Primeval: All Grief to Refrain
Title: All Grief to Refrain
Author: Desiree
Rating: PG 13
Characters: Stephen/Nick, Abby, Connor, Becker, OC soldier
Disclaimer: All characters belong to their various creators (who aren't me, sadly). Title is borrowed from the song Health to the Company, because I suck at coming up with one.
Summary: Not all anomalies bring death. Sometimes, they bring a gift.
A/N: Set before 2.05 (and 3.03 respectively). Aspires to be a fix-it AU, but really, it's not funny how long it took me to write this, so for now it's going to stay a one-shot. Feel free to brit-pick (or nitpick, as the case may be: English isn't my first language, and I don't have a beta-reader)
Never should have waited so long to say,
What I've always known since the very first day.
Thought that you would stay forever with me,
But the time has come to leave.
FInal Goodbye - Rihanna
You don't know what you'll find once you step through those sparkling shards of light. You never do, and - if anyone asked your opinion, which they don't; you're here to follow orders, not second-guess them - you'd just as soon not step into them at all.
Command has long ago deemed the risk of exploring the other side of these anomalies too high, and you're glad of it. Unfortunately for you and your fellow Special Forces soldiers Cutter's merry band of misfits and scientists choose to ignore those decisions more often than not.
Which is why this day sees you here, in front of another orb of broken, revolving, glittering shards, Cutter's right hand man at your shoulder. His tranquillizer rifle is pointing down, but you watched him load and check it, and you know from experience that he's ready to bring it up at a moment's notice. If you have to step through into the unknown in search of a lost little girl, you're glad it's Hart you have to keep an eye on. The man's a margin more sensible and cautious when it comes to the wonders of the prehistoric than that nutter of a professor. And he's a bloody good shot with that rifle of his, you've seen him in action before.
It's just you and Hart this time, which suits you fine as well. The less civilians to keep an eye on, the better. Cutter and the rest of his crew are off to investigate another sighting; if you had to chance a guess, you'd say that the professor didn't bother calling his assistant for back-up. Hart's poker face is almost perfect, but even he couldn't disguise the falter in his step when the Lieutenant mentioned his team's whereabouts in the offhand manner that suggested he thought Hart knew what was going on anyway.
The rumour mill among soldiers, especially bored ones, often times rivals the gossip of teen-aged girls, and so you're not entirely unaware of the tension between Hart and the professor, as well as its cause. And yes, you understand that Cutter was bound to have been shocked and feeling betrayed when he first found out about his wife's unfaithfulness - he was entitled to that, at least.
But that has been over six months ago. You'd think that, by now, the impotent anger has drained away, and Cutter was able to see past his own hurt at the bigger picture.
Hart's not a bad man; he joins you and your mates for drinks sometimes, at the end of most of the missions your squad has been called on for help, so you know what you're talking about. You actually like the bloke, and - if pressed - you'd go so far as to call him a friend. Not a close friend, by any means, but a friend all the same. And a blind man can see that the current situation is eating away at him, as much as he doesn't want it to show.
What you don't understand is Cutter's unwillingness to finally let go of the past. This whole affair he's so up in arms about, even if he claims differently, has happened about ten years ago, which would put Hart's age then at around twenty-two, if you're not entirely mistaken. Barely out of his teens and no match for the she-devil the professor calls his wife. You still remember all the daft things you've been up to at that age. Moreover, as you've heard the story, Helen Cutter has been Hart's tutor at the uni which makes this whole sordid affair… perhaps not illegal but more than a little morally questionable. In your opinion, there's more reason to be furious with Cutter's wife than with her student. Unless Cutter's anger stems from an altogether different place - it's no business of yours, but again, soldiers like to talk, and there's always been plenty of talk and speculation about the professor and his assistant.
The Lieutenant signals you that the rest of the team have secured the perimeter, and you're good to go. There's a pair of anxious, worried parents being consoled and fed lies to by the talented Miss Lewis in their flat a few streets away and no reason to wait any longer. Hart's a brilliant tracker; you're confident to find the little girl if she's still alive, so at least this expedition has a purpose other than unchecked curiosity.
You take a last look at your surroundings (idle sentimentality you won't admit to): a large meadow, a line of small houses obscured by a hedge of brambles beyond the steadily turning, bright lights of the anomaly, your team-mates spread in a wide circle with the anomaly at its centre.
You nod to Hart and walk into the gently pulsating shards without hesitation.
Stepping through one of these portals is always disconcerting. Not because it has any great affect on the human body, but because - even though consciously you know better - you expect the familiar. You expect to take one step and see the world around you shift one step. Instead, you take one step, and all you see is too bright light, and then you take another step and you're in a different world entirely.
Considering this, it's pure irony that this time, the worst of the disorientation is due to seeing nothing but the familiar. You step out of the light into a meadow, a high hedge in the distance and a circle of soldiers around you. Only on second glance do you realize that it's not really the same location; the setting is similar, but not identical. You recognize Miller in the ranks, and Rutherford, but there are some new faces as well, and the numbers are more. At the edge of your vision you notice the tree line of a forest stretch to the horizon.
It isn't until you catch sight of the professor, however, do you dread that something is awfully wrong. The hair for one. It's longer than you're used to, a tidy, professional cut, not the messy fringes you're half convinced he cut himself with a pair of household scissors and a mirror. The expression in his eyes for another. He looks at you as if...
No. Not at you. At Stephen.
The dread settles as a tight knot in your stomach as you watch the professor go very still, colour draining from his face, mouth falling open. He isn't the only one to react like this.
“Cutter?”
Hart's surprised voice breaks the spell, pushes Cutter into action. The professor breaks through the circle of bemused, uncertain soldiers, walks right up to his assistant and pulls him into a tight embrace.
