Robocalypse Now

Chapter 5: Goodbye

Over the next several days, funeral plans were quickly made. Nixon wanted a very public funeral service for all of the heroes who had died during the catastrophe; as such, Leela was going to be buried in the World Heroes section of Orbiting Meadows.

Fry spent the next several days helping to clean up what was left of the Planet Express building. He hardly slept; and when he did he was constantly woken up by nightmares of Leela slamming into the ground.

Saturday

While the funeral was broadcast all over the earth, only the families and close friends of those being honored were allowed in orbiting meadows. Tom's mercenaries had even arranged for Leela's parents to be at the funeral, essentially telling what was left of the NNYPD where they could stick their mutant laws.

Many people were honored that day; But Fry stayed lost in his own thoughts. Leela was the last to be buried. Fry had been asked to say a few words about Leela but had declined, anything he had to say was for her ears only.

Both Amy and the Professor gave short speeches, but fry hardly heard a word of them. His attention was focused on Leela's peaceful face; the funeral directors had made her look as she once was, she almost looked alive.

After all was said and done, the people began to file out until only the Planet Express crew and Leela's parents were all that remained. The professor and Amy wandered off after a few moments, Hermes rising soon after.

He placed a sympathetic hand on Fry's shoulder, "We'll talk about getting her affairs in order on Monday, mon." he walked toward the waiting ship.

Bender, who was being uncharacteristically nice, came up, "Take all the time you need buddy. I'll make sure they don't leave without you." He turned, "And later, booze is on me."

Fry gave him a silent smile of gratitude.

Leela's mom put a tentacle on Fry's leg, "Thank you for being there for our little girl," she said, tears running down her face, she looked at him with a small, sad smile, "She cared about you an awful lot. I hope you know that."

Fry was too choked up to say anything so he just nodded.

"Uh, stay strong kid." Morris said, clapping a hand on Fry's shoulder, his voice shaking with emotion, "For Leela."

Fry nodded, and the two left, leaving Fry alone with Leela.

He looked down into the casket, studying her beautiful face, knowing that this was the last time he would ever see it. He gently caressed her cheek, tears beginning to drip into the casket.

Fry started slightly when someone quietly cleared their throat behind him. Fry turned, not realizing who it was at first; then seeing that it was Tom, wearing a grey suit and blue tie.

"What are you doing here?" Fry asked.

"Some of my men were honored earlier in the afternoon."

Fry nodded.

Tom nervously rubbed the back of his head, "Ok, I'll cut right to the chase then. I was going through my crew's holo-recorders, looking for footage to help DOOP convict Zapp and I found this on Jade's recorder…" He pulled a small device from his pocket and tossed it on the ground and it projected a holographic video screen showing what Fry assumed was the mercenaries' headquarters just before they left to come to Planet Express.

"Play stating at seventy-two hours and thirty-six minutes." The recording scrubbed forward.

The camera showed Tom holding onto Jade's arm, "Come back to me."

"I always do." Jade's voice said from slightly above the camera.

Then she was running, shooting ducking and dodging through the horde of robots. Some of them were vaporized or blown apart as Tom and Plrr fired on the bots in her path. Soon she reached Leela, Quickly turning the cyclops over.

Fry gasped, in the video Leela was still alive, he had assumed she had died on impact.

"Oh my god…" he heard Jade whisper.

Leela's eye, red from burst blood vessels darted around, blind and unseeing. The purple haired woman's voice was almost lost amongst the sounds of battle. "Fry?" she whispered quietly, a slight gurgle in her voice, as Jade hauled her up into onto her shoulders, "Fry is that you?"

There was a small whimper in Fry's throat at the mention of his name.

"No." Jade grunted, straining under Leela's weight as she made her way back towards the entrance, "He's waiting for you inside."

There was a few moments of silence as Jade jogged back. Fry could see Tom and Plrr clearing a path for her.

"Tell Fry…" Leela's voice was barely audible, even with the audio enhancements Tom had clearly put on the video, "Tell Fry I love him."

"You can tell him yourself!" Jade continued to run but there was no further response from the woman across her shoulders. She made it back and handed the woman to Plrr.

Tom stopped the video, "You know the rest." he said gently, "I know it's not much of a consolation, but I don't think she was in too much pain. And it may not be my place to say this, but you made such an impact on her life that her last thoughts were of you… well, I think she loved you an awful lot."

Fry stood looking at the paused frame of the video, which showed Plrr hefting the cyclops onto his shoulders, her eye now glazed having clearly died a few minutes prior. This was all almost too much to process. In some ways this just made him sadder, but in other ways it gave him and odd sense of closure.

Tom picked up the holo-projector and ejected the video card, handing it to Fry. "This contains the five minutes of footage from when she…" he paused, sighing, "I deleted it from the recordings I turned over to DOOP, it was meant for your ears only."

Fry rubbed his thumb over the video card, "Thank you…" he said quietly, "I don't… I don't know what else to say."

Tom handed him his business card, "If you ever need to talk, feel free to call me. I won't pick up if I'm on a mission, but any other time…" he trailed off.

Fry nodded.

Tom nodded back, clapped Fry on the shoulder and walked back towards the docking bay.

Fry turned back to the coffin and looked at the love of his life, memories of their all the years they had together flashing through his head. "Well," he said, a small, sad smile playing across his face, "We had some damn good times, didn't we?" he sighed, some part of him thought talking to the dead was futile, "I hope you can hear me, but even if you can't, I need to say this."

Tears began to drip into the casket again, "I love you so god-damn much Leela… the last ten years have been the best of my life." He sniffed, running a thumb along her cheek, "They were only that good because you were in them." He said quietly.

"And now... I have no idea what to do with the rest of my life…" he silently cried for a few moments.

He wiped the tears from his eyes. He leaned down and placed one last soft kiss on her cold lips and gently closed the lid to the casket.

The cemetery staff gently lowered the casket into the ground.

"Goodbye Leela." He whispered. He turned and walked towards the airlock where his friends were waiting for him.

Sorry for the short chapter, but while I wanted to put more, I felt that any more would have been too much and I hate putting up walls of text.

I don't really have a schedule for this story (for all 3 of you who actually read this) So I can't say exactly when the next chapter will be up. but once I finish with my RWBY story I'll try to put a little more time into this one and finally finish it off!

Thanks for reading and please drop a review!