Just Another Mission 24.9

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Waiting- Jak’s POV

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He’s alive.

For the first week, that’s all I could think. Thank god he’s alive.

His every breath was relief. My comfort. But I’m still waiting. Waiting in a different way.

I know I wasn’t… lying, back there. If he had died, I don’t know what I would have done.  The thought, because it was so real, the pure possibility of him not being there… it’s like wavering on an edge.

The drop is so far on one end that, even though you know you’re safe on the other side, it still scares you shitless because you can still look down, so far down to a deep gaping something you don’t want to name, and it was so close. So much closer than it ever should have been. Too close to say it won’t come back.

If Dax had died, I would have followed him. I know that. But now that he’s here, and alive and safe and alright, I don’t know what to think.

No- I know what to think. I just don’t know what to do.

I… I hate him hating me.

That nightmare in the alley was my worst fear. It was… it was Dax, and he was there, and that should’ve been so good, but he was hating me with every single breath he took. I couldn’t take it, and then I… I finally got hold of him, and it was alright, everything was alright, but then it wasn’t- and it was another kind of nightmare. One that was worse.

The thought of losing him made me run faster than I ever have, because I realized I’d… missed everything. Him, me. I’d done so many things wrong, I wondered how he even stayed with me. How he looked me in the face, because I was so screwed up, too screwed up for him to stay when I gave him NOTHING, and he gave me EVERYTHING. But he did, he stayed- and now I don’t have to… skirt around it.

I don’t have to stop, don’t have to doubt myself… when I say I love him.

Because I do. I… love him.

But that’s my problem. Because I could never tell him that.

God, I wish it was so easy. I can feel it, but I can’t talk about it. I’ve… never been good with words. Everything important I said when I didn’t need them, those noisy things- words- I said with my hands. My hands, or my eyes, or the slightest quirk of my mouth, but there was never silence because he was always there. And I always want him to be there.

It was so hard even realizing it, so hard even… thinking about it.

The first time he… tried me, I couldn’t tell you how I felt. Scared, terrified, stunned- so instant, bitter and sharp. Because it was so like… him. The color, the taunts, the voice, it was all burned into my head and I should have realized how different it was from… that place.

But he was touching me. It was just… a reflex. I didn’t want it to happen again, I couldn’t let it, not when I could fight back because I didn’t care who it was- they were trying to touch me and I couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t take it, I couldn’t just sit there and do nothing! Not when I was strong!

But it was… Dax. Not him. So different, but I just shoved it all away because I never, ever wanted to feel that weak again. But I did, and my mind… went wrong.

Then… came the fights. We’d never fought before, but we did it then because everything was just so wrong, just like inside my head. Just like inside my dreams.

We fought, and it was rushed and sharp and so bitter all over again… and all because I couldn’t take the fact that he was threatening me.

Threatening the me I’d built, hoping I’d stop being that other me I didn’t want anybody to see. He was threatening my shield, the one only he could break. The life I thought I wanted always shrank away whenever he went off on me. I thought it was because he broke my life- took away everything I had, just like him!

That was before I realized that… he is my life. Everything I want. That’s why it felt so impossible, so crippling when he screamed and cussed at me, like… the Dax I never knew. When he changed, but I never noticed. When he hated me.

Does he… still hate me? I don’t know. Wish I did.

All I know is that I had nothing left when he disappeared. And I would do anything to make him happy.

And even though it’s different now, so different because I know what I feel… I’m still afraid. I’m afraid I want him too much, or… in the wrong ways.

In… his way, not mine. My lost time, when I was… crazy, maybe I’m still a little crazy… I don’t know how it made me see it all so clearly. It was just emotion emotion EMOTION, raging and spitting and suffocating until I knew I would lose it if I didn’t touch him. That’s how it was, and every desperate little thing I felt (no- LIVED, breathed) is burned into my head.

But what’s unnerving is how clear it still is. And it makes me wonder if it’s real.

I wonder if I really feel this. If I’m really here, and he’s really here, and all this really happened. Because it all seems so impossible.

And then there’s her.

I liked Keira. I know, it sounds… flat, but I did. I’m not... like that. Not using her. She was just the one everyone knew I would end up with. Someone… safe. Fairy-tale safe, from a place where water crept up white sand and the world was painted green.

I made myself bearable through her.

She made me human when I couldn’t manage it on my own, when my veins were still sluggishly draining the last of the eco and I couldn’t speak, couldn’t think, couldn’t hear a thing because I was screaming too loud and then her arms were there. They were small and so breakable like glass, but cool like glass and I was normal, I could… I could still have a girlfriend. Hah.