There's only one conclusion to come to, a behaviour like this from a man like Cutter, and you don't like it one bit.
Hart, rigid in his surprise and confusion, says, “So I didn't just quit then, did I?”
The words may be flippant, but his voice is strained.
It doesn't surprise you that he's thought of leaving. If anything, you're surprised he's lasted this long. It doesn't surprise you at all, the way Cutter's arms tighten around Hart's shoulders, the way he chokes out the words, “No. No, you didn't just quit.”
Hart's arm, the one not still gripping his rifle, comes up around Cutter's back to return the hold as he finally looses the rigidity.
It's a damned shame, you think as you spot the missing two members of Cutter's little crew run towards the two men, expressions open and vulnerable, that only now Cutter seems to have noticed the important bits of a friendship he let his wife break into pieces.
oOo
“There are so many things I wanted to tell you and now...” I can't think of a single one.
No, that wasn't true. Cutter's thoughts were jumbled, all topsy-turvy, chasing each other around in his mind, but he still knew exactly what he wanted to tell Stephen. All these things left unsaid until it was too late.
Taking a deep breath, he pushed down the ache tightening his throat. It wouldn't be the first time Stephen had seen him break down; a few months ago, back before - before, that thought would have made the simmering anger burn brighter, would have made him question the younger man's motives time and again. It was different now. So very different.
But the idea of giving in to his grief right now, with Stephen here, at his side again, alive, seemed wrong, ridiculous even. He swallowed down the tears prickling in his eyes.
“I don't know where to start,” settled Cutter on eventually.
The bark of the uprooted tree trunk they were sitting on was rough beneath his palms; he pushed down on it harder. Becker was stealing sidelong glances at them from where he was standing a few metres away, far enough to give the illusion of privacy, but close enough to intervene in case of... Well, it was annoying either way.
Connor and Abby were with him, anxious and wide-eyed, not even pretending to do anything but stare, and Cutter felt vaguely guilty for hogging Stephen to himself. He wasn't the only one who missed him. But still, they gave Cutter the space and time alone with his friend he so desperately craved. They were bloody amazing, the two of them. He really ought to tell them that, some time.
“Why don't we start with the obvious?”
Stephen's voice, calm and collected. There was already an edge of resignation there, too, which Cutter wished he wouldn't remember so well. He almost hoped Stephen would demand an apology, but what he said, turning his head to look Cutter straight in the eyes, was, “It wasn't your fault, Nick.”
Taking a shuddering breath, forcing away pictures of blood and despair, Cutter had to look away for a moment. Absolution; unasked for, undeserved. It had been Helen's fault, not his; he'd told Jenny, he knew. Only deep down, he didn't feel it. There were so many things he could have, should have done differently. And just one of them might have saved Stephen's life. It were all those 'what-if's which were slowly driving him insane.
“You don't even know what happened.”
“No.”
When he looked back at Stephen, a small, sad smile played around the younger man's lips. “But I know us, Cutter. I know me. And I know that I've been old enough for a while now to make my own choices. Some of them may have been bad or - plain stupid, but they were mine.”
So much in that sentence. Stephen, like Cutter, didn't know how to ask for forgiveness. This time, Cutter took it for what it was.
“Whatever happened, it wasn't your fault.” Stephen sounded so sure of that. So unlike that time in the bowling centre when he was accusing Cutter of purposely not shooting the raptor that was attacking him. The memory brought back these images again, the ones he tried so hard to forget.
“You were torn limb from limb.” He hadn't meant to say it out loud. But now that it was out there, he couldn't stop. “You walked into a room full of hungry creatures, because the door wouldn't shut from the outside, and you were torn to pieces.”
Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Stephen pale. Then he closed his eyes and nodded. “And you watched.”
“You knocked me out. 'I'm doing this one, mate,' you said. 'I'm doing this one.' It was supposed to be me!”
“Like I said, not your fault. If anything, I was being selfish.”
“Selfish?” Cutter stared at him. Stephen had been - brave, desperate to redeem himself, so bloody stupid. But selfish?
“You need it spelled out for you, Cutter? I didn't want to see you die.”
They'd skirted around the edges of platonic for years before Helen so cheerfully destroyed everything they'd worked to built. They'd never taken that last leap of faith, and he couldn't deal with this now. Not when he had to say goodbye again.
Instead, Cutter deflected the sentiment. “You're awfully calm about this.”
Stephen's smirk was barely there, wry and knowing, but he didn't call Cutter on it, just shrugged, uncomfortable but fatalistic.
“Not much I can do about it.”
Only there was. There was!
It was too late for his own Stephen.
Another rainy day spent in their office, another stack of dissertations yet to grade.
“Why do you always leave these things until too late?”
Clear blue eyes rolled in exasperation, but the voice was more fond than annoyed.
He had been a ruddy fool. He had let his anger blind him to everything that was important, and now he was too bloody late for the one thing that mattered. But in another time-line, Jenny Lewis had been Claudia Brown, and maybe, just maybe, he still had the chance to make things right; at least for one of them. If he'd learned one thing from Helen, one thing at all, it was that nothing was set in stone.
Reaching to take Stephen's hand in one of his own like he had been itching to do for a while now, Nick entwined their fingers, resolved to finally do what he should have done to begin with.
“You can't trust Helen! Whatever she's told you -” Beneath his fingers, against his side, he felt the other man tense. He didn't want another argument, not now.
“No, Stephen, listen! Please, just listen.”
Stephen did.
oOo
He was going to die.
Stephen knew as soon as he'd caught sight of Nick, but whereas that notion, certain though he was, left him feeling light-headed and vaguely frightened, hearing it confirmed - in gory detail - felt like a punch to the gut. It sort of pushed any other issues into the background.
