It had never before seemed strange to walk through the base in clothing that was soaked in something; whether that be sweat, blood, water, mechanical fluid, none of it mattered.

After years of moving around, or at least not remembering where he’d been, Tempest Point had finally become…….home. Since he almost always healed any wounds and the armor Apex and William had created eventually “healed” itself, he’d never really thought about what he looked like when Alliance 2 returned to base after a mission.

Now, standing in the hallway leading into the giant room that housed the living room, kitchen and bar, he did. The shadows hid him, they always did. It wasn’t like he had blood splattered all over, in fact, for him it was minimal, likely hard to see as it dried against the dark green of his armor.  For the first time ever, he wondered what it was like to be sitting here, isolated from society, from other people, waiting to see if someone would come back.

He’d failed that particular test.  He’d never really considered the mental, and maybe physical cost, of waiting.  Oh, when he first enlisted, he’d been angry more than anything else, but as the years passed, even before the project consumed him, he’d kept a distance.  He’d already done and seen so many violent things that he’d told himself that Mum and his siblings would be better off if he kept his distance.  For a lot of reasons, but important among them had been that it might be easier on them if the day came where he didn’t come back.  Bridgette had been the conduit to them, and he fooled himself into thinking that was a good solution.  When in reality it had just been easier; easier for him to not say goodbye every time he left.

Was it really fair to put Olivia and Amelia through that every day?  And if it was, should the evidence of wounds be hidden away?  A pretense of safety?

He’d certainly failed the test with Shawna.  He’d lost her originally against the Circle of Skullz.  Then again when the team defeated Experion, and they were pulled forward through time.  Oh he’d found her there in that future period, an older version of her original form ironically, but still her.  One who had thought he had died, a version that still loved him, even if she had moved on after his death.  Then he lost her again on that trip back.  That scream still echoed in the nightmares when he could sleep.  Three times he lost her, and yet some how each time the universe brought her back to him, or him back to her.   Coward that he was, he never told her how much it hurt.  The fourth time broke him.  He wasn’t strong enough to handle it, maybe he never had been.  So he ran from it.  Straight to Amelia.  Even though he still hoped the universe would somehow bring Shawna back to him, he knew he didn’t deserve the happiness she brought him.  Deep down, he also knew that this fear, this weakness, this was why he was so adamantly opposed to the idea of the Red Widow.

He sighed a sibilant breath as the repeated thoughs slithered through his weary mind.

Down the other way, the medical wing hummed with energy. Between the scents of pain, excitement, blood and a foreign scent similar to William meant the baby been born.

He’d been to the medical wing before he came here.  Not to see the baby yet. To make sure. To make absolutely sure that he didn’t carry any alien contamination or virus.  Basic protocols that nobody cared about but him.  Apex had cleared him. Again. And then he’d asked about Olivia.

He’d been stunned by her negative response. It was not what he had expected, what he had assumed. The shock had clenched at his heart. In truth, he’d been arguing for the delay because he figured it would not take long before she began to change. No markers. Allison had been her age, so had Shawna.  He knew that it hit kids at anytime, but still he’d expected some indication. Why?

He shook his head to purge the memory from a few minutes prior and watched them across the room. Ice cream, they were eating ice cream.

Four hundred and twenty nine feet behind him awaited the new family in the medical bay. Or three hundred and thirty seven feet forward through the big room and he’d be at her door. He could be there in less than a minute. She still loved him. She’d said so just today. But…..regardless of what anybody thought, he knew that if he did that, the new relationship with his daughter would be damaged, it was just too new. He’d just be the father that left again, even if they lived only a thousand feet away. So he pushed it down, and walked into the living room.

“Who wants to go see Baby Foster?”

 

---

 

He stood with his arm around Amelia, as she held baby Robbie.  He smiled faintly, and the anger he’d pushed down inside from the confrontation with Martial Law in the corridor seemed to melt away, turning instead into sadness.  He hoped that all he radiated in view of the exhausted Stacey was his normal pricklishiness.  He even attempted a lame joke about offering Olivia up for babysitting services.

