Ellie picked her head up when the operating room doors flapped outward after what felt like hours, dully bouncing off the wall as Maria, the black-haired nurse, and Dr. Anderson emerged, carrying the injured brunet man on the stretcher he arrived on. Maria's face was lined with stress and exhaustion, and Dr. Anderson looked like he could sleep for days. After they had deposited the stranger on the cot beside Oliver's, Maria muttered to Ellie that she was free to leave, her voice as tired and strained as her expression.
But although she was free to leave, Ellie couldn't help hovering around Oliver's cot for a few more minutes, studying the young man's injuries.
His left shoulder was heavily bandaged, and his arm was in a sling. Gauze was wrapped around his abdomen, where Ellie could imagine the mosaic of stitches he undoubtedly had. The man wasn't so pale anymore, though he had still had a long ways to go before returning to a healthy colour. Like the other two patients opposite him, he had an IV protruding from his wrist.
The injured man's breathing was shallow and ragged, suggesting that he was fighting for each breath, struggling to just stay alive. He reminded Ellie of how Joel fought to keep breathing when he had been impaled by the rod of rebar last fall, and she didn't know if her encouragements helped any, or if Joel could even hear her, but it made her feel better. Maybe this man wasn't so deep into unconsciousness that he had no awareness of what was going on around him? It was worth a try. He looked like he could use a few kind words, and if he knew Jason…maybe he wasn't so bad.
So Ellie pulled up a chair next to the young man, pursing her lips as she rested her elbows on the edge on the thin mattress. Then a thought occurred to her: she didn't even know his name. Ellie glanced up, catching Maria watching her as she cleaned the man's black jacket, wiping all the blood off with a damp rag.
"Do we know his name?" Ellie asked her.
Maria silently nodded, pulling a tattered, faded card from her back pocket. Ellie recognized it as a military photo ID pass. Soldiers back in Boston usually had them, not that they were much use unless they were for forgery and smugglers. Maria got up and handed it to her, looking grim and exhausted as her gaze settled on the man she had just helped save. "I'm not sure if he's French, but his name in English is Dominic," she informed Ellie, shuffling back to the man's jacket.
Ellie studied the faded, worn card in her hands, trying to match the picture on the card to the man in front of her. He had the same hair colour, but the teenager in the picture couldn't be over sixteen or seventeen. Ellie's brows drew together as she wondered why the photo had never been updated.
She could tell the man was the same kid in the ID photo, but his older self just barely resembled the picture. They had the same defined jawline and sharp cheekbones, but that was where the similarities stopped. The man in front of her had faint scars scattered across his face like freckles, and if he wasn't so pale, they would be more noticeable, even in a photo. The teenager in the picture was missing the particularly jagged one across his throat.
Dominic looked more like Jason than anything. If Jason hadn't told her once that he didn't have any siblings, Ellie would have guessed that this Dominic and Jason were brothers. He and Jason weren't even that much older than each other. Squinting at the just barely legible birth date, Ellie did some quick math and figured Dominic was only 21, while Jason was seventeen.
Ellie suddenly felt a twinge of guilt, chewing her lip as she cast her gaze down at the white bed sheets. Remembering the Polaroid of Jason and that blonde girl, she dug it out from her back pocket and stared at the writing scrawled across the back. "I promise…" she mumbled to herself, "Promise what?" Ellie studied the photo more closely, as if the longer she stared at it, the clearer the answer would become. But it remained just as obscure, revealing nothing.
She shrugged, tucking the puzzle away in her mind to solve later. Ellie gently pressed the card and the photo into Dominic's limp right hand with a soft, "Sorry for taking it." To her surprise, Dominic's fingers lightly closed around the objects, as if more out of an automatic response than a conscious decision. He mumbled something in his sleep, and it had to be in a different language because to Ellie it sounded like gibberish. It certainly wasn't English.
Dominic stirred as if waking up, and his breathing became sharper as his semi-conscious mind registered the pain. Ellie threw a worried glance at Maria, who also heard the change in his breathing pattern. She dashed into the operating room and quickly returned with a syringe of morphine. She injected it into the IV, and Dominic's slight writhing and whimpers gradually ceased.
Letting a relaxed breath out, Dominic groggily cracked open an eye, yet a few seconds later he began blinking rapidly, as if fighting the urge to be pulled back into unconsciousness by both the drugs and his body's demand for rest. "…Myriam? That…you, love?" the young man queried in a slur, his glassy gaze resting on Ellie.
