One final chapter for the year. It's wild that we've been going for so long now, and reaching the last quarter of this story! Thanks for coming along for the ride. And thanks to BrambleStar14 and Minaethiel, as always, for beta reading for me.
Everybody's So Afraid They Could Die
Written by TunelessLyric
But they never once said
'Thank god we're alive'"
-Architects, 'when we were young'
"Where's Harper?"
Now that she had some pain medication in her system and her arm in a sling, Blizzard was able to make a headcount.
Circuit let out a long sigh and shook his head. "Freelancers took him."
"No, he let them take him," said Crosshair.
Firefly glanced up from the unconscious Geist, brows lifting. "What?"
"Allen was dying. Had something to give Harper before he went out. Harper stayed with him, sent me away." Falcon shot a look over his shoulder. Blizzard felt the weight of it like a rock to her face. "Said he was waiting for Jason."
"I need way more meds before I hear the rest of this," she said after an uncomfortable silence.
Firefly pushed a hand through his sweaty hair. The entire team found somewhere else to look. Blizzard envied Geist. He didn't have to live through this awkward moment.
"And a raise," she added when it was clear nobody knew what to say.
She was free of Harper now, she realized. Her life was her own. She was surrounded by people who cared about her. Who liked her. They were her family. But each aching breath put more distance between her and Jason. And him.
The rest of the flight to their ship was spent in silence. No matter how she shifted or struggled, Hannah couldn't get comfortable in her seat.
Phoenix took over the medbay. With Geist floating in a sea of unconsciousness, Lucas' dislocated leg and Hannah's shattered arm, there was no reason for the others to use their own beds. Instead, with Aaron determined to stay at Geist's side, and Phil and Mike's dogged attempts to cheer Hannah up, they all elected to spend the night surrounded by medical equipment. It all hazed over, fuzzy at the edges while morphine dripped through her veins. All she could be certain of was how weird it was to see the team without Harper and Jason.
Besides, Lucas was delirious with the painkillers swimming through his system. Hannah tried to go easy on her own supply since her arm really wasn't that bad compared to some of what she'd been through. But she couldn't stop herself from trying to retreat into the blissful ignorance of the world outside.
She was distantly aware of Mike pulling the blankets up to her chin while Phil laughed at Lucas. But she had no idea what they were saying. Everything, their voices, the lights, the machinery surrounding them, washed over her like waves. She shut her eyes, cradling her numb arm to her chest just to feel the weight of the cast.
Everything was so distorted and confused. She felt heavy, like she was sinking in a hot, black sea. She wished Dom was there to cheer her up. She wished Mark was there to make her laugh.
But most of all, she wished Jason was there to hold her.
The lights were unbearable when she woke. Her mouth felt as if it had been coated in dust. Sitting up, Hannah nearly instantly regretted it as the medbay swam and spun.
"Did we go out drinking last night?" she grumbled, squinting at Aaron hunched over nearby. God, even saying that much made the headache worse.
He shook his head and chuckled at her sorry state. "You looked like you were having fun, though. Took a nice trip and never even left your rack."
Hannah risked cracking one eye all the way open and finally located the irritating beeping sound. And all the wires hooked up to her chest and free arm. "Oh."
"Just sorry you missed Lucas' musical number. I think he was trying to convince Phil to stay, but I'm gonna be honest, I think it gave him a reason to hurry out."
She probed gently at the layer of plaster that started just below the shoulder and went right down to her knuckles. "Do I want to know?"
Aaron laughed again. "Nah, probably not. But it was the highlight of my day."
"How are they?" she asked, managing to nod at the unconscious Geist and Lucas. The room was sharpening, the fog packing her head clearing.
"Aw, Lucas just has a flesh wound. He'll be fine. And this big ox figured he'd take that giant fuck-off Freelancer on his own and had his bell rung. Might've learned his lesson, yeah?" Aaron lifted a brow, digging into the sardonic tone to hide the white-knuckled grip on Geist's hand.
Yesterday was starting to untangle itself. Hannah drank down the entire glass of water on her bedside table and poured herself another. "I should've been there."
