A/N: This was a very hard chapter to write. It follows the novelization canon, which shows the end result of Raleigh and Yancy's relationships with their father and younger sister, but is entirely my invention on how they got from drift memories of what appeared to be a happy childhood to apparent estrangement.

Trigger Warning: This chapter portrays a personality disorder through the immature and unsympathetic eyes of a teenaged brother who views the sufferer as a rival. Jazmine suffers from borderline personality disorder, but Raleigh doesn't realize that, and although Yancy has some inkling of it, neither of them are equipped with the knowledge or support system to understand, let alone deal with it. There are no saints in this story, but very few human villains (well, okay, I don't think much of their father knowing the choices he made) and Jazmine is not one.

Chapter Six: The Choices You Live With

Anchorage, Alaska, October, 2016…

"The funeral is Sunday," Dad told them as they all stared at sandwiches over the kitchen table. Jazmine got up and tossed hers in the trash, then wandered out of the house. Dad waited until she'd gone, then slid some papers towards Yancy. "I want you to sign these."

Yancy had looked as drained and numb as Raleigh felt until that moment, but now he looked shocked. "Huh?"

"It's only a year. She'll be seventeen in February, so just a year after that. She can even stay with Diane down the street if you want to finish Jaeger training, until she's eighteen." Dad gestured absently at Raleigh. "I don't think you have anything to worry about with him in the Academy, not so close to his eighteenth birthday."

Yancy stared at him. "What about you? Aren't you supposed to be her guardian?"

"I..." their father dropped his eyes. "I can't."

Raleigh was completely confused. They were talking about Jazmine - guardianship? But that would only come down to Yancy if Dad wasn't... "What're you talking about?"

"I'm going," his father said. "After the funeral. I'm getting a new job, going... away." He glanced at them, saw their faces, and looked down again. "I have to."

Raleigh's head was swimming again. Nothing made sense. "I don't understand," he said. "Going where? How long?"

Apparently, Yancy understood. As Dad seemed to shrink, Yancy looked like he might Hulk out. Raleigh felt lost, and increasingly scared. In a low, hard voice, frigidly polite, his brother said, "Raleigh, would you excuse us? Go sit with Jazz. Let Dad and me talk in private."

Like he had no will to refuse, Raleigh slowly got up and left the room. He found Jazmine out on the curb, staring at the sky. For a few minutes, from behind in the darkness, she could have been Mom. But there was no glow of a cigarette ember in her hand, no smell of smoke. No Mom. No mother anymore. She's gone and she's not coming back.

"He's told you, hasn't he?" Jazmine said.

Raleigh sat down next to her. "I don't get it. He's leaving? Where to?"

She shrugged. "Dunno. He won't say. Maybe he doesn't know." She snorted and added roughly, "He definitely doesn't care."

Mom's gone and Dad's going. That's why he wants Yancy to be Jazmine's guardian. A new emotion pierced the fog of shock and numbness - something ugly and shameful. He didn't want Yancy to be Jazmine's guardian. Yeah, sure, it was only a year - a year and a few months - but for all that time, he'd be responsible for her. Here they were heading towards being Jaeger pilots, and Yancy would have to be like Jazmine's dad?!

It was terrible and selfish and petty of him, he knew that. Mom used to tell them, "Your brother is not a toy to fight over."

Mom was dead. Dad was leaving. There would only be Yancy left for both of them, and Raleigh knew he was feeling like he'd been as a little kid, when he and Jazmine had each grabbed one of Yancy's arms and pulled, howling over whose brother he was. Sometimes Yancy and their parents had laughed, other times they were annoyed and frustrated.

That little kid's voice was in the back of his mind, and he knew he shouldn't listen to it. But it wouldn't go away.

I've lost my mom, and now I'm going to lose my dad, and all I've got left is Yancy.

So does Jazmine.

I'm not the oldest, not the youngest, can't I have anything for myself?!

She's the only girl, and she's not even legal yet. She needs a guardian. I should be the bigger person.

We're going to be Jaeger pilots. We've made the second cut. Top six out of thousands.

We're going to be officers, responsible for other people. How can we be responsible for protecting anyone if we don't do right by our own sister?

He's my brother he's my partner he's going to be my co-pilot he's mine he'sminehe'smine!

"We made the second cut." How fucking trivial. "We're drift compatible." You are a piece of work, Raleigh Becket.

