now made her skin crawl.

"He'll never trade me for another." Rachel promised him as she knew Tom, he'd never trade another life for hers.

"Oh, that's adorable given you and he were apparently very flirty before you got shot. "Come find me", looks like you'll get your chance to throw him an invite." He told her. Rachel frowned as she wondered how he could possibly know what Tom had said to her that night before she went back to her hotel room.