He wanted to stay angry at Cutter; for the way things had been going lately, for all the little slights that didn't seem like much up close but added up to make the rift gaping between them seem insurmountable. And it wasn't his self-pity talking, even though it hurt, hurt like nothing else to be standing alone again after all these years.
But they had a traitor in their midst, and Cutter playing all his cards close to his chest didn't only serve to make Stephen feel left out (which he could live with, however little he liked it), but it put Abby and Connor in danger as well. Nick's unwillingness to meet him half-way, as much as Stephen understood was his own fault, was infuriating.
Still, it was hard to muster up that anger when the Nick sitting next to him now looked so completely forlorn. A couple of months, maybe a year older than the Nick waiting on the other side of the anomaly, this Nick looked both better and worse than after Helen had first disappeared. He didn't reek of whiskey, his attire was tidy, he was neatly shaven - as neatly as Cutter ever got, at any rate; but there was something in his eyes that hadn't been there before. Or maybe something was missing that had been there before, and it vindicated Stephen even as it made him cringe to think he'd been the cause of that.
Hearing about Helen's betrayal... he wished he could say it was a surprise, but the truth was that, not so deep down, he had already been aware that she was using him again. He had blinded himself to the obvious, because she was one of the few people still talking to him without that simmering edge of anger and disdain he seemed to detect in the others. And despite everything, he still cared about her. It stung, yes, but she had used him before, there was no reason to think this time was any different. What did surprise him, though, were her motives.
Stephen listened in mounting horror as Cutter spun a tale of two people arrogant and foolish enough to think they could control evolution itself. It was a hard pill to swallow, but Stephen found himself trusting his former professor a lot more willingly than he had done for a while now.
Nick was clutching his hand so hard Stephen imagined his bones grinding together, and the tension thrumming through the body against his side felt too strong, too immediate to suspect he was telling anything but the truth.
When the other man was finished, they sat in silence while Stephen tried to grapple with the magnitude of what had just been revealed to him.
“Leek, huh?” he finally latched on to the easiest part to come to terms with. “Can't say I saw that one coming.”
“None of us did.”
Cutter avoided meeting his eyes again, but he was still clutching Stephen's hand in both of his. Stephen left it there and took a moment to observe. Pallid skin and bags underneath dull eyes.
“Do me a favour?” he sighed. Cutter turned questioning, blue eyes on him, and Stephen instructed, “Don't take another eight years to get your feet back under you. You don't have that luxury any more. Abby and Connor still need you, so just don't...” He wanted to say 'Don't rush to follow,' but that seemed unnecessarily presumptuous, so he settled on, “...don't do anything stupid.”
Cutter ducked his head, an unwilling smile tugging at his lips. “Me, do something stupid?” asked he, smile morphing into a wan but genuine grin. “Now, where did you get that idea?”
Stephen huffed a laugh, and it seemed to surprise them both. It had been so long since he felt like laughing, he'd been afraid he didn't even understand the concept any more. But however weak the cause, it felt good to banter with Nick again.
“You let your hair grow,” he remarked upon another difference to the Nick Cutter he remembered. “It suits you.”
Faint shouts of “Caitie!” reached his ear then, and Stephen felt guilty for almost forgetting about the little girl Lance Corporal Jenkins and he had come here to retrieve. But the young captain Stephen didn't recognize had put most of his contingent on search duty, and Jenkins had all but ordered him to stay. One more pair of eyes wouldn't make much difference at this point.
“So who's soldier boy over there?” he asked instead with a short nod in the captain's direction. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the man look over and glare at him.
Nick smirked. “Captain Becker. Lester brought him on board after you...” He looked away for a moment and swallowed hard. “Anyway. He fancies himself the new head of security, but really, he's just our new babysitter.”
Stephen scoffed at Cutter's glib assessment. “And he's not ready to shoot you yet?” Because, really, if ever there was a man who needed a babysitter, it was Nick Cutter.
“You know, he can hear you just fine!” Becker's annoyed voice broke through their bubble of non-existent privacy. Apparently having decided that, now that he was the subject of their discussion, he wouldn't stand back any longer, the man approached them, Connor and Abby in tow. “And I've felt the urge to shoot him since the first hour of his acquaintance, but I do have a modicum of self-control.”
And, evidently, an attitude to go with it. Stephen grinned in relief; the man was no mere marionette waiting for orders, which went a long way to reassuring him that Becker was, indeed, up to keeping up with Cutter at his most obnoxious. As much as it pained him to admit he had been wrong, but Lester obviously knew what he was doing when he chose Becker for the job. Also, judging by the glint of amusement in Cutter's eyes, the professor wasn't nearly as put out at Becker's presence as he'd made out to be.
Turning his attention to the two other people hovering behind the soldier's dark form, Stephen felt his smile slip just a bit. They looked so different; hardened in a way he hadn't seen on them before. Both of them had chosen to have their hair cut shorter, and while Stephen realized the new looks were really just the tip of the iceberg, it lent them an edge of... matureness, maybe. They weren't the inexperienced youngsters he knew.
Connor, especially, seemed to have finally come into his own. He still looked the part of the geek, Stephen didn't think Connor would ever be able to shake that off. But at the same time he seemed more confident, more at home in his own skin than he had been before.
“Hey, guys,” he greeted, and it seemed to break the spell of uncertainty they had been trapped in.
Connor broke out into one of his huge smiles. Abby just went ahead and launched herself at him, and it was only Nick's quick reflexes as he grabbed hold of Stephen's shoulder that saved him from landing on his back in the patch of nettles growing at the foot of the log they were sitting on.