The sadness overtook him though.  Whitley was already arranging some sort of spell and amulet that would allow Robbie to appear “normal.”  For just a moment, he found himself in agreement with the racist meglomaniac he’d just encountered.  Why should Robbie or anybody have to grow up hiding who they were?  Sadness at the fact that forever more, Martial Law now knew the faces of Amelia and Olivia.

When they returned to their room, he chased Olivia off her shower with a promise that they could go back to the movie room and watch Atomic Blonde when she finished.

“I need ta shower too…..” but he was interrupted by a long kiss as he turned back towards their bedroom.

“Yes, ya do…..” but she smiled as she said it after she broke the embrace.

“Wanna help?” he asked……picking her up before she could say anything.

Twenty-five minutes later, Livy hammered on the master bathroom door.  “Ar’ we actually going ta watch the damn movie?”

“Just finishin’ rinsin’ my hair out, kiddo…..”

“Ya know I can hear ya right?”

“If ya don’t want ta see us, I suggest ya go get the popcorn ready…..”

“AARGH! Yer so gross.”

As he heard her stock off, he turned back to Amelia who was laughing as she toweled her hair partially dry, a larger towel wrapped around the body he had just…..inspected.

His smile slowly disappeared and she saw him in the mirror.  “What?”

“What did ya think?”

“Well, probably a’ eight, I thin’ we’ve done better but I slipped o’ the soap….”

“Not that ‘melia.”

“I know Brett, but since I’m not psychic…..”

He sighed, “I meant Robbie.”

“He’s beautiful.”

“So……” Pausing again, struggling to say it.  “Ya wouldna’ care?”

“Brett, ya really need ta be a bit more specific in yer questions.  Care about what?”

“Well, ya know, if a hypothetical…proposal were ta occur in some future date, an’ a child or children resulted from such a…..hypothetical weddin’, that they might……have scales….or somethin’.”  He held his breath, not really knowing what answer he wanted to hear.

“Of course not…..,” but she turned to look at him.   “Would ya?”

“No. . . .” he shrugged tightly, looking away, “I guess I never thought about it.  Not really…..I don’t think I’d care.”

She stepped into him, grabbing his jaw and pulling his face back around, and kissing him lightly.  “Ya should probably figure that out first, don’t ya think?”

“Yesssss.  I mean, I don’t care, I guess I just never thought about it because……” and he shrugged again.  “How would they be treated by everyone who saw them?”

“Brett…..that’s not the important part.  How would you treat them?”

He held her close……before replying, “All I know is I want ta find out.”

---

 

He hadn’t seen the movie before, which was no real shock to anybody.  As far as he knew he’d never been to Berlin, and certainly not before the wall came down.  He kind of thought his brother would be the better one to decide its realism, but…..it at least bore a resemblance to some of the things he’d been taught.  Or at least that he remembered being taught, or whatever.

After they’d returned to their rooms, he’d tried to go to sleep.  He really had….and after the last forty-eight hours or so, he definitely felt tired.  He’d held her for a while, but then he’d slid out of bed, with a whispered “I’m goin’ for a walkabout……” he felt more than saw her relax back into her pillow.  It was taking some getting used to…..she slept far lighter than Shawna.

Really, it was the noise that was keeping him up.  It wasn’t that Whitley’s coven was loud, they were just…..here.  It disturbed his senses and anything that disturbed him kept him awake.

He didn’t know how long they would be here, and he’d never done more for the barracks section than throw out the bunks and put in a few single beds and arrange with Apex to keep it clean.  The one thing he had done years ago was make sure the plumbing and showers had been fixed, in fact the showers were the first thing he worked on before building everybody’s personal quarters.  But it gave him something to do, so he checked again.  It took him all of five minutes to make sure they were good to go.  It wasn’t much, but the coven hadn’t seemed big on luxury items when they kidnapped Shawna anyway.  While the familiar surge of anger came, he fought it down in far less time than previously.