Shame and self-disgust warred with frustration and indignation at her scoff. "I'm very happy for you." As if. "Who'd you bribe?" You are such a bitch, Jazmine. He could see her sneer in the street light. "I mean, I could see Yance passing the tests, but you? Fat chance."

It was always that way. Jazmine loved to remind him how very, very inferior he was to Yancy, the larger the audience the better. "It must be the answer to your prayers, a college that specifically wants siblings. The only way you've ever accomplished anything was riding on Yancy's coattails," she'd told him when they decided to go to the Academy.

Yancy had pointed out that there wasn't an age limit. Jazmine could apply too, and they might very well accept her. They'd qualified a set of triplets last year who were her age.

Raleigh had smarted, folding in on himself with hurt. Yancy had avoided his eyes, knowing full well that the three of them going to Academy together would not be Raleigh's choice. But Jazmine had been in full tantrum mode and yelled that she didn't WANT to go join some military school. "I could see Dorky over here wanting to clomp around in a glorified Transformer, but you're smarter than that!"

"Why do you keep bringing this back to him? For your information, this was my idea!"

"Of course it was, he doesn't have any ideas of his own! But now you're going to run off, and where does that leave me?!"

"With Mom and Dad, finishing high school, if that's what you want to do! Jesus Christ, I can't stay home forever, Jazz, I'm nineteen and you're sixteen! I've already put off college because of Mom being sick since Dad won't get his act together, but you're old enough now that you shouldn't need me to take care of you!"

"But you're still gonna take care of HIM!" Jazmine had screamed, and ran sobbing out the door.

She'd barely had a civil word for Yancy up to when they left, and Mom had assured them, "She's just having separation anxiety. She'll come around, and be as proud of you as we are."

Well, she hadn't. When they'd come home after making the first cut in August, they'd spent most of their time in Mom's hospital room. Jazmine had always left when they started talking about the Academy. Raleigh had seen her hovering around trying to talk to Yancy alone several times, and hovered himself, anxious about what she would say and what sway she'd hold.

At some point, she had managed to pull Yance aside, and Raleigh had gnawed off most of his fingernails sitting with Mom. When they came back, Jazmine was flatly ignoring Yance, and Yance was looking tired and flustered. Raleigh had felt triumphant. After all, he'd told his conscience when he felt guilty, it wasn't like Mom was about to die.

His conscience was a lot louder this time around, and harder to reconcile with what he wanted.

They didn't talk about it an more that night, and when he went to his room to go to sleep, he found that every one of his model planes had at least some part broken, some more subtly than others, and every poster on his wall was torn. He almost went back out to confront her, but Dad and Yancy were still having a hissed, furious conversation in the kitchen. So he just went to bed.

Yancy stayed in bed until after noon on Saturday and looked like death warmed over when he did come downstairs. Raleigh made him breakfast and didn't make fun of him like he normally would.

Jazmine stayed in her room most of the day. A few times, when Raleigh passed by, he could hear her crying. She'd always been a crier. Sometimes, growing up, Raleigh had just brushed it off, figuring she was being a drama queen. Other times, he hadn't been so sure, especially when the moments where she cried were the same ones that he felt his stomach in knots, his skin itching, and his chest in a vise.

Moments like this one.

Dad was packing. Raleigh kept wanting to ask Yancy. Is he really leaving? Where? Why?

Finally, when he caught his father putting another box in his van, he said weakly, "Dad, you don't have to go."

Dad looked at him, sort of cringing as if he were the kid and Raleigh was the parent, and smiled weakly. "You're a good kid, Raleigh. You'll be just fine." He went back to the house as Raleigh stared after him.

Late that night, after they all made sandwiches and stared at them again, going over the funeral arrangements in dull voices, Dad went to his room, and Yancy pulled Raleigh aside. "Listen, Rals, I need to have... a talk with Jazz." Raleigh's heart went to his throat and for a second he was sure he was going to lose it, and then he'd be no better than her. But then Yance muttered, "She's not going to be happy."

Relief swept through him, but his stomach was still churning and his throat was still tight. "We're... going back?" His voice sounded so weak and pathetic. "You haven't changed your mind?"

Yancy shook his head and gave him a shaky smile. It made Raleigh feel pulled in two directions: relief that if Yancy was upset too, then he wasn't wrong to be upset, but also distress because if Yancy couldn't hide how upset he felt, then it was bad. "Okay, I'll go... out."

