A/N: This is a collaborative effort with Regnasis on Deviantart's "Granduation" picture. Another memory of Wash's he keeps sharing with me, so I'll keep writing. Unfortunately, Regnasis can draw far far faster then I can write, type and edit a fic. We have already started working on another collab piece, once again involving Wash. So enjoy! And still don't own RvB, I has a sad
Washington hated being in the medical wing of Command; it always brought back memories of Epsilon's final days. A time that left the Freelancer a mental mess and had him sectioned 12-ed. This time, however, he had some very different, but just as haunting memories to keep him company.
He didn't think any copies of the old picture still existed, but then York always had been the sentimental one of the group. While prepping Delta during the recovery, Wash had caught sight of the singed paper next to the locksmith's body and salvaged it on a whim.
The still shot seemed older then the few years it was from all the charring, dirt and even a bullet hole in one corner. It was a testament to the lives they had lived.
North, South, himself, Tex, York, Wyoming and Maine on the day they graduated from the Freelancer Program. Before the AI implantation when they had still been the best of friends. They were going to be the ones who won the war. Where others had failed, they would succeed. The Freelancers were the best soldiers the UNSC had to offer short of a SPARTAN.
They had all looked so young, so hopeful. Now North, Tex, York and Wyoming were all dead; South and Maine were AWOL; and Wash recovering from being shot in the back by the woman he had gone out of his way to save.
South…she had been so different back then, before the distribution of the AIs. Being passed over in favor of her brother in the first wave had left her angry and bitter. The incident with Epsilon had given her a focus of that anger. That had become clear before she'd shot him.
He allowed himself to muse that he really, really shouldn't have slept with CT while still technically seeing South. The one night kept popping back up and biting him in the ass.
CT, now she was a piece of work. She was a manipulative, lying, backstabbing, catty, and violent bitch but with a body that more then made up for her personality. Out of the armour, she was fit, glamourously beautiful and, even he had to admit, she was racked. How she not only got in the armour, but also passed herself as male, Wash would never know.
She had approached him after a fight with South. The twin thing always came up with them. South would be in a position where she had to choose between North and Wash, and she always, always chose North, much to Wash's ever increasing annoyance. CT had somehow convinced him with a half a bottle of Jack Daniels and purred words to go back to her quarters that evening. She had promised it would be a secret just between the two of them, no one would ever know. Until the next day when South got back and CT told her to her face what had happened along with telling the rest of their little circle.
Maine had laughed himself sick at the whole situation. Then again, the smart ass was almost always laughing at something, even back in their ODST days. The women, Reggie's accent, Wash's problems, Tex's blue shadow, even himself. He'd thought it was great when they found out after getting the pictures back, Maine had moved at the last second to give Wash rabbit ears and appeared in the picture as a blur. They never had time to take another picture, and after implantation nothing had been the same.
Folding up the worn picture, Wash let a bittersweet smile cross his face. Life had a way of making a person eventually stop and remember everything normally kept locked away. He found his thoughts going to Epsilon and couldn't help but envy the Alpha, wherever it was. It would always be separated from its memories, both the painful and the sweet.
The Freelancer couldn't help but think that depending on the type of life lived, it really wasn't that steep of a price to pay for having all the past wiped away. He decided then if he ever had the chance to start over, he would.
Like that would ever happen.