He walked the entire base again, before stopping to check the monitors.  In all the antics of the day he had forgotten to discuss with Apex and William the need to restore his access, here and the Paragon Center.  Maybe he should just leave it that way.  Not his problem anymore.  Still, he sat there an hour before sighing and getting up, walking down to his “office” in the armory.

He flipped the lights on and sat at his ‘desk.”  He pulled out an ammo container and reached inside, retrieving the bag, and then walked towards the medical bay.

 

---

 

He stood in the cooridor looking into the main wing.  William sat outside of the bay in which Stacy rested, or so he assumed anyway,  holding baby Robbie.  It was always hard to tell with William, and he didn’t really want to interrupt, but he thought Robbie was asleep, so he appeared out of the shadows and walked up before sitting on the floor next to William.

Eventually, William acknowledged him, “Brett.”

“William.”

“Shouldn’t you be asleep?”

Brett chuckled lightly, “Is that a joke?”

“Not really, I thought you had been sleeping….more.”

“Some, not tonight I guess.”

“So you saw Clyde?”

“Yes, but I don’t want ta talk about it.”

“I can accept that.  Did ya come down here for a reason then.”

“Yea, I guess.  Apex says Olivia doesn’t have any of the Homecon markers, at least not yet.”

“Is that a positive test or a negative?”

“I don’t know anymore.”

“So…..how can I help with your decision.”

“Ya can’t but….I know Amelia asked ya for armor for Livy. I wanted ta ask a favor.”

“Continue.”

Brett dumped part of the contents of the bag into his hand, “I wanted ta know if we could coat these in titanium an’ nanotech an’ make them part of the suit. Make them into small bites that come out of her fists. At least once she learns how ta do it. Also maybe into shoulder guards that can pop in an emergency, or at least when she progresses well enough to control such defenses or emergency manuevers.”

William nodded in acknowledgment.

“If that’s possible, I’d like ta make her a nanotech necklace with this,” and he handed him a massive shark tooth, “as the center ‘jewel’ ta store the armor. Amelia says ya can do this quickly. The suit I mean. If you can and will, an’ it won’t detract from time with yer beautiful boy, I’d like it ta be done before we leave tomorrow night an’ for Amelia ta have access ta it. Just ‘n case.”

“I thought you did not want to talk about Martial Law.”

“I don’t, not really.” Brett sighed deeply,  “I know I don’t have any right ta ask ya for a favor William, with the way I’ve been acting, but I want ta protect her with all that I can. I guess I’m hopin’ you can understand that. If yer willing ta do this, I will be eternally in yer debt.”

“Brett, I would be more than happy to build this set of armor to any specifications you desire. However, to be quite honest with you Apex will do the majority of the actual construction.” He paused, “Place them all on the floor for a moment,” and, when Brett complied he gazed at them, committing them to his memory with eyes that saw far more than just scans. “I have altered the design to include your special gifts,” and then William stood up without altering the sleeping baby’s position and walked to to a monitor where the screen awakened to some unseen communication. “If these designs meet your needs, I can send them to Apex for immediate construction.”

Brett nodded.  ‘I know that Amelia asked for this.  The armor is her idea.  I’d have preferred that Olivia want ta be anythin’ other than this, but…..I guess I can’t control this anymore than my Mum could convince me not ta join the army.”  He paused again, obviously organizing his thoughts, “I also wanted to thank you for your invitation to Amelia. Ta have lunch an’ spend time with Stacey, at least as her schedule permits. She’s very excited. Very happy. She deserves more than I can give her. They all deserve more.” Looking at the baby “Congrats again o’ Robert. I envy you the journey you are beginnin’.”  Standing awkwardly looking at William holding the blue skinned baby……”Have ya figured out the answer yet?  Or if not, when you do, I’d be interested ‘n hearin’ yer conclusion.”

“I have lots of answers Brett.  To which question are you referring?”

“I was thinkin’ about this over the last few days.  Its not what ya would do for them,” nodding at the child held in his friend’s arms.  “The real question is what wouldn’t ya do?” And with that Brett walked out of the medical bay.