“You stupid bastard!” Abby accused him heatedly, cuffing the back of his head at the same time as she was hiding her face in his neck.
Yeah, Stephen thought wryly while trying to keep their balance. He might actually deserve that.
oOo
So this was the infamous Stephen Hart.
Captain Becker had heard the stories. He couldn't not. The man was a bloody legend around the ARC, and to be honest, it put Becker a bit on edge around the bloke. Legends rarely told the truth. And the bad things about the hero usually got lost in translation.
What he did understand about Hart, though, was this:
The little team of civilians he had been hired to protect had considered him a friend. And while Connor and Abby had bounced back from his death with relative ease, any fool could see what it had done to Cutter. Oh, the professor hid it well, most of the time. Right now, though, clutching his former assistant's hand like a lifeline, it was obvious exactly what the man had meant to Cutter. It was also quite telling that Hart let him.
Then again, he endured Abby clinging to his other arm and Connor, unconsciously but frequently, reaching out to touch his legs from where he was sitting in front of his three friends with the same good grace.
Becker couldn't resist a small smirk at the way Connor was gesticulating wildly in accompaniment to a tale of one of their more humorous adventures. He'd grown inordinately fond of both Abby and Connor, although he refused to believe sometimes that they were all around the same age. Even Cutter, in his own abrasive, uncompromising way, wasn't all that bad.
And now, throwing in comments and pointing out exaggerations in Connor's story, Becker got to see a side of the professor he hadn't even known existed. As it was, Becker suspected he was witnessing a flashback to how things used to be between this team before everything had gone tits-up.
Whatever else Stephen Hart might have been, whatever faults the man had, it was clear enough that he cared for this little group.
Hearing what Cutter had had to say couldn't have been easy; Becker had seen Hart pale when the professor had recounted his death. And yet, here he was, rolling his eyes and chuckling at all the appropriate places for his friends' sakes. That, more than anything, soothed his previous doubts. Which wasn't to say that Becker believed all of the stories circling around the ARC. The man seemed nice enough, but he wasn't bloody superman.
He did seem bothered by something all of a sudden, though. Becker watched him frown, turning his head slightly this way and that. Both Abby and Connor went on obliviously, but Cutter seemed to have taken notice as well.
“Stephen?” asked he.
Hart held one hand up in an aborted gesture to ask for silence and turned around to peer into the rustling shadows of the woods.
“I thought I heard...”
How he could have heard anything over Connor's excited storytelling and Abby's clear laughter was beyond Becker, but Hart got up to investigate anyway, long limbs easily sidestepping fallen branches and bramble vines.
They all watched curiously, Becker fingering the safety of his gun just in case, as Hart stopped about ten paces in and crouched down.
“Caitie?” he called. And, as a small, tear-stained face hesitantly peeked out of a curtain of leaves and low hanging branches, “Are you Caitlyn O'Hanaghan?”
...so maybe some of the stories were true after all.
Stepping away to order his men back from the search, Becker left it to the civilians to deal with the frightened little girl.
As grateful as he was that this anomaly hadn't landed them in what he'd learned to be the usual disasters, he couldn't help but wonder what affect today's miracle encounter would have on Connor, Abby and Cutter after all was said and done. Especially on Cutter.
All too soon came the time to say goodbye again. Connor's equipment showed the anomaly's magnetic field was waning, and as much as the professor's team might wish differently, Hart, Jenkins, and the little girl they had come to bring home couldn't stay here.
While Jenkins took the little girl by the hand and stepped through the anomaly without further ado, Becker watched as the three scientists he had come to respect so highly in such short a time said farewell to their friend for what they all knew was going to be the last time. But where both Abby and Connor unabashedly enveloped Stephen in a crushing hug, Cutter was hesitating.
“Oh, sod it all!” Becker heard him murmur, before the professor resolutely stepped up to the other man.
Somehow, he was entirely unsurprised when Cutter cupped the nape of Stephen's neck and pulled his baffled but unresisting friend into a kiss. It didn't take long for Hart to cotton on.
When they parted, flushed and short of breath, there were quite a few mouths open in surprise. Becker shook his head in disbelief; he was the one who hadn't met Hart before today, but even he had seen this coming.
Hart, a wry smile grazing his lips, said, “You have the most dismal timing, Nick, you do realize that, don't you?”
Cutter thumped him affectionately in the shoulder. “This was my last chance. My turn to be selfish.” And despite it all, he sounded more at peace than he had the entire time Becker had known the man. “No matter what happens, Stephen,” the professor went on, serious this time, and quiet, before stepping back, “don't let me push you away!”
Hart watched him inscrutably for a moment, before his eyes sought out Becker, and a devious grin blossomed on his face.
“A word of advice, Captain Becker?”
“And what would that be?” he asked warily, and a little resentful. No matter who the bloke was, Becker didn't need any advice to do his job.
“I reckon no one here is going to be terribly upset with you, should you take a leaf out of your predecessor's book and lump Cutter one if he's being particularly unreasonable again.”
Actually? Good advice.
“Oi!” Cutter spoke up indignantly. “Now that's just...”
But Becker unscrupulously talked over him, “I'll keep it in mind.”
And, with a last smile in his friends' direction, Stephen turned and vanished through glittering shards of light.
For a long moment, there was silence. Then, subdued, Connor began, “You know he wasn't our Stephen. I mean, our Stephen never encountered this anomaly before - before Leek. And if he did it obviously hasn't changed anything...”
“Shut up, Connor!” Becker interrupted him firmly but not unkindly. “You've just been given a gift. For once in your life, don't try to rationalize it.”
“A gift?” Connor asked.
Abby explained, “We got to say goodbye.”
Cutter, however, shook his head and whispered, “We get to remember him laughing.”
