Participants:
Scene Title | When We Get There |
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Synopsis | Edward and Kaylee make plans for the future… |
Date | January 13, 2011 |
The Hub
Some time after being cleared from quarantine Kaylee stumbled and fell. She wasn't sure when it happened, some time around the corner near the main hall. But before she'd gotten back to her quarters, that much she's sure of. Yet she's there now, laying on her cot and wrapped in a gray wool blanket. She's cold, but there's also a sheen of sweat glistening over her arms and brow.
“I’m sorry,” the unexpected voice of Edward Ray offers in a hushed whisper, watching Kaylee from by the closed door. He's sitting in a chair, a copy of Slaughterhouse Five closed in his lap. With considerable tension he leans forward and considers the blonde laying in the bed, fingers drumming on the book’s cover.
She now understands what he's sorry for. She doesn't need to use her ability to know that.
There is a visible tremble that shivers through her body, as muscles tense, sending up a layer of goosebumps… was it from the virus… or the cold wash of fear that spikes through her, bringing the prickling of tears to her eyes. Lips part to take a shaky breath, before another shiver hits her, and a tear slides down her temple. “You’re sorry?” the words have a touch of anger to them, but also some confusion.
Her throat works as she tries to swallow the lump of fear that was sticking at the back of it. Lifting her hand to scrub at the tears that threaten to join the first, it suddenly freezes as she notices the light sheen of moisture. Her lower lip trembles a little, before she catches it in her teeth.
Just the word brings back the horror of what she had seen… Dirk… Knox…. Trembling hands lift to cover her face, fingers curling into her palms as the heel of her hands press against her eyes… as if she could stop the memory… it doesn’t work, of course, and she gives a stifled sob.
It was her first time in combat… the princess that Edward tried to keep locked away from it all had learned a harsh lesson about this new world… and she was going to die in the worst way imaginable.
“No one knows you’re sick,” Edward confides in a hushed tone of voice, approaching Kaylee’s bedside and removing a syringe from his jacket. He lays it down on a night stand beside the cot, then takes a seat at the foot of the bed with a creak of protesting springs and metal frame. “No one will, either. Because it doesn’t matter anymore…”
The haunted look in Edward’s eyes is frightening, seeing someone who is always composed and prepared show signs of vulnerability. He reaches out, laying a hand on his daughter’s shoulder. “You… you weren't supposed to go out.” Sounds a lot like I didn't predict that. But also a lot like I'm sorry I didn't stop you.
At his approach, hands damp with tears pull away from her eyes, which are now red-rimmed and watery. Kaylee tries to move when he goes to touch her, a move to protect him, not to push him away. She was sick… he was family. The movement only serves to be remind her of the damage she received in the fighting, the pain makes her gasp, her back lifting off the cot slightly. It takes effort to keep her voice even as she accuses softly, “You should have banished me.” The last word catches, despite her best effort to seem strong against what was going to eventually be her death.
His daughter is scared, she doesn’t hide it… scared and worried. The cot vibrates with the trembling of her body, from just as much fear and the fever. “I-” Her throat thickens with unshed tears. “I wanted to help… Gillian…” Kaylee trails off, suddenly feeling stupid. “I wanted to do it for Peter,” she whispers his name, refusing now to look at her father, as tears finally come unbidden. “I wanted to do it for them, too. To get everyone away from this shithole world. The kids don’t deserve this.” She weakly motions towards the door and the people beyond it. But she did it mostly for him… cause he would have done it… cause she knew what that woman meant to him.
It takes a moment, before what he says sinks in, “It doesn’t…?” Kaylee looks confused. What does he mean? “Dad.” There is a worried note in the way he says that. “Why doesn’t it matter? You’re going to get them killed if I don’t….” A look goes to the syringe on the table and then back to her father in confusion. “…leave.”
“You will be leaving,” Edward explains as he picks up the syringe. “It's adynomine. It's too late to prevent you from getting sick and it doesn't matter if you expose everyone else now. If we don't leave this place within the next four days we’re all dead anyway.”
He removes the plastic cap from the syringe and holds it in one hand. “The negation shot will suppress your ability, but… it will also mask the symptoms for a few days. You’ll still be sick, you just won't experience any of the deleterious side effects right away.” Carefully, Edward takes one of Kaylee’s wrists in his hand and gently guided her arm to sit out straight.
“You… are the only person left in this whole world I care about. You and…” Edward’s eyes flick to the side, then back to Kaylee. “I need to tell you something, because you may be the only person who knows the truth.” Gently, Edward injects Kaylee with the adynomine. His brows furrow, and he looks up to her with a troubled expression.
“You have to promise to keep this,” Edward motions to the needle, to her, to everything, “a secret.”
“So… they all died for nothing?” She was going to die for nothing? Kaylee doesn’t even have it in her to fight him when he pulls out her arm for the injection. His actions are watched with a sort of defeated sadness, a pinch at the corners of her eyes as the needle breaks the surface of her skin.
“I… I had hoped… I’ve watched just about everyone I ever care about leave or….” she sighs heavily, finally looking away and to the ceiling.. “Or die.” Her other wrist scrubs at tear-filled eyes. Already she can feel the humming sounds of everyone’s minds fade out the rest of the way, leaving her in that stifling silence. For a short time she had felt like herself.
The mention of secrets, grabs her attention. Pulls at her curiosity.
“Of course, I will,” Kaylee finally murmurs giving him a bit of a small smile. “I always have.” Despite the distance between them, the treatment, and the anger she had shown towards him; his daughter hadn’t told any of the secrets she knew, yet.