He changed into workout sweats, and went down the street in a random direction. He alternated between walking and jogging and sprinting like a madman, then stretched through every yoga position he knew, then went through all the Jaeger Bushido positions, drill after drill after drill. It was monotonous and painfully dull without Yance and the rest of the class around to have for comparison and the instructors announcing the katas. But it developed into a sort of hypnotic rhythm, and that wasn't so bad, because it shut his mind down.

An hour passed, then two. Something made him keep going. Something told him that Yancy's talk with Jazmine was going to last awhile. Something inside him was so relieved, maybe even smug. Something else inside made him hate himself for those feelings.

When he finally made his way back to their street, the lights were all on at the Saunders's house down the block. Diane Saunders was a divorcee who'd been a good friend of Mom's and baby-sat them all when they were younger. Raleigh stopped and backtracked when he saw the silhouettes crossing the street, so they wouldn't see him in the street light.

It was Diane and Jazmine, and in the cold, dark silence, he could hear Jazmine crying. His stomach burned even hotter, and the vise around his chest got even tighter. He stayed in the trees of the empty lot at the end of their cul-de-sac and watched as Jazmine and Diane went back and forth between the houses a few times. Finally, they went back into Diane's house, and Jazmine didn't go home.

Raleigh went back to the house. "Yancy?"

Yancy was still at the table, staring at nothing, looking like he'd aged twenty years. Oh god, oh god, his eyes were red-rimmed, and Raleigh wanted to explode across the street and start screaming at them, how dare they do that to him?! Or just run back into the woods and sleep there overnight.

But he went hesitantly to his brother's side, and Yancy pulled himself to his feet. "Just... it's okay," he said absently. "It's okay. It's not your fault, Rals. None of it's your fault." He gave Raleigh a quick, rough hug, patting his back, then shuffled up the stairs to his room.

Diane brought Jazmine to the funeral, keeping an arm around her as if she was Jazmine's mom now - or as if Jazmine wouldn't be able to stay upright on her own. Jazmine looked resigned and seemed to be moving on autopilot. Diane alternated between glaring at Yancy and glaring at Dad, and Raleigh kept wanting to step in front of Yancy and shield him from the stares.

Yancy was calmer today, composed again, politely thanking people for coming, and putting them off when they tried to question him. A few times he smiled reassuringly at Raleigh. Anytime he looked at Jazmine, Jazmine looked away.

As they drove home in their rental car, Yancy told him, "Diane Saunders is going to be Jazmine's guardian. Dad and I are going to a lawyer in the morning; he's signing the house and the stuff over to me. If... Jazmine or - or you don't want it, I thought we could just sell it."

"I don't want it," Raleigh said. What was left in it for him? What was left in it for any of them?

"Then whatever you want to keep of your stuff, we need to put in storage. Diane won't hold it for us."

Raleigh shrugged and almost said, Might as well toss most of it, Jazz broke just about everything. But he choked it back down. There wouldn't be much to store, since they'd relocated so many times over the years. A few picture albums, maybe. But even the family ones of their trips... would he ever be able to look at them again? Would Yancy?

That night, Diane came over with a stack of paperwork and absolutely radiating disdain. Yancy was waiting at the table, and she informed them, "Jazmine doesn't want to come. She signed where she needed to."

"Okay," said Yancy cautiously, and motioned Raleigh away as if he were afraid she'd go rabid. "Why don't you - "

"Oh no, you don't," Diane growled. "I haven't yet heard what your brother thinks about this."

"No. Leave him out of this," Yancy snarled.

She ignored him and began haughtily, "Raleigh - "

"I SAID - "

"NO!" Raleigh threw up a hand, though Yancy hadn't physically come towards either of them. They both froze. Mind racing, he croaked, "It's fine. It's fine." He was embarrassed. Embarrassed that Yancy thought he should be sent out of the room like a kid. Embarrassed that he felt so scared. He was a Ranger candidate, almost a pilot. He should be able to take this without quaking in his shoes. He straightened his shoulders and looked at Diane. "What?"

Her eyes filled with tears, and she softened her stance. "Raleigh, honey, I am so sorry to put this on you. You're only seventeen, you shouldn't have to in this situation, but I've got no choice. Can you find it in your heart to begin to understand what you and your brother are about to do?" she pleaded, but the twist of her mouth and the change in her tone made it clear what she thought of said brother.