The End
Author: Desiree
Rating: PG 13
Characters: Stephen/Nick, Abby, Connor, Becker, OC soldier
Disclaimer: All characters belong to their various creators (who aren't me, sadly). Title is borrowed from the song Health to the Company, because I suck at coming up with one.
Summary: Not all anomalies bring death. Sometimes, they bring a gift.
A/N: Set before 2.05 (and 3.03 respectively). Aspires to be a fix-it AU, but really, it's not funny how long it took me to write this, so for now it's going to stay a one-shot. Feel free to brit-pick (or nitpick, as the case may be: English isn't my first language, and I don't have a beta-reader)
Never should have waited so long to say,
What I've always known since the very first day.
Thought that you would stay forever with me,
But the time has come to leave.
FInal Goodbye - Rihanna
You don't know what you'll find once you step through those sparkling shards of light. You never do, and - if anyone asked your opinion, which they don't; you're here to follow orders, not second-guess them - you'd just as soon not step into them at all.
Command has long ago deemed the risk of exploring the other side of these anomalies too high, and you're glad of it. Unfortunately for you and your fellow Special Forces soldiers Cutter's merry band of misfits and scientists choose to ignore those decisions more often than not.
Which is why this day sees you here, in front of another orb of broken, revolving, glittering shards, Cutter's right hand man at your shoulder. His tranquillizer rifle is pointing down, but you watched him load and check it, and you know from experience that he's ready to bring it up at a moment's notice. If you have to step through into the unknown in search of a lost little girl, you're glad it's Hart you have to keep an eye on. The man's a margin more sensible and cautious when it comes to the wonders of the prehistoric than that nutter of a professor. And he's a bloody good shot with that rifle of his, you've seen him in action before.
It's just you and Hart this time, which suits you fine as well. The less civilians to keep an eye on, the better. Cutter and the rest of his crew are off to investigate another sighting; if you had to chance a guess, you'd say that the professor didn't bother calling his assistant for back-up. Hart's poker face is almost perfect, but even he couldn't disguise the falter in his step when the Lieutenant mentioned his team's whereabouts in the offhand manner that suggested he thought Hart knew what was going on anyway.
The rumour mill among soldiers, especially bored ones, often times rivals the gossip of teen-aged girls, and so you're not entirely unaware of the tension between Hart and the professor, as well as its cause. And yes, you understand that Cutter was bound to have been shocked and feeling betrayed when he first found out about his wife's unfaithfulness - he was entitled to that, at least.
But that has been over six months ago. You'd think that, by now, the impotent anger has drained away, and Cutter was able to see past his own hurt at the bigger picture.
Hart's not a bad man; he joins you and your mates for drinks sometimes, at the end of most of the missions your squad has been called on for help, so you know what you're talking about. You actually like the bloke, and - if pressed - you'd go so far as to call him a friend. Not a close friend, by any means, but a friend all the same. And a blind man can see that the current situation is eating away at him, as much as he doesn't want it to show.
What you don't understand is Cutter's unwillingness to finally let go of the past. This whole affair he's so up in arms about, even if he claims differently, has happened about ten years ago, which would put Hart's age then at around twenty-two, if you're not entirely mistaken. Barely out of his teens and no match for the she-devil the professor calls his wife. You still remember all the daft things you've been up to at that age. Moreover, as you've heard the story, Helen Cutter has been Hart's tutor at the uni which makes this whole sordid affair… perhaps not illegal but more than a little morally questionable. In your opinion, there's more reason to be furious with Cutter's wife than with her student. Unless Cutter's anger stems from an altogether different place - it's no business of yours, but again, soldiers like to talk, and there's always been plenty of talk and speculation about the professor and his assistant.
The Lieutenant signals you that the rest of the team have secured the perimeter, and you're good to go. There's a pair of anxious, worried parents being consoled and fed lies to by the talented Miss Lewis in their flat a few streets away and no reason to wait any longer. Hart's a brilliant tracker; you're confident to find the little girl if she's still alive, so at least this expedition has a purpose other than unchecked curiosity.
You take a last look at your surroundings (idle sentimentality you won't admit to): a large meadow, a line of small houses obscured by a hedge of brambles beyond the steadily turning, bright lights of the anomaly, your team-mates spread in a wide circle with the anomaly at its centre.
You nod to Hart and walk into the gently pulsating shards without hesitation.
Stepping through one of these portals is always disconcerting. Not because it has any great affect on the human body, but because - even though consciously you know better - you expect the familiar. You expect to take one step and see the world around you shift one step. Instead, you take one step, and all you see is too bright light, and then you take another step and you're in a different world entirely.
Considering this, it's pure irony that this time, the worst of the disorientation is due to seeing nothing but the familiar. You step out of the light into a meadow, a high hedge in the distance and a circle of soldiers around you. Only on second glance do you realize that it's not really the same location; the setting is similar, but not identical. You recognize Miller in the ranks, and Rutherford, but there are some new faces as well, and the numbers are more. At the edge of your vision you notice the tree line of a forest stretch to the horizon.
It isn't until you catch sight of the professor, however, do you dread that something is awfully wrong. The hair for one. It's longer than you're used to, a tidy, professional cut, not the messy fringes you're half convinced he cut himself with a pair of household scissors and a mirror. The expression in his eyes for another. He looks at you as if...
No. Not at you. At Stephen.
The dread settles as a tight knot in your stomach as you watch the professor go very still, colour draining from his face, mouth falling open. He isn't the only one to react like this.
“Cutter?”
Hart's surprised voice breaks the spell, pushes Cutter into action. The professor breaks through the circle of bemused, uncertain soldiers, walks right up to his assistant and pulls him into a tight embrace.