Ellie was about to shake her head and answer no, but Maria gave her a pointed glance. Ellie imperceptibly nodded, albeit skeptical, and she gave Dominic her best fake smile. "Yeah, it's me," Ellie replied softly, gently wrapping her fingers around the man's wrist. She was close enough to read the words coiled around his upper right arm, but it was lying against his side, so most of them were hidden.
The edges of Dominic's thin lips quirked up, his eyes fluttered shut, and with the next exhale, his head lolled to one side. Ellie unwrapped her fingers from his cold skin, hearing his breathing return to its shallow pattern. But this time, it didn't sound like the next breath would be the man's last.
"Thanks, Ellie. I think he needed that," Maria nodded to the redhead, returning to her post by the young man's jacket.
Ellie lifted her brows and cocked her head at Maria, resisting the urge to wag her finger at her in a playful warning. "That's lying, you know," she drawled with a smirk.
"I know," Maria retorted firmly, giving her a sharp look that suggested her patience had run out for sarcasm, "but the best we can do for him now is make him feel better, give him something to stay alive for. If that means lying, then it's a good lie." Maybe she was overdoing it a little on the reprimanding, but God was she tired. She hoped Ellie knew she meant well. Maria dropped her shoulders, giving a light sigh and a tiny, strained smile as she waved Ellie off.
The redhead chewed her lip, giving Dominic one last glance before departing for the barn. She felt uneasy as she strode along, kicking at a bit of gravel. False hope is the worst kind of lie…
When she arrived back at the barn, she didn't see Jason. But, the scraping sound of a boot on wood from a back corner of the hayloft gave her an indication of where he might be. So Ellie ascended the stairs to the loft, as quietly as she could, but even then the creaking of the old wooden steps threatened to betray her presence. As she came into view of Jason, a small smile crept up her face.
Jason had propped himself up against a hay bale, head lolled to one side as a gray tabby cat slept in his lap, draped over one thigh and purring blissfully. One hand limply held a worn Polaroid photo, the edges curled like it had been held too many times. Jason slept deeply, with a few twitches of his lip every now and again. Ellie never noticed how truly exhausted and vulnerable he was until it showed in the lines on his forehead, the perpetual furrow of his brow, and how fitfully he slept. He didn't look peaceful or untroubled like other people did in sleep.
Ellie silently, tentatively crept over to him, making almost no noise as she settled herself next to Jason. The silence and peace of the barn blanketed her, and she imitated Jason by propping herself up against the hay bale. Glancing down, she noticed the faded photo in his hand. It was of Jason and the blonde girl, like the one Dominic had, except this time they were smiling at the camera. Ellie felt sorrow spike within her, comparing the Jason in the picture to the one she knew. In the picture, there was so much life and happiness in Jason's eyes. The girl looked the same. But the Jason she knew, there was no such joy in his expression, no brightness, no life. It was as if it had been all drained out of him. She would bet anything it was that girl who made him so happy.
Maybe…if we found that girl, Jason would be happy again…That injured guy has the same picture, maybe he knows where that girl is? Ellie mused, her mind wandering back to the young man's photo of Jason and the blonde girl, Jason must've been real happy when she was around…
Ellie gently set the photo beside her leg, loosely intertwining her fingers with Jason's in an attempt to bring him some comfort. Jason seemed to sense her presence in his sleep, shifting closer and curling himself around a surprised Ellie. The disturbed cat waddled away, spreading itself out on a nearby hay bale as Jason draped a lanky arm around Ellie's torso. Ellie stiffened considerably, almost making the decision to scuttle away from the foreign amount of intimate contact.
Then she thought back to Maria's small lecture on lying, and she decided that if it helped Jason, maybe a bit of false hope wasn't so bad.
Besides, at this proximity, she could plainly see the dried tear streaks on his face.
"Hey, Ryebread…" Jason quietly purred in his sleep, nestling his head into Ellie's shoulder. Not having a clue as to how to respond or what to do when a boy insisted on using her as a human pillow, Ellie focused on keeping her breathing under control and silencing the alarms going off in her head.
He's not hurting you, just breathe…he doesn't know it's you, it doesn't mean anything, Ellie's galloping thoughts slowly gave way to tranquility, her rigid muscles gradually relaxing as she acclimated to Jason's body heat, the intensity of which she hadn't noticed until now. The heat from her own face slowly receded, and she came to enjoy the new feeling of having Jason use her as a pillow. Not wanting to act heartless by moving away when Jason finally seemed at peace, Ellie settled into the hay bale to take her own light nap.
