Out Of The Past

Part III - Explosion

Layton froze in his chair. "Josie?" He all but whispered the woman's name. It hadn't past his lips since the day they had told him some vague story about an accident and she had died. He had tried for more details, but they seemed to keep talking in circles until it simply became too painful for him to listen to anymore, and he had eventually stopped asking.

But she had lived in his memories every day since.

He had all but fallen apart that day. Till and Roche helped him hold everything together. She had died for the revolution, they told him. It was his duty to her memory to see it through to the end. To free the people of the train.

He had asked who. He had threatened, begged, pleaded with them to tell him who. Someone had to be responsible.

From the looks they gave each other, he knew they knew the answer. But they both denied it. They claimed to only be hearing about it second hand themselves.

But still he swore that day he would go forward with the fight. Because it would give him the opportunity to kill as many jackboots as he could. As many of those leading the privileged class. Give him a chance at every person on the other side of their banner. And maybe..., just maybe...in all of that 'fight for right', he might just get lucky and sink his weapon into the one responsible for taking the woman he loved from him.

And then the revolution was over.

He had won it for her.

But the victory somehow seemed empty. He sat in that chair in the communications room for the first time and addressed the train. And the only person standing next to him was the solid, perfect symbol of his hatred. Of everything he had fought against.

The same person who had pulled him out of that personal pit of pain and despair. The last person he thought would care less. Who on days he didn't want to face one more day of the problems and arguments and infighting, made him stand up and face it down.

Always, she stood at his side.

The person who was now his closest friend on this rolling survival ship.

Layton turned back to her. "I wasn't even aware you knew her. She was...she was just another rebel."

" I didn't know her." Melanie answered him. Her voice now was utterly hollow sounding. Almost automated. "Not until you went missing from the drawers. You see, I was told...by someone...that Josie might be the key to finding you."

Layton wasn't sure after that how long she talked, or how much of what she said he even heard. Only key words and phrases stood out for him as the story started to come together.

But finally she stopped talking and a dark, pressing silence settled in the room. Layton had stopped looking her a long time ago. Now he sat at the table, simply staring down at it. When it became to hard to listen anymore, he would focus on the patterns in the wood. Trying to shut out her words. But they kept reaching out to him. Drawing him back. Forcing him to hear her out.

Melanie knew that 'angry' didn't begin to do justice to what she believed he was feeling. For months, a faceless stranger had been responsible for the worst event since he had boarded the train. Someone he likely told himself was dead now. Maybe someone he killed himself, exacting some sort of revenge for Josie.

Now, not only did he not have that, but the truth was worst than the past he had imagined. That someone he trusted, cared about, loved as a friend, and had protected, was that faceless, nameless stranger. The very person he slept next to every night for months, had cruelly taken the life of someone he had formed a deep, loving bond with.

"You..." The word slowly slipped out of his mouth.

The sheer hatred attached to that one word washed over her like a cold spray. When she looked up at him, she knew she wasn't looking at her friend anymore. Now she faced someone who was a stranger to her once again. Who probably was now fighting everything in him not to grab the nearest available weapon and exact that need for revenge that still lived in him.

This was the man she faced down in the engine room. Who held a scalpel to her throat and threaten to kill her. She closed her eyes, swearing whatever came, she would allow it. She had promised him that much.

"Layton..." she softly said, "I'm..."

"NO!" The word was screamed at her as he leaned across the table. "DON'T say you're sorry. Don't. You. DARE!"

Each word was a physical blow to her. She kept her eyes shut at first. She told herself it made it easier. Not to have to face his anger. To see the hatred in his eyes now. But she told herself quickly she was just being a coward. Even now she was stealing something from him he deserved.

Opening her eyes, she tried to force back her tears but couldn't even begin to do so.

Layton stood in the center of the room now, running his hands over his head several times as though just trying to find something to do with them. To keep himself under control.

Then suddenly he turned, and his gaze found her's. For several seconds he just stood there and stared at her, tears in his own eyes brimming over and cascading down his cheeks.

"You always said you were a monster. And I tried so hard to make you see otherwise. But you were bound and determined to prove me wrong." He stated, staring back at her. "I should never have stopped that execution. I should have LEFT you...in that chair."

Melanie stared back at him, keeping her voice low and steady as she answered him. "Maybe you should have."

In those silent moments, as they held each others stare, he seemed to make his decision as he turned and stormed out of the cabin, leaving her sitting alone at the table.

Only then did she stop fighting the tears and let them flow openly as she covered her face and let the sobs break free.