“Not for nothing.” Edward says with a certain detachment. “You're— they moved us closer to where we needed to be. The right combination of events and… I just— I'm not working with the tools I expected to be, is all. But now Peter is back with us and…” Edward looks down to Kaylee, brows furrowed.
“When Elisabeth and Magnes arrived, I wasn't surprised. I expected someone to eventually come through Mateo’s portals… because it's not the time this has happened.” Edward removes the syringe and sets it down on the table, then removes a small mint tin from his pocket. It has cotton balls inside instead. One of them is pressed into the small of Kaylee’s elbow at the injection site and her arm bent up to hold it in place.
He looks back up, determined. “I failed to save so many people who are important to me, but I will save you.” Edward’s eyes wander her expression, warily. “I know this will work, because when I was around your age I saw someone cross over. It's real. All of it.”
The implications of what he is saying has her eyes widening with surprise, her head comes up off the pillow. The fact that Peter was back.. It catches her attention and for a moment make her heart stop… but even this is shadowed by the fact that her father had one hell of a secret. “You… “ She can’t read his mind; but, he can tell, she is trying to search his eyes to if he is telling her the truth…. Really telling her the truth. “You saw it happen?” She still sounds disbelieving, though she feels confident that he didn’t lie.
Determined to sit-up, pain hisses through the young woman’s teeth as she forces herself up; a hand pressing against her side as if it could relieve the pain. Doing this allows her to get closer to her father’s eye-level.
“Why didn’t you tell anyone?” Kaylee accuses, brows furrowing a little… “And how in hell is it going to save me? Daddy, people don’t survive this.” She motions at the door and whatever is beyond. “You could be condemning another… world. To-to this fate.” The woman wants so badly to believe there was hope for her..
Edward’s blue eyes level on Kaylee with tension at the corners, visible in the wrinkles there growing deeper by the day. “It was 1982,” he affirms, taking the easier topic first. “I was helping a friend with a groundbreaking scientific experiment, intended to… view events in the past or future. Something went wrong,” Edward admits in a colossal understatement. “We… tore a hole between space and time. I saw myself on the other side of… of a window.” Edward looks away from Kaylee. “A different version of myself… and…”
Trailing off, Edward shakes his head. “I used to have photographic proof,” he admits softly. “But I tucked it away for safekeeping, before the world ended. It’s… it might as well be gone now.” Blue eyes alight to Kaylee, and Edward is torn in how to proceed with the conversation. He chooses an easy enough lie, one based in something as seductive as hope.
“In the timeline Elisabeth comes from they stopped this. They have medical facilities, they know this virus. They’ll be able to fix you.” Yet Edward hadn’t told anyone else that, he’d allowed someone to be exiled right after they’d returned from the textile factory. She can feel the way he treats her, the way he makes exceptions for her.
“You deserve to have a full life,” Edward whispers, resting a hand on Kaylee’s arm.
“So does everyone else…” Kaylee points out softly in return.
He can rest easy knowing that hope has been instilled, it shows in her eyes… the lie covered by the negation of her ability and a daughters blind trust in her father. The hand on her arm, draws her attention. Fingers start to reach to cover his hand, but stop short and curl into her palm. Even with hope, she’s afraid of infecting him and feels the need to keep distant. Her gaze lingers on the hand, brows furrowing a little with a thought. “Do you…” she starts, looking up, “ do you think there is a parallel world out there where we, actually, got to be a family?” It is an odd question. There is a part of her that wonders if there was a place where they didn’t have to have that wall between them… though it didn’t seem to be there right now.
“I hope you’re right about this world of theirs,” Kaylee says studying her father. “Otherwise, you and I are going to be responsible for the death of another world.” It’s a heavy burden for them both.
“There’s at least one more world out there,” Edward feels certain of now. “And it’s got to be better than this one. Whether or not we all got to be a family… ” He reaches out, laying a hand on Kaylee’s forehead, sweeping her sweat-slicked hair from her brow. “If there isn’t one, we’ll make one.”
Edward smiles, faintly. “And I’ve no doubt that… that everyone deserves a chance to live, but I only have one daughter in the here and now,” he admits quietly. “Family always comes first. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to be there for you when you were younger, that we had to… reunite like this.”
Edward looks away, moving his hand from Kaylee’s forehead. “Everything I’ve done, I’ve done to try and protect you. I’m out of options at this point…” blue eyes settle back on the young telepath. “This is my hail mary. I won’t… I can’t fail you.”
Kaylee is thoughtful for a long moment, trying to wrap her mind around this man that she hasn’t really known. Yet he has always tried to do his best. Reaching out, long fingers to curl around his arm, she admits quietly, “While… it’s hard to forgive, I can’t judge. I’ve never been where you are…and may never, but you did your best, not matter how things play out.”
Fingers tighten briefly, to make sure he looks at her. “Promise me, if we make it, no matter what this… “Reaching up, she lightly taps her father’s temple. “…tells you… please, don’t push me away anymore or hold me at arms length.” Kaylee’s voices thickens and catches, eyes going glassy with tears. “I have nothing left… no family… in this world but you, Daddy.”
She brushes at the tears as they start to fall and she gives a small sniff, “And maybe once we get over there you can finally tell me the truth about you and mom… how you met. Everything that she wouldn’t tell me… okay?”
For a time, there’s a haunted look in Edward’s eyes. He reaches up, putting one hand over Kaylee’s hand at his arm. She had asked him not to push her away, and he can do that for the time they have left. Smiling, though sadly, Edward squeezes her hand and looks up at her with an uncertain expression.
“Maybe when we get there.” Edward agrees, looking down to their hands. She’d asked him not to push her away.
She didn’t ask him if he was going to make it.