It turned into a routine, to keep me steady.

A drug, a fix. One of many, when I couldn’t depend on myself. When I couldn’t trust myself.

Skip dinner, show up at her apartment, pretend to talk, spend the night with her- and leave before morning. Just… go, before she woke up. It would have sent any other girl into screaming hysterics- but because of how fucked up we were, because we didn’t know what we were doing, she let me do whatever I wanted.

We were the perfect couple.

It was safe. So safe. God, I loved that safety.

Not her.

Being with her made me feel almost… protected. Untouchable, because I had someone to protect, to be safe with. And that meant that… someone else couldn’t get me, couldn’t get TO me, because I was strong. He hadn’t destroyed everything, I still had this!

And… that’s all this is, isn’t it? Trying to forget. Trying to forget those two years ever happened.

Trying to forget what happened to me, and what I almost did to someone else. The one person I can never hurt.

The way I... want him, I’m… it’s not physical. Not guilty. But at the same time, it is.

I’m wanting different things lately. Keira was soft, so slow but he’s fast and angular and sharp and I want that, crave that- I want somewhere I can’t sink, somewhere I can feel things. Real things, crisp things. Just like before, it’s a… basic want.

It’s strange, but… I find myself wanting to touch him. Not like that, but something with the evasive tingle… of a held breath. Something that could turn into that. It’s so awkward and NERVOUS to see someone you’ve seen all your life, someone you… you ignored, took for granted, as… desirable. Someone you look at, and think ‘Don’t ever leave.’

He thrills me- a small spark, a guilty pleasure. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn’t even be looking at him, because of what he makes me think. It’s even tougher because of how wary he is. I don’t know what to do with myself anymore, because I think that every little breath might scare him off.

I… just don’t want him scared. The things going on in my head mean nothing compared to what he feels. I’d give anything to be alright with him again. Anything.

I don’t care what it takes. I don’t care what anybody thinks of me now. There is no hesitation, no reluctance. I’m not even getting any mixed messages.

It was… some afternoon, I don’t know. I came in from an errand for the Samos in the forest, bristling with dry-brush and needles from a hell of a fall I took, to find Jinx and Grim lounging in one of the larger booths like they owned the place. Really, that’s just the kind of guy Jinx is. No surprise there. If it’s under his boots, it has his name on it, but now I could tell he’d really marked this territory. I glanced around warily for Krew, thinking he was ready to snag me for another mission, but approached the booth as soon as Jinx flicked the crumpled, smoldering scrap of his cigar into Grim’s drink.

It sunk to the bottom, and they jerked around to peer at me, freaked. Then Jinx waved his grime-smattered hand, and in another second I was settled stiffly next to the smaller of the two, sipping off a cold something Tess’d brought to me. It tasted good, so I didn’t care. The forest was warmer than most, so anything with ice was welcome- even if I’d lost my taste for booze lately.

Not knowing if I was breaching some taboo (as most of Krew’s dirtier agents like to keep far away from his business, to not tip off the Guard) I asked them what they were doing, hanging around his place. Jinx laughed, and said they got free drinks as Krew’s demolition team.

“A pretty sweet deal, eh?” He cackled raucously, nasal squall filtering above the graceless slap of his feet on the table, mud-caked soles wiggling to some silent, oblivious beat. “Boom-boys ahoy! We blow up a little sugar here and there and we can get smashed off our asses anytime we want! Sweet mother of Mar do I love my life…” He trailed off reverently, wiggling in his seat.

I nodded- it sounded like the kind of thing to bribe a guy like Jinx with. I bet Tess came up with it. Then I said I never noticed them around on normal business hours, even with as much as I’d been around lately… and they traded this look, and just burst out laughing.

Said the only reason the HH wasn’t their normal haunt during daylight hours was because of Sig- and the almighty grudge he held against them after they got ballsy one night during a wild party and slipped a swallow of kerosene into his cocktail.

“Boy’oh boy, every time he so much as LOOKS at us, I can just see the bloke hackin’ up a storm in the corner with every floozie packed in there laughin’ her ass off! His guts were all over the place! It was priceless, man; pure comic gold! The whole place was after him for it for weeks, callin’ him dyna-breath and shit! He hates us!” He slapped hysterically at Grim over the table, rattling a glass, who traded the blows with an off-kilter chuckle.

I kept quiet- me personally, I couldn’t see how having Sig after your ass would be a thing worthy of kicks and giggles, but I shrugged blankly. Part of me would’ve liked to see Sig actually get at them.  Jinx is just one of those guys I put up with. Barely. He can be good for a laugh sometimes, but otherwise just a coward. I barely even knew why I was there, really.