There's only one conclusion to come to, a behaviour like this from a man like Cutter, and you don't like it one bit.
Hart, rigid in his surprise and confusion, says, “So I didn't just quit then, did I?”
The words may be flippant, but his voice is strained.
It doesn't surprise you that he's thought of leaving. If anything, you're surprised he's lasted this long. It doesn't surprise you at all, the way Cutter's arms tighten around Hart's shoulders, the way he chokes out the words, “No. No, you didn't just quit.”
Hart's arm, the one not still gripping his rifle, comes up around Cutter's back to return the hold as he finally looses the rigidity.
It's a damned shame, you think as you spot the missing two members of Cutter's little crew run towards the two men, expressions open and vulnerable, that only now Cutter seems to have noticed the important bits of a friendship he let his wife break into pieces.
oOo
“There are so many things I wanted to tell you and now...” I can't think of a single one.
No, that wasn't true. Cutter's thoughts were jumbled, all topsy-turvy, chasing each other around in his mind, but he still knew exactly what he wanted to tell Stephen. All these things left unsaid until it was too late.
Taking a deep breath, he pushed down the ache tightening his throat. It wouldn't be the first time Stephen had seen him break down; a few months ago, back before - before, that thought would have made the simmering anger burn brighter, would have made him question the younger man's motives time and again. It was different now. So very different.
But the idea of giving in to his grief right now, with Stephen here, at his side again, alive, seemed wrong, ridiculous even. He swallowed down the tears prickling in his eyes.
“I don't know where to start,” settled Cutter on eventually.
The bark of the uprooted tree trunk they were sitting on was rough beneath his palms; he pushed down on it harder. Becker was stealing sidelong glances at them from where he was standing a few metres away, far enough to give the illusion of privacy, but close enough to intervene in case of... Well, it was annoying either way.
Connor and Abby were with him, anxious and wide-eyed, not even pretending to do anything but stare, and Cutter felt vaguely guilty for hogging Stephen to himself. He wasn't the only one who missed him. But still, they gave Cutter the space and time alone with his friend he so desperately craved. They were bloody amazing, the two of them. He really ought to tell them that, some time.
“Why don't we start with the obvious?”
Stephen's voice, calm and collected. There was already an edge of resignation there, too, which Cutter wished he wouldn't remember so well. He almost hoped Stephen would demand an apology, but what he said, turning his head to look Cutter straight in the eyes, was, “It wasn't your fault, Nick.”
Taking a shuddering breath, forcing away pictures of blood and despair, Cutter had to look away for a moment. Absolution; unasked for, undeserved. It had been Helen's fault, not his; he'd told Jenny, he knew. Only deep down, he didn't feel it. There were so many things he could have, should have done differently. And just one of them might have saved Stephen's life. It were all those 'what-if's which were slowly driving him insane.
“You don't even know what happened.”
“No.”
When he looked back at Stephen, a small, sad smile played around the younger man's lips. “But I know us, Cutter. I know me. And I know that I've been old enough for a while now to make my own choices. Some of them may have been bad or - plain stupid, but they were mine.”
So much in that sentence. Stephen, like Cutter, didn't know how to ask for forgiveness. This time, Cutter took it for what it was.
“Whatever happened, it wasn't your fault.” Stephen sounded so sure of that. So unlike that time in the bowling centre when he was accusing Cutter of purposely not shooting the raptor that was attacking him. The memory brought back these images again, the ones he tried so hard to forget.
“You were torn limb from limb.” He hadn't meant to say it out loud. But now that it was out there, he couldn't stop. “You walked into a room full of hungry creatures, because the door wouldn't shut from the outside, and you were torn to pieces.”
Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Stephen pale. Then he closed his eyes and nodded. “And you watched.”
“You knocked me out. 'I'm doing this one, mate,' you said. 'I'm doing this one.' It was supposed to be me!”
“Like I said, not your fault. If anything, I was being selfish.”
“Selfish?” Cutter stared at him. Stephen had been - brave, desperate to redeem himself, so bloody stupid. But selfish?
“You need it spelled out for you, Cutter? I didn't want to see you die.”
They'd skirted around the edges of platonic for years before Helen so cheerfully destroyed everything they'd worked to built. They'd never taken that last leap of faith, and he couldn't deal with this now. Not when he had to say goodbye again.
Instead, Cutter deflected the sentiment. “You're awfully calm about this.”
Stephen's smirk was barely there, wry and knowing, but he didn't call Cutter on it, just shrugged, uncomfortable but fatalistic.
“Not much I can do about it.”
Only there was. There was!
It was too late for his own Stephen.
Another rainy day spent in their office, another stack of dissertations yet to grade.
“Why do you always leave these things until too late?”
Clear blue eyes rolled in exasperation, but the voice was more fond than annoyed.
He had been a ruddy fool. He had let his anger blind him to everything that was important, and now he was too bloody late for the one thing that mattered. But in another time-line, Jenny Lewis had been Claudia Brown, and maybe, just maybe, he still had the chance to make things right; at least for one of them. If he'd learned one thing from Helen, one thing at all, it was that nothing was set in stone.
Reaching to take Stephen's hand in one of his own like he had been itching to do for a while now, Nick entwined their fingers, resolved to finally do what he should have done to begin with.
“You can't trust Helen! Whatever she's told you -” Beneath his fingers, against his side, he felt the other man tense. He didn't want another argument, not now.
“No, Stephen, listen! Please, just listen.”
Stephen did.
oOo
He was going to die.
Stephen knew as soon as he'd caught sight of Nick, but whereas that notion, certain though he was, left him feeling light-headed and vaguely frightened, hearing it confirmed - in gory detail - felt like a punch to the gut. It sort of pushed any other issues into the background.