Aaron's gaze dropped and he picked an invisible speck off his sleeve. "But you weren't, so. Don't beat yourself up. Look at you, I'd feel bad if you keeled over."
"Blue bitch is better than me. There, I admitted it." She forced her tone too bright.
"Guess you both learned your lessons then?"
"Yeah."
The various heart monitors beeped away annoyingly while Hannah worked on her water.
"Nothing from Harper. Before you ask."
She shrugged. Her fingers itched for her data pad. Not because she expected anything from the AWOL team leader, but because… well, she figured there'd be something from Jason instead. The memory of the setting sun touching his Freelancer helmet taunted her again.
"What's next?" she asked instead of the questions piling up inside.
"First we see who gets promoted to general. Then we see what they want from us. Harper…" Aaron made a vague helpless gesture. "Up to him. Nothing we can do until we know what he wants from us."
Hannah flopped back against her pillow. It wasn't a cushy civilian hospital bed piled thick with pillows and an adjustable mattress. It was barely a step up from lying on the metal floor. Colliding with it sent a shock through her arm.
"Great. More waiting."
Finally free of the medbay, Hannah and Lucas went poking around the ship. The halls seemed extra empty with half the team incapacitated, playing nurse, or missing in action. In fact, Phil and Mike seemed to be taking this opportunity to catch up on some well-deserved rest. Which left her and the limping Lucas to their own devices.
They settled into Hannah's cramped bunk and filled each other in about the events of the Battle of Byzantium. Which sounded much grander than a simple scorched-earth op.
"So there I was, surrounded by these Freelancers. I mean, we'd only seen about a half-dozen until then, yeah? But suddenly there were eight more. Geist completely screened out that big one, Maine I think they said, but even with the four of us—and I know Mike's gotta count for three people—that was really a lot of Freelancers," said Lucas, hands waving all over the place.
"No wonder Aaron kept asking where I was."
"Yeah, no shit. We needed three extra pairs of hands." He shrugged.
Right. The three missing pairs. With Harper waiting for Jason and Hannah playing Chicken with Carolina, they'd left the others short-staffed on the roof. She stared down at her immobilized fingers silently.
"It's fine. We did it."
"Yeah, look at us. You can barely walk, I can't dress myself and Geist probably won't wake up for another two days. Go us."
"Hannah."
For a moment, she considered slamming a fist into the wall. She pictured herself tearing the sheets off the bed and flipping the mattress to the floor. Raging and screaming just to pretend for a second it would change everything. So she wouldn't feel this helpless as everything spun out of control.
"Look at me."
Reluctantly, pressing her fingers against the cast holding them captive, she met Lucas' gaze.
"Don't do this. Please."
She didn't know what to say. The selfish thought crossed her mind that he had no idea how she felt. But he did. They all knew. They'd all made choices that had cost them. They had all been forced to walk away. But it didn't compare. Beside everything she had cost her teammates—Orange, Geist, Aaron—her tally weighed heavier.
"Please," Lucas said, more firm than before. He grabbed her good hand, squeezing it between both of his. "Aaron said you went off the roof yesterday. Tell me you weren't being stupid."
"Of course I wasn't! That Freelancer chick was standing close to the edge and I was out of rounds. It wasn't like I had other choices. And I might be good, but she's a foot taller than me." It came easily. The reasoning. The logic. "What else was I supposed to do?"
"Not run off alone, for a start." He rolled his eyes.
"Okay, so then it would've been ten Freelancers against five of us."
"And I'll take those odds any day of the week. You know we all would."
"I saw Jason."
Lucas squeezed her hand again, eyes softening. "That doesn't mean you're allowed to be stupid."
She threw him a withering glare.
"I'm being serious, you crazy bitch!" But he laughed at her expression.
She blew out a loud sigh and said, "Okay, fine, you're right."
"Mark it on the calendars, Hannah admitted to being wrong!" He clutched his chest and schooled his face into utmost sincerity.