Joel was a fitful sleeper too, constantly muttering and flinching in his slumber. Ellie had grown used to the sounds of his restlessness. But Jason found comfort, his deep breaths were quiet and calming. Ellie listened to them, matching her breaths to Jason's to slow her racing heart. Accompanied by his body heat, Jason's breathing gradually made Ellie's eyelids heavy. The rising and falling of his chest sent a gentle rhythm throughout Ellie's body. She succumbed gladly to it, falling into a light sleep.
Ellie awoke to the sunlight filtering through the cracks in the roof, the angle of which causing the light to hit her face straight on. She guessed it was well past noon, but it was far from being dark yet. Jason stirred at the jerk of her head, sleepily rubbing his eyes. Ellie was amazed that he didn't wake at the sound of footsteps, but of a single movement of the person next to him.
Ellie remained stock-still, unable to predict his reaction. The last time she had seen him, he hadn't been very friendly. Jason likewise tensed, realizing the person sleeping next to him wasn't who he had been lost in the memories of. The peaceful silence of the barn became palpable, fraught with tension.
However, instead of viciously accusing her like Ellie thought he would, Jason asked a simple question, his voice almost childlike, "Where is it? The photo, where is it?" It was like a toddler asking where someone had hidden his most prized possession.
Ellie didn't know if it was a rhetorical question, but she took the opportunity to get a few answers out of Jason before he fully collected himself and clammed up again. She held the photo out of his reach, and his eyes locked on to it, his hand shooting out to snatch it with lightning speed. But Ellie's body was in the way, and she refused to let him have it.
"What's her name, Jason?" Ellie giggled playfully.
"Give it back, Ellie!" Jason growled, grabbing at thin air. He grit his teeth when Ellie asked again, grudgingly replying, "Her name's Riley, now give it!"
Ellie relented, giggling as Jason plucked the photo from her fingers, sliding it into his back pocket with the utmost care.
"You're mean," he spat at her, brushing the dust and hay from his pants as he stalked off down the stairs.
Ellie rolled her eyes, grinning at his annoyance as she followed him. God, he gets riled up too easy, when will he learn to relax?
Jason whipped around as Ellie reached the main floor of the barn, and she started in surprise at his icy death glare. "Calm down, I was just messing with you!" Ellie smiled playfully to ease the tension in the air, but she could hear the slight strain in her voice.
He was not relenting, as she had expected. She felt a sudden prick of guilt as she began to suspect there was more to the story of the blonde woman in the photo.
"You better not, it's all I have left of her," Jason hissed viciously, and the intimidation worked enough on Ellie to make her hunch her shoulders, but not break her gaze.
"Look, I'm sorry, okay?" Ellie frowned, "Do you want to talk about it? I didn't know it was painful for you."
"Painful?" Jason started sarcastically, but it soon turned to a quiet bitterness, "I know I'm never going to see her again. I've accepted that, so what's painful for me now? She's probably dead, anyway."
Ellie could tell Jason was trying hard to keep himself composed, but his mask was slowly crumbling. The muscles in his shoulders and arms were taut as wires, about to snap at any moment.
To say Ellie had struck a chord was an understatement. Jason felt the tension in his shoulders slowly giving way to an uncontrollable shake, not from the threat of tears, but from the barely contained fury that was starting to boil within him. Unknowingly, Ellie had snapped that fury to life and let loose all the pain Jason had so carefully tucked away inside him. The dam he had built was about to explode, and as the shaking grew more violent, he realized there was nothing he could do to stop it.
"Maybe I still have that hope because I haven't seen her-" Jason's voice caught, and he clamped his mouth shut, grinding his teeth as if to keep a particularly painful image out of his mind.
Corpse. Ellie chewed her bottom lip, filling in the rest of the sentence.
"Maybe it's good you still have hope, but you haven't moved on. You never allowed yourself to recover," she said gently, hoping to stave off the anger she could see smoldering in his eyes.
Jason let out a mirthless bark of laughter, one that sent shivers of fear down Ellie's spine. "I haven't moved on? Do you even know what I was like a year ago?" his voice slowly increased in volume, and Ellie took a few steps back. For a moment, she couldn't keep the look of shock from her face. He looked like he was tempted to hit her. "I was a wreck; I wouldn't eat, I couldn't sleep, it took everything I had just to get up in the morning! If you tried to be my friend a year ago, I would've strangled you."