He wanted to stay angry at Cutter; for the way things had been going lately, for all the little slights that didn't seem like much up close but added up to make the rift gaping between them seem insurmountable. And it wasn't his self-pity talking, even though it hurt, hurt like nothing else to be standing alone again after all these years.
But they had a traitor in their midst, and Cutter playing all his cards close to his chest didn't only serve to make Stephen feel left out (which he could live with, however little he liked it), but it put Abby and Connor in danger as well. Nick's unwillingness to meet him half-way, as much as Stephen understood was his own fault, was infuriating.
Still, it was hard to muster up that anger when the Nick sitting next to him now looked so completely forlorn. A couple of months, maybe a year older than the Nick waiting on the other side of the anomaly, this Nick looked both better and worse than after Helen had first disappeared. He didn't reek of whiskey, his attire was tidy, he was neatly shaven - as neatly as Cutter ever got, at any rate; but there was something in his eyes that hadn't been there before. Or maybe something was missing that had been there before, and it vindicated Stephen even as it made him cringe to think he'd been the cause of that.
Hearing about Helen's betrayal... he wished he could say it was a surprise, but the truth was that, not so deep down, he had already been aware that she was using him again. He had blinded himself to the obvious, because she was one of the few people still talking to him without that simmering edge of anger and disdain he seemed to detect in the others. And despite everything, he still cared about her. It stung, yes, but she had used him before, there was no reason to think this time was any different. What did surprise him, though, were her motives.
Stephen listened in mounting horror as Cutter spun a tale of two people arrogant and foolish enough to think they could control evolution itself. It was a hard pill to swallow, but Stephen found himself trusting his former professor a lot more willingly than he had done for a while now.
Nick was clutching his hand so hard Stephen imagined his bones grinding together, and the tension thrumming through the body against his side felt too strong, too immediate to suspect he was telling anything but the truth.
When the other man was finished, they sat in silence while Stephen tried to grapple with the magnitude of what had just been revealed to him.
“Leek, huh?” he finally latched on to the easiest part to come to terms with. “Can't say I saw that one coming.”
“None of us did.”
Cutter avoided meeting his eyes again, but he was still clutching Stephen's hand in both of his. Stephen left it there and took a moment to observe. Pallid skin and bags underneath dull eyes.
“Do me a favour?” he sighed. Cutter turned questioning, blue eyes on him, and Stephen instructed, “Don't take another eight years to get your feet back under you. You don't have that luxury any more. Abby and Connor still need you, so just don't...” He wanted to say 'Don't rush to follow,' but that seemed unnecessarily presumptuous, so he settled on, “...don't do anything stupid.”
Cutter ducked his head, an unwilling smile tugging at his lips. “Me, do something stupid?” asked he, smile morphing into a wan but genuine grin. “Now, where did you get that idea?”
Stephen huffed a laugh, and it seemed to surprise them both. It had been so long since he felt like laughing, he'd been afraid he didn't even understand the concept any more. But however weak the cause, it felt good to banter with Nick again.
“You let your hair grow,” he remarked upon another difference to the Nick Cutter he remembered. “It suits you.”
Faint shouts of “Caitie!” reached his ear then, and Stephen felt guilty for almost forgetting about the little girl Lance Corporal Jenkins and he had come here to retrieve. But the young captain Stephen didn't recognize had put most of his contingent on search duty, and Jenkins had all but ordered him to stay. One more pair of eyes wouldn't make much difference at this point.
“So who's soldier boy over there?” he asked instead with a short nod in the captain's direction. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the man look over and glare at him.
Nick smirked. “Captain Becker. Lester brought him on board after you...” He looked away for a moment and swallowed hard. “Anyway. He fancies himself the new head of security, but really, he's just our new babysitter.”
Stephen scoffed at Cutter's glib assessment. “And he's not ready to shoot you yet?” Because, really, if ever there was a man who needed a babysitter, it was Nick Cutter.
“You know, he can hear you just fine!” Becker's annoyed voice broke through their bubble of non-existent privacy. Apparently having decided that, now that he was the subject of their discussion, he wouldn't stand back any longer, the man approached them, Connor and Abby in tow. “And I've felt the urge to shoot him since the first hour of his acquaintance, but I do have a modicum of self-control.”
And, evidently, an attitude to go with it. Stephen grinned in relief; the man was no mere marionette waiting for orders, which went a long way to reassuring him that Becker was, indeed, up to keeping up with Cutter at his most obnoxious. As much as it pained him to admit he had been wrong, but Lester obviously knew what he was doing when he chose Becker for the job. Also, judging by the glint of amusement in Cutter's eyes, the professor wasn't nearly as put out at Becker's presence as he'd made out to be.
Turning his attention to the two other people hovering behind the soldier's dark form, Stephen felt his smile slip just a bit. They looked so different; hardened in a way he hadn't seen on them before. Both of them had chosen to have their hair cut shorter, and while Stephen realized the new looks were really just the tip of the iceberg, it lent them an edge of... matureness, maybe. They weren't the inexperienced youngsters he knew.
Connor, especially, seemed to have finally come into his own. He still looked the part of the geek, Stephen didn't think Connor would ever be able to shake that off. But at the same time he seemed more confident, more at home in his own skin than he had been before.
“Hey, guys,” he greeted, and it seemed to break the spell of uncertainty they had been trapped in.
Connor broke out into one of his huge smiles. Abby just went ahead and launched herself at him, and it was only Nick's quick reflexes as he grabbed hold of Stephen's shoulder that saved him from landing on his back in the patch of nettles growing at the foot of the log they were sitting on.