“Nice.” I smiled thinly over the rim of my glass, watching idly as the rough man lit up a new smoke and took a deep, luxurious breath. The fact they were one short in their threesome crept up slowly on me, when I should’ve known it just from the pure fact there was room for another person. Being the size of a bear means you like your booth-seats taken solo. ‘Probly half the fact I’ve never sat with these guys before…

“Hey- where’d Mog get to?”

Jinx pulled a sour face, batting the muggy smoke simmering over the booth a little more to the left before taking a swig of his drink.

The guy was like a walking toxin. He just spat the stuff everywhere.

“Mog’s out with a funky bug. Poor lug’s hackin’ up his guts all over the goddamn house.” He grimaced around the cigar, perched precariously between his thin lips. He settled back into the booth-seat with a certain mutter, shooting a glance at Grim. “Must’ve been somethin’ he picked up in our last joyride through the sewers, eh?”

“Yeah.” Grim nodded blankly, fiddling with the wilting bits of cigar perched on his rustling ice-cubes. It sank a second later, vomiting grey ash into the musky liquid, and he pulled a face. I watched his mouth melt and become strangely alive with disgust beneath his sightless, shining goggles. Wondered why he wore the things inside. Dark enough as it was.

I was just about reconsidering my choice in seating, ‘cos’ve how rowdy the two bundles of fun were getting, when Jinx looked up lazily from a new cigar, flipping the thing around in his grizzled hands before he spoke.

“Speakin’ a which, listen, ah… Jak.” He thumbed absently at his temple, staring at anything but me before his gaze snapped up sharply, eyes bright with his usual acrid appraisal. “What the fuck is up with you?”

I stopped, feeling my brows sink in silent confusion. Suddenness aside… it just wasn’t the gloriously pointed asshole that was Jinx. A joke? I let myself relax into the watery remnants of a smile, shaking my head. I wasn’t going to get dragged into whatever they’d planned.

“Hm?” I made a vague sound, raising an eyebrow.

“Don’t gimme that trash, man.” He sneered immediately with a disgusted jerk of his lips, spitting to the side- and directly into Grim’s drink. Again. He sniffed loudly, thumbing at his nose as the other man balked incredulously. “I know we ain’t used to rubbin’ noses here, but humor me. Anyone workin’ with half’a what Mog’s got, which is currently on the decline, can see you’re moronically torn up about somethin’- and that’s never a good thing. ‘Specially when you’re in deeper’n most of us with the whole ‘dirty work’ rap. We don’t deep-six people. You do.”

That caught me off guard. Again- not Jinx. Biting my lip at my suddenly blank head, I only watched as the two turned, and had a brief, sharp, conveniently immediate squabble about all the trash making its way into Grim’s drink. I let my chin sink into my hand. By the time Jinx had slapped his partner a good dozen times, beating him into stuttering submission with a sharp glare, I met him with a caustic quirk of my eyebrow.

He stalled, looking at me for an answer… before realizing I was looking for the same thing. Jinx bristled violently, earlier dialogue catching his memory again. Sucking on his cigar sourly, he jerked it out of his mouth a second later to roll his eyes, leaning forward mockingly.  

“And NO, if you think I’m gettin' all touchy-feely on you, worried about poor ickle blondie- I’ll blast your balls off ‘fore you got the time to blink.” He barked, sitting back in his seat with a contemplative grunt, jiggling his drink with glassy eyes. “What I got for you? It’s something’ just short’a… professional courtesy.”

There was nothing to do but stay silent as he fixed me with a hard stare, suddenly assertive and tactless. Just like Jinx.

“Point blank, you nearly got us deep sixed the last time we moseyed on down to the sewers to blow somethin’ for balloon boy- and if it’s anything to suicidal punks like you, we value our skins a little too much to have you droolin’ off into space while we get our asses burnt. That shit was too close for comfort.”

Yeah. Better.

“So what’s on the rise, man?”

I knew from experience that the person who meant most to Jinx was Jinx, and with him settled firmly back into his constant obsession with himself, it gave me time to think.

The run wasn’t a hard one. Some creeper ‘heads had gotten into the sewers, and were giving the errand-boys hell- so Krew called me in with the turpentine trio to block off the entrance. Get rid of the source. I did it, but… maybe I let it slip a few times when I should have been watching their backs. I think one actually got in a hit on Mog- just ‘cos I was careless. Of the three, I think I like Mog the most, so I definitely didn’t mean to; I just couldn’t think that day.