The fear that Jason would hit her had partially passed, but Ellie could feel frustration licking at her insides, leaving a sour taste in her mouth. It quickly turned to irritation the more she fed off Jason's anger. "But you still haven't moved on, you're still suffering! Jesus, Jason, just let someone help you—"
She was interrupted by Jason's feral snarl. "I don't suffer because of what happened anymore. And I don't need people like you bringing those memories back," he growled darkly at her.
He's totally in denial. Ellie sighed, just getting more pissed off by his stubbornness. "What if that's what you need? What if you need to remember that stuff to deal with it?" she asked.
"I don't need you playing fucking therapist, Ellie!" Jason brutally yelled at her, "You don't know what happened to me, what kind of hell I had to go through in Denver!"
Startled, but half-expecting his outburst, Ellie took a few steps back to give him more space. The silence that followed left a bitter taste in her mouth, but it wasn't the kind she was unfamiliar with. She had felt the same kind of silence for a few moments back at the ranch house with Joel after their argument.
"Then tell me. If you do, I'll tell you about who I lost," Ellie offered gently.
Jason was still leaning against the wooden column, but now he looked less like he wanted to break it and more like he needed it to keep his legs from buckling underneath him. He imperceptibly nodded, gritting his teeth against the onslaught of horrible memories that flooded his mind. "If you speak a word of this to anyone, I will find out, and I will hunt you down myself. Understand?" Jason's piercing gaze stabbed right through Ellie, and she nodded, her mouth set in a grim line.
"I was…a survivor. Of a battle, between Cobras and the military. Almost everyone died, on both sides," Jason started haltingly and swallowed, taking a deep breath before he continued, "But…on my sixteenth birthday I was torn away from Riley and my parents to become a Cobra."
He stopped again, taking a few moments to compose himself. "I will never forget how Riley suffered once she found out I wasn't coming back," it came a tiny bit easier to him now, "She didn't know I was a Cobra, and I couldn't tell her without being exposed and having both of us killed. Ian convinced her that I was dead, and…" Jason bit down hard on his knuckles as his shoulders shook violently again. Ellie spotted a bead of blood form on his hand.
Ellie took a few steps closer, wanting to comfort him, but still wary in case he exploded again. "What happened?" she softly prompted.
A distant look fell across Jason's eyes, the same one he got when he was remembering painful things. It was one Ellie knew well. "Riley, she…she tried to commit suicide, but I stopped her. And you know what?" the first tears collected at the edges of Jason's eyes, "She was so far gone…she was suffering so much, she didn't even recognize me. It was my fault. I was too much of a coward to tell her what happened, I watched her suffer and I did nothing…I broke her."
Silent sobs wracked Jason's body, and the normally strong, stoic boy was crippled by his own sorrow and guilt, sinking to the floor and weeping into his kneecaps.
Ellie cautiously approached, taking a seat next to him. She bit her lip uncertainly, fiddling with her hands. C'mon, don't just sit there. Do something! She scolded herself as she listened to Jason cry. It tugged at her heart, but nothing came to mind that she could do to ease his pain. Should I talk to him? What the hell can I say to that? His girlfriend tried to fucking kill herself and he thinks it's his fault!
Ellie resisted to the urge to sigh out loud in utter frustration, tilting her head back to rest on the wooden column. Jason felt the movement beside him, and he relaxed one arm as if accepting her presence. It wasn't much of a shift, and when Ellie decided to rest her head in the crook it created, he allowed her.
She felt a bit of the tension release from his arm, and the effect the simple gesture had on him seemed to soothe him a little. Encouraged, Ellie moved her hand up to comfortingly stroke Jason's back, first lightly and cautiously, and then with more confidence when the muscles there started to relax under her touch. She wondered if it was more out of exhaustion than calmness, but when he began taking deeper breaths between sobs, Ellie figured it was the latter. She switched to rubbing soothing circles into his shoulder after a while, smirking a little when she caught a tiny smile tug at his lips.
He rested his forehead against hers, the salty tears on his cheeks dampening her bangs and her skin, but he wasn't really crying anymore.
Ellie's smile widened at the flicker of life in his eyes, like the burden he had been carrying was finally lifting.
Jason imitated Ellie easily, but his grin faded as a certain thoughtfulness settled over his features. Ellie was about to question him, but the words died in her throat as he tilted his head, brushing his lips against hers.