"If my punching arm wasn't in a cast right now, you'd be dead, Thorpe."
But she did hit him in the side of the head with her pillow.
Two days later, she was curled up in her bunk, tapping out a message with her newly freed hand. It would be a while before she was back in fighting form, and since the injury was still healing she wasn't allowed any training yet. So there she sat, fumbling with the keyboard like learning to type all over again.
It was the third message asking Jason for a sitrep.
It was completely rational to expect he was out of contact for completely legitimate reasons. Maybe the Mother of Invention was traveling between systems. He could be in cryo. Or out of normalspace service. Or he could be busy with duties. On a new deployment already. Busy with Harper.
She stared at the brief lines of text. Scowled at it, really. I'd like to know what you are up to sounded so stiff. So unlike their easy exchanges.
Hitting send before she had the chance to delete the whole thing, Hannah told herself she was being ridiculous. There were a dozen reasons he hadn't replied yet.
She went in search of Aaron. It was her turn to convince him to take a shower and eat something.
Geist finally regained consciousness hours before they dropped into orbit back home. He was still bleary and had no idea what had happened on the roof, but he put up with Aaron's exuberant bedside manner with his usual stoic grace.
A weight eased off Hannah's shoulders when she watched him hobble down the Pelican ramp to the base. For her own part, the medics had approved light duty as long as she stayed out of sparring and the weight rack. Which was how she found herself wandering laps around the yard with Phil later that afternoon.
The team second was content to walk in silence for an hour, eyes constantly shifting over the dead grey landscape. Then, as they started down the gentle slope behind the building for the eighth time, "No updates."
She nodded, kicking a stone out of the way before she twisted an ankle on it. "They tell you about Allen's replacement yet?"
He lifted a shoulder. "Some Lieutenant Knowles. Been over in the Tau system for a decade. Never actually met her before."
The name rang a bell, conjuring impassive brown eyes, curly dark hair and a scowl that could curdle milk.
"I've seen her in news releases. Way back. Ages ago," she said after coming up empty on anything useful.
"All I can say, too. We were always out this way, dealing with our own ops," he said.
They continued for another lap.
"You think Ian would ever go for a promotion?" asked Hannah. The wind played through her hair, making her smile despite her sulky thoughts.
Her armour was still being repaired after the number she'd done on it and her shoulder was still too messed up to handle a rifle. That left her in a flak jacket, pistol holstered on her thigh rather than hip out of habit.
Phil inhaled deeply, as if preparing himself for the answer. Or to stall. Sometimes Hannah wondered about their blind loyalty. She remembered what it was like to fully, unconditionally trust White with everything. It was too hard to look past all of the hate she and Harper had slung at each other's eyes.
"No," Phil said at last. "I think he's happiest doing what he does right now."
"I certainly don't see him at a desk job," she agreed.
And picturing him going grey at the temples, wrinkling at the brow, wasn't something she was capable of. It simply didn't seem like the thing Harper would ever achieve.
I haven't got any 'after the war ends' plans.
"Well, you know what they say. Do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life. Brilliant fireteam leader, absolutely. Put him in charge of actually running a war?" Phil shook his head. "Does not compute."
They trudged on, the sun climbing higher toward noon.
"What about you?" asked Hannah.
He glanced over in surprise. "What about me?"
She shrugged and kept her eyes forward. "You could do it. Not saying we stage a coup or put out a hit out on the fresh General Knowles. But down the road, if there was a vacancy…"
His sharp eyes fixed on the horizon. "I wouldn't leave Phoenix."
"Okay, fine, hypothetically. If Phoenix was looked after or retired or, I don't know, probably in prison if we're realistic. What then? Place drops in your lap. General fucking Philip Blake."
"I don't know."
"That's not a no."
"Well, it's not a yes."
"Come on. Don't think about it. Just say something. Do you want to change the galaxy or not?" she pressed, planting herself in front of Phil.
He stared down at her, eyebrows so low she could barely hold his gaze.
"Yeah. I do."
She punched him in the arm lightly. "Was that really so hard?"