It took every shred of self-restraint he had not to look at Yancy. But he managed to keep her gaze and stare her down. "We're in the Jaeger Academy," he said quietly. "We're Ranger candidates. She doesn't need us to baby-sit her." Not even if she thinks she does. We've grown up, she should too, he thought.

Another voice in the back of his mind whispered, Keep telling yourself that, jackass.

Diane's breath caught like a sob, but she looked disgusted. "All right then. Since you're such big men now, you can both stand here and watch while I take custody of your sister."

Yancy's jaw was clenched, and there was a vein throbbing on his temple. Raleigh had never seen him like this. Once Diane had signed the papers, she glared at him while he did, and he handed her some of them. Her copies, Raleigh assumed. "My father's signing the house over to me tomorrow. Did she say whether she'd like to keep it?"

"She doesn't. Sell it. There's nothing left in it for her, is there?"

"Fine."

With one final, long stare at each of them, Diane heaved a sigh and walked out. Raleigh stood where he was like he was rooted there. Yancy scrubbed at his face. "I want to... get loose ends wrapped up this week. We'll have to hurry."

"Okay." It'll be okay, Yance. He'd never felt such an urge to say that before. It scared and embarrassed him that he wanted to. "He's really going?" he mumbled.

Now Yancy's mouth twisted like Diane's had. "Yeah. I had to... argue with him just to get him to do the formalities before. He didn't say where he's going."

"Did he say why?"

Yancy shook his head, and eyed Raleigh. "Sorry, kiddo. I should've seen some of this coming."

"It's not your fault," Raleigh said, with feeling. But he knew Yancy didn't believe him.

Yancy got up early the next morning, which was crazy. Dad did show up when he said he would, and Yancy only had one-syllable words for him. He stood leaning against the rental car, glowering, as Dad came up the porch steps to Raleigh. "I'll say goodbye now to you and your sister," he said, as if he was just going on a trip and would be back in a few weeks.

Raleigh stared at him. "You don't have to go," he said.

Dad shook his head. "I can't stay, Raleigh. I'm... I'm sorry." He took a deep breath and looked at him again. "You've grown into a great young man. I'm very proud of you. I love you all."

I don't understand any of this. Raleigh shrugged and took a step back. Normally, when Dad went on one of his longer trips and they weren't going with him, they'd have hugged. Quick and awkward, but a hug. Not this time, not like this, when Dad was just... going. You love us? Really? "Not enough," he muttered, and looked at Yancy.

Dad trembled, seeming to shrink even more, and went down the porch and across the street. He had to knock for several minutes at Diane's house, then stood on the step talking to her for awhile longer, but she finally let him in. Raleigh half-expected to hear Jazmine start screaming or see something fly out the window, but there was silence, and in only a few moments, Dad came back out.

He looked up at Raleigh on the porch, and then at the house as he stood by the door of his van, then he got in and started it up, and drove down the street ahead of Yancy.

Raleigh knew he'd never see him again. He had a feeling Jazmine and Yancy wouldn't either.

He stood inside the living room for about thirty seconds, then sprinted up the stairs, changed again in a rush, and went tearing down the street like a maniac, running until he was exhausted, then did drills over and over again, slowing down only to stretch and keep from pulling a muscle. He was still at it when he saw Yancy's rental car pass by, and walked back to the house. Yancy was already returning from Diane's when he got there.

"It's done," Yance said shortly. It really was. He cast a searching look over the house much like Dad had done, then asked, "Want to maybe get a hotel room until we go back? I'm not really up for... living here."

"Yeah," Raleigh mumbled. "That'd be great."

They spent the rest of the day throwing their own things out with abandon, emptying the cupboards and fridge, and trying not to actually look at anything too long. Raleigh found the picture albums from their assorted trips and almost, almost threw them out. Yancy found him sitting in the master bedroom floor, staring at them.

"Let's... store these somewhere," Raleigh finally said. He thought about suggesting giving them to Jazmine, but he had a feeling she'd burn them. He didn't want that to happen.

Yancy helped Raleigh clean out his room, and noticed that just about everything Raleigh owned - books, keepsakes, and models - had been damaged in some way. His lips thinned like they always did when he knew Jazz (or Raleigh) had done something nasty and was denying it. Raleigh had (almost) never gone after Jazz or her things physically, at least not after age five. That was one of the few instances where Mom and Dad had intervened in their fights, to tell Raleigh that he could not hit Jazmine because (a) she was a girl, and (b) she was younger.