“You stupid bastard!” Abby accused him heatedly, cuffing the back of his head at the same time as she was hiding her face in his neck.
Yeah, Stephen thought wryly while trying to keep their balance. He might actually deserve that.
oOo
So this was the infamous Stephen Hart.
Captain Becker had heard the stories. He couldn't not. The man was a bloody legend around the ARC, and to be honest, it put Becker a bit on edge around the bloke. Legends rarely told the truth. And the bad things about the hero usually got lost in translation.
What he did understand about Hart, though, was this:
The little team of civilians he had been hired to protect had considered him a friend. And while Connor and Abby had bounced back from his death with relative ease, any fool could see what it had done to Cutter. Oh, the professor hid it well, most of the time. Right now, though, clutching his former assistant's hand like a lifeline, it was obvious exactly what the man had meant to Cutter. It was also quite telling that Hart let him.
Then again, he endured Abby clinging to his other arm and Connor, unconsciously but frequently, reaching out to touch his legs from where he was sitting in front of his three friends with the same good grace.
Becker couldn't resist a small smirk at the way Connor was gesticulating wildly in accompaniment to a tale of one of their more humorous adventures. He'd grown inordinately fond of both Abby and Connor, although he refused to believe sometimes that they were all around the same age. Even Cutter, in his own abrasive, uncompromising way, wasn't all that bad.
And now, throwing in comments and pointing out exaggerations in Connor's story, Becker got to see a side of the professor he hadn't even known existed. As it was, Becker suspected he was witnessing a flashback to how things used to be between this team before everything had gone tits-up.
Whatever else Stephen Hart might have been, whatever faults the man had, it was clear enough that he cared for this little group.
Hearing what Cutter had had to say couldn't have been easy; Becker had seen Hart pale when the professor had recounted his death. And yet, here he was, rolling his eyes and chuckling at all the appropriate places for his friends' sakes. That, more than anything, soothed his previous doubts. Which wasn't to say that Becker believed all of the stories circling around the ARC. The man seemed nice enough, but he wasn't bloody superman.
He did seem bothered by something all of a sudden, though. Becker watched him frown, turning his head slightly this way and that. Both Abby and Connor went on obliviously, but Cutter seemed to have taken notice as well.
“Stephen?” asked he.
Hart held one hand up in an aborted gesture to ask for silence and turned around to peer into the rustling shadows of the woods.
“I thought I heard...”
How he could have heard anything over Connor's excited storytelling and Abby's clear laughter was beyond Becker, but Hart got up to investigate anyway, long limbs easily sidestepping fallen branches and bramble vines.
They all watched curiously, Becker fingering the safety of his gun just in case, as Hart stopped about ten paces in and crouched down.
“Caitie?” he called. And, as a small, tear-stained face hesitantly peeked out of a curtain of leaves and low hanging branches, “Are you Caitlyn O'Hanaghan?”
...so maybe some of the stories were true after all.
Stepping away to order his men back from the search, Becker left it to the civilians to deal with the frightened little girl.
As grateful as he was that this anomaly hadn't landed them in what he'd learned to be the usual disasters, he couldn't help but wonder what affect today's miracle encounter would have on Connor, Abby and Cutter after all was said and done. Especially on Cutter.
All too soon came the time to say goodbye again. Connor's equipment showed the anomaly's magnetic field was waning, and as much as the professor's team might wish differently, Hart, Jenkins, and the little girl they had come to bring home couldn't stay here.
While Jenkins took the little girl by the hand and stepped through the anomaly without further ado, Becker watched as the three scientists he had come to respect so highly in such short a time said farewell to their friend for what they all knew was going to be the last time. But where both Abby and Connor unabashedly enveloped Stephen in a crushing hug, Cutter was hesitating.
“Oh, sod it all!” Becker heard him murmur, before the professor resolutely stepped up to the other man.
Somehow, he was entirely unsurprised when Cutter cupped the nape of Stephen's neck and pulled his baffled but unresisting friend into a kiss. It didn't take long for Hart to cotton on.
When they parted, flushed and short of breath, there were quite a few mouths open in surprise. Becker shook his head in disbelief; he was the one who hadn't met Hart before today, but even he had seen this coming.
Hart, a wry smile grazing his lips, said, “You have the most dismal timing, Nick, you do realize that, don't you?”
Cutter thumped him affectionately in the shoulder. “This was my last chance. My turn to be selfish.” And despite it all, he sounded more at peace than he had the entire time Becker had known the man. “No matter what happens, Stephen,” the professor went on, serious this time, and quiet, before stepping back, “don't let me push you away!”
Hart watched him inscrutably for a moment, before his eyes sought out Becker, and a devious grin blossomed on his face.
“A word of advice, Captain Becker?”
“And what would that be?” he asked warily, and a little resentful. No matter who the bloke was, Becker didn't need any advice to do his job.
“I reckon no one here is going to be terribly upset with you, should you take a leaf out of your predecessor's book and lump Cutter one if he's being particularly unreasonable again.”
Actually? Good advice.
“Oi!” Cutter spoke up indignantly. “Now that's just...”
But Becker unscrupulously talked over him, “I'll keep it in mind.”
And, with a last smile in his friends' direction, Stephen turned and vanished through glittering shards of light.
For a long moment, there was silence. Then, subdued, Connor began, “You know he wasn't our Stephen. I mean, our Stephen never encountered this anomaly before - before Leek. And if he did it obviously hasn't changed anything...”
“Shut up, Connor!” Becker interrupted him firmly but not unkindly. “You've just been given a gift. For once in your life, don't try to rationalize it.”
“A gift?” Connor asked.
Abby explained, “We got to say goodbye.”
Cutter, however, shook his head and whispered, “We get to remember him laughing.”
The End