Not that it’s any different from any other minute of any other day lately. Because… I’ve been thinking too much. I’m doing so much thinking I barely know when to move anymore, because I’m trying to find the best way to approach him.

Dax.

I’m… practically helpless. I can never say the things I want to, and I know he won’t believe me if I do. I think, and I worry that I’ve messed up, screwed up everything, because just ‘cos he doesn’t run anymore… doesn’t mean he’s really there. He’s still angry at me. I know that.

Don’t get me wrong. I do my best stuff when I’m not thinking, because… thinking slows me down. Everything I do, everything I deal with, it’s so fast I don’t have time to decide if it’s right or not. People get hurt, but it’s always the bad people, so we come out with a plus on our side. That’s that.

But now? I’m not up to par, and I know it. Having to actually plan things like this, but ending up caught in the headlights, dropping everything… I can’t stop thinking about a way to fix this. A way to make him forgive me.

And it’s messing me up- because it never works. Even in my head, it’s never really right.

I guess I’d been so quiet they thought I’d nodded off in my drink- and I looked up blandly as Jinx sighed in irritation, leaning forward almost confidentially with an easy heave of his stringy frame.

“Listen, pretty-boy- if it’s anything about what’s goin’ on for you and the rat, NOBODY GIVES A FUCK.” He juggled his cigar, glaring at me.

I stared.

Didn’t give him a thing, just sat there- like this was the joke, and he was trying to lure me out. It was the joke. My eyes flinched into uncertain slits, brow arching. These guys had strange ways of getting their kicks, and Jinx still had a few to spare.

“Jesus, you really think the great big moral gutter of Haven is that doubled up over a little mano y mano romance? You’re a sucker for the limelight, aintcha? Unless your tiff is with the fact the little bastard used to lick his ass in his spare time. That’d be a turn-off if I ever saw one.” He gave a gruff, somewhat disgusted chuckle, carding through the oily gleam of his hair- and rattling his hand in annoyance when a few strands stuck like wet glue. He wiped his fingers clean and continued, settling back with a whine thick with nasal contempt.

“Listen, if you haven’t NOTICED, Jakkie-boy, Haven ain’t got no rules. Just the same as those bloodsuckers on the street can nick your foodcash and slip away scotch-free… guy, gal, it don’t make no difference. So long’s you two don’t start coppin’ up on each other in the middle of the street, nobody but those frigid palace bitches are gonna bat an eye. But hell, they’re even against public orgies!”

He threw a look way, way too shocked for common decency over to Grim, who turned to me- slim mouth set flat with a thick, solemn nod. I inwardly prayed to god I never got my hands on these guys’ weekend agendas. While amazing, probably not worth the trouble.

“And me personally, if I’m plastered ‘nuff, and can haul ass outta the sack before I grab a peek at what my one-nighter was actually sportin’… hey- so long’s I get a good fuck outta it, where’s the harm?” Jinx continued with a low, indignant puff of his cigar, watching the smoke furl and seethe up through the air, murmuring around it. “People here just don’t give a rat’s ass what happens in your bunk, buddy boy.”

A pause.

“Not that a rat’s ass is real negotiable, considering that’s what you’re givin’ the ol’ heave-ho.”

His grizzled cheeks split in a gleaming, shameless grin as his sharp green eyes simmered in shallow malice, pleased at his wit. I gave a loose throw of my shoulders, rolling my eyes…and remembering why I never sat with these two. I got enough of this in the sewers.

And he wasn’t done.

“Hey- how you get yours is your own business, unless it’s other peoples business. Then I’d say you’re not bein’ a good Samaritan and divvyin’ out your fair share to our economy, but hey. Hookers gotta be lookers. S’not my fault if you ain’t diggin’ up nothin’ at the nine-o’-clocker but street-rats.”

He finally quieted- but with a casual, easy air that tensed disturbingly in the next few seconds. Before I could say something, shaking my head with a dull, tortured grin, he nodded at me sharply, pinning me with an appraising eye.

“S’that it? S’that why you’re such a big ol’ prick, goldilocks? You don’t get laid?”

“JINX.” Grim barked, glaring furiously from his slump at the table.

“WHAT?” He squawked, blaring the syllable and whirling to seethe at his partner. Grim fidgeted and grappled with himself, mouth flapping several times before he finally flopped into the wall, the twist of his lips spelling defeat. Jinx immediately ignored him, and turned back with his gnarled hands open wide.