He'd thought that was incredibly unjust, since up until their teens, she had hit plenty hard enough to leave marks, and hadn't thought twice about smashing his stuff or ripping pages out of his books. Hell, up until just a few years ago, she was taller than him! He'd mocked her, though, belittled her for being "the dumb one in the family," made fun of her "stupid girl stuff" and called her a drama queen when she got upset. Especially when it was Yancy's shoulder she tried to cry on.

With nearly everything Raleigh had ever collected in the trash, Yancy tried to throw all his comics and action figures out too. "It's just stuff," he insisted, as he'd always done when Jazmine wrecked something, even though she never touched Yancy's things.

Raleigh stopped him from tossing the ones he knew Yance treasured most. "Keep 'em. Some of them are valuable. Especially this one." He held up Iron Man and grinned. "After all, we're about to be Iron Men on Steroids." It had been a running joke from Day One of the Jaeger Program, and for the first time since they'd been home, Yancy laughed.

They checked into a motel near the airport and spent the next few days on autopilot. Waking up, doing their drills, going to the house, cleaning and boxing, back to the hotel, drilling again, going to bed. Carting stuff around and throwing it out was a lot of work on top of their drills, but in a way, it was good. It left them both exhausted enough to sleep without having to think too much first. They didn't talk much. Just moving, moving, moving made Raleigh feel numb, and that was all right.

But on the last day where they thought they pretty much had the work done, Yancy was fidgeting and looking towards Diane's house. Raleigh braced himself. "Rals, I... I don't want to go like this." He stared at the boxes around them and the covered furniture. Their family's house now looked like it could just be any empty place up for sale. "Her hating us."

Raleigh stared at his dirty hands. "What do you want to do?"

"... I thought we could go see Mom's grave. Once more, before we go. Ask her if she'll go with us. I... I think Momwouldwantthat," he finished in a rush.

What argument could Raleigh really make against that? "Okay."

On Saturday morning, they drove to the cemetery, and Diane was waiting with Jazmine. Jazmine had been crying, but Raleigh thought maybe she looked a little less like she wanted to gut the two of them. That was good, he told himself. That would make Yance feel better. Maybe they could still feel a little like brothers and sister after all this.

They walked side-by-side to the grave, still covered in flower arrangements from the funeral, and Raleigh found himself humming Mom's favorite Bels song from when they were little. Is this better, Mom? Are you somewhere better, like heaven? Will this be okay?

"Will you shut up, Raleigh!" Jazmine snapped at him.

Thus ended those hopeful thoughts. Between them, Yancy shut his eyes. "Jazz, can you not - "

" - Don't call me Jazz. Only my friends call me that."

Ouch. She knelt and began mechanically removing some of the flowers that were dead, rearranging the live ones to frame the grave. At least she didn't slap Yancy's hands away when he went to help her, and Raleigh cautiously joined in.

They finished the work in silence, and Yancy said to her, "We need to get back to Jaeger training. Here's the keys to the house, and the realtor knows to talk to Diane. You get the money from the sale." Jazmine stared at the keys in his hand and made no move to take them. "We can... get in touch again when the term is done. Over Christmas."

She took a deep breath, mustering herself like Yancy did, like Mom and Dad had both done when they were about to address something unpleasant. Like Raleigh knew he himself did. She looked at Raleigh, then Yancy, right in the eyes. "Don't. Don't call me. Don't come. Ever again."

Yancy and Raleigh stood rigid, and their sister turned her back on them and walked away. By the time she reached Diane, she was running for the car. Yancy stared at the keys in his hand, then started after her. Diane was waiting, and Raleigh started to follow, but Yancy half turned and said, "No." Raleigh frowned. "Please?"

He just looked so worn down, so Raleigh nodded, and stayed where he was. But he watched. Yancy went to Diane, and she did take the keys, but leaned forward and said something that made Yancy's jaw clench. Once she was walking away and he looked back, Raleigh took that as the go-ahead to rejoin Yancy, and they headed for their car. Diane was standing next to hers with Jazmine already in the passenger seat as they drove away.

Raleigh was sure he felt Jazmine's eyes on them for miles, and wondered why it felt this way.

To be continued...

Coming this weekend: The Beckets return to the Academy and face the challenge of full-blown drifting with the demons they both carry. The finalists of Class 2016-B begin combat simulation and get support from their former classmates and the Gage twins in Chapter Seven: Go With The Flow.

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