He hit back before stepping around her. "Yes, it was. Are you satisfied now?" he asked over his shoulder.
"Not at all." She had to hurry to keep up with his much longer stride. "Why don't you go for it? Shit, Phil, Harper's not even here. What if he never comes back—hypothetically," she added quickly, seeing his face darken.
He took another deep breath, but didn't answer for a long time. They completed another circuit. Hannah assumed she'd never actually get a response. But as long as he at least thought about the possibility then she was satisfied.
The sun was directly overhead and they stopped under the shelter of the main entrance for water and food. Phil played with his bottle cap, looking out at the endless nothing in all directions.
"Hypothetically, Harper never comes back. Okay, fine. I guess I'd take over Phoenix." He eyed her, taking her measure. "You want me to make you my second, don't bother denying it. I… I'd think about it. I'd have to. Lucas and Aaron are out. Geist's really the only one in the running for the position."
She nodded. She'd expected nothing less.
He went on, "I'd be on the lookout for someone new. It's not easy to fill personnel on the team, but someone would eventually come along needing a second chance. Someone who fit in. Not a replacement."
Hannah nodded again. Half to encourage him to continue, half because that's just how Phoenix worked. She said, "Okay, so general opens up and you're asked. What do you say?"
Phil stood and started cleaning up their brief meal. Shrugging on his pack again, he caught her shoulder so there was no escaping.
"What's the point, Hannah? Are you angling for your own promotion here? That's pretty shallow of you."
She looked him in the eye steadily. Trying to take his measure in this moment when she caught his walls down.
"Answer the question, Blake," she said. "It's a simple yes or no. Do you want it?"
His mouth pressed into a tight line as he scrutinized her. She didn't move. Didn't shift under the weight of his inspection.
"All right, fine. Yes."
She patted the hand on her shoulder. "Something to think about. Always good to know how you feel. What are you so scared for?"
"I'm not scared." He turned away, marching back into the sun and midday heat.
"Look at you running away. You know, if you let your shoulders hunch up too long you'll get stuck like that," she said, following at a far more relaxed pace. Letting him put the distance between them.
After stewing for fifteen minutes, Phil let her catch up. She didn't push the matter, convinced he'd said all there was to say. Or at least, all he'd been willing to admit.
But he surprised her.
"I'm not like you, Hannah. Or Jason, Harper, Aaron or half the Insurrection. I don't have this—this drive. I don't think I'd be any good at it. I'm not sure how long it's been since I even wanted something for myself. I don't have the time for that anymore. I've got you lot to look after and being a soldier and just everything else going on."
"It's not about wanting something for yourself. That's not why I want command of a team," she said, shooting him a look. Trying to gauge his reaction. "It's about what you can do to help the most people."
"Why did you join Phoenix then?" he asked, turning everything around again.
Hannah let out a hard laugh. "Because you guys wanted to get vengeance for what happened to me. Because you accepted me—mostly. Because of Jason. Because I thought I deserved punishment for what I've done. Because despite everything, Ian made me feel welcome. None of you judged me, or asked me for anything, or hated me for being the fuck-up I am. Not just because I owed you for saving me. Because I owed you for giving me a second chance."
"I die and general opens up again. Do you take it?" he pressed with an intensity rarely displayed.
She thought about it. Considered every possible, insane meaning. General Steele. Her father would shit a brick. And Jason… When she tried to picture the look on his face, she couldn't tell if it was pride or disbelief. A desk. A retirement plan. The war shrunk down to numbers on a map. A dress uniform in place of her armour. A brown uniform instead of a blue one.
"No," she said at last.
Phil accepted it without comment.
They completed their last laps and were heading inside for a shower and a chance to put their feet up. Phil held the door for her. Instead of ducking through, Hannah looked up at the perfect mask of professionalism. She nearly let the moment slip by without commenting. But she knew what White would have done.
"You're allowed to want something, Phil. You're a person, not a machine. It's not your job to bury yourself in our problems until you forget your own. And it's not healthy. Take it from the expert."
She stepped inside and let him digest that in peace.