“Aw, fuck. He’s just sore ‘cos he got it the same as you, pretty-boy. Talk to ‘im later, see if he wants to share any secrets ‘bout how much he reeks at catching chicks. Lemme tell you, if you reel in a girl a year- you run circles clean ‘round him, poor sap.”

I didn’t say anything. Grim just spasmed in the corner, throat working in silent, furious indignity as Jinx threw a callous smirk back at him, nose wrinkling. Then he turned to me again, a filthy, knowing expression sinking into his features.

“People in this city, kid, they’re color-blind- all they see is green. All they wanna know is if you got cred, and how they can get it. Don’t matter if you kill no one to get your mits on it. That’s just the way it is ‘round here.”

He shrugged after a second, hiking his cigar up onto his lip with an off-handed snort.

“Hell, with that girly-ass hair you got goin’ on, I’d be surprised if you couldn’t finagle a horny chick out of a pretty penny or two for a video-chip’a whatever the hell you and the rat do for fun.”

I froze.

Even Grim melted from his offense at this, and I heard his low, halting chortle skimming over my deep-throated growl.

“Jinx, you are unbelievably twisted.”

Feeling like I was being stretched out on a rack, straining at all my muscles and my hands, which were spasming, I just buried my face in my fists and wished to hell the darkness would blot out his voice. And I wanted the rest of my drink. Badly. All in one shot.

Bit my lip as they wouldn’t shut up.

“’Least I got the brains to see a business opportunity when it smacks me in the face, ass-breath!” Jinx slapped Grim stoutly across the head, producing a hollow tang of metal as his fist glanced off the man’s helmet. Grim yelped and drew back, framing Jinx as he fell across the table towards me in outright assault, thumbing at his drink. Suddenly invasive and loud. Never like usual.

“I mean C’MON! Come to thinkuvit, who here lookin’ blondie in the ugly mug could ever believe he WOULDN’T end up in the big daddy p-house, rollin’ in the hay for a living? C’mon, girls go crazy for that whole deaf’n dumb act, and with that goldilocks edge you’d be in like flint. Hell, they always want the guys ugly as sin so the girls look snazzier! You’ll be perfect! I, ah, know some people with a shtick in the biz, so if you ever wanna go serious with this, you know whose digits to punch-“

While it pissed me off to no end, it opened my eyes. Opened my eyes with all the grace and abrasive tact of floor disinfectant, yeah, but I still realized something.

That wasn’t what I was worried about. Other people caring? No. It’s not about other people. I’ve learned enough from this place- you can’t care what other people think.

This city is about finding what you need and never letting it go. And that’s what’s happened with me. And I’m never letting go.

And… it’s true. I’ve been thinking about him so much lately, it’s… heh, not really a change from earlier. But I’m not obsessed now. I’m not. It’s different, I swear. I… promise.

I just… want him. Need him, so badly still, everything about him- but not like I did. Not… not sick like that. I know that part of me won’t come out anymore, but the idea still scares me, even though I’m getting things back. Things that scare him off.

I’m sleeping again. There aren’t anymore nightmares- especially when he’s close. His breathing puts me to sleep. I even have my warmth back, but it’s… watery. Weak. A thin, flaking coat, grumbling underneath my skin. Reluctant, not good enough. I still need him by me to make sure the shadows never come back, even in the dark. He’s the last piece. MY last piece.

No one gets… what he IS to me. That’s why I can never talk to anyone about this. Even when he was tiny, furry… his hands were so small, but they still held me. No one understood that. No one.

Not even him. And I never told him.

It’s not a case of… impatience. It’s not that I can’t understand the fear and the pain, because I was on the other side of it. It’s all a mirror, I know, because I was there. It’s not irritation. It’s nervousness.

That he’s hovering just outside, out of reach, and I don’t know if a step on my part will make or break my chance. It’s like I have to say something to keep him from running away- have to make a desperate, stifled little move to stop the steel trap from closing. I thought it was over in the alley. Over at the fact he would actually stay with me, no matter how much I hurt him- but he can still be with me and hate me.

He’s not my best friend anymore.

He’s someone different and we both know that, just like I turned into something different so, so long ago. He lost his best friend two years ago, but I always had mine. And… now I don’t. But I could have something more.

It’s just so… alien. Having the one person you’ve always felt right with, the one person you’ve never left… suddenly be the one you’re farthest from. I couldn’t talk to him if I tried.

But I know what I have to do. I’m drawn to him, no matter what happens. He’s… Dax. My best friend that isn’t.

I love him. I do, and I’ll make it up to him. No matter what.

It’s a little waiting game. I won’t move till my piece comes.

Even if the prize will make or break my life.