Frustration burned as he walked through the hallway towards his quarters, his home. He tried to bring up the security breaches in a logical way, but lost his temper. He hadn’t meant to, but no one wanted to take security of the base seriously. They refused to listen, William especially refused to listen. Whenever questioned, he considered it criticism and reacted like a spoiled child who wanted to take his toys and run away to cry in his room. William was a brilliant scientist, brilliant at technology, and refused to accept that someone might, just might, be able to eventually compromise his creations. All Brett wanted to do was to protect his family, his friends….and their families…..including William and little Robbie.
Ironically, William had spent years wondering whether he was truly human, truly warm, friendly beneath the isolated brilliant scientist combined by his trasnformation into….a homecon made of nanotech capabilities. But Brett watched, watched everyone…..and William’s true flaw, true humanity, was he believed in people. He trusted them to do what they said they would do, to be human, to be good people.
Brett didn’t. Brett expected conflict, change…..betrayal. The person that was trusted most was the one with the most capability to betray. Security’s whole purpose, ultimately, was to protect against weakness, and multiple protocols provided a capability to mitigate, reduce the chance for betrayal. Titan 9 proved the weakness in the protocols they had in place prior to that backstabbing event and it…..had broken him. Maybe he couldn’t fix all the pain that had arisen because of those actions, couldn’t fix Shawna’s pain that he had caused, couldn’t fix his own pain, the sense of loss of a future he hadn’t expected, the pain of being convinced that he killed his own child, but he could work towards preventing a similar event in the future.
He couldn’t protect the base without William, without Apex. He didn’t want to. He just wanted communication, sharing, no single point of failure or weakness. He didn’t even want to be in charge. He wanted to work with William. He wanted to give up control…..to be……a team. Partners. To be his…..friend. But a friend could betray him. A friend could die. Even if they did everything exactly right. He wanted his friends to take him seriously. To help protect themselves. To protect his family.
He walked into the bedroom…..spying, and ignoring, the sweat soaked workout sweats and tights thrown across the floor, watching briefly as she twisted the controls in her hands, before shouting, “No, you bloody kangaroo fucker,” before clicking on the start new game as he sat down next to her.
“How ya goin’, ya rowdy ankle biter?”
“Not a kid…..ya geezer…….”, she muttered as she stuck her tongue out slightly in concentration, blasting away at some image on the video. “Just playing CoD…..DAMNIT, bloody ‘roos just pop up outta nowhere.”
“How do the cockie’s compare ta yer uncle’s sims?”
“Come on, Dad……this is just a toy in a cubby, not real like Uncle Brant’s mission trainin’.”
He watched her for a bit, watching the desert scenes fly by, explosions in the background, as she approached the hospital with her team, talking shit over the mic. Flashes echoed in his mind…..sparks. Gunfire. She screamed distantly, “Get down you fuckin’ goon….Die die die.”
The machine gun thuds in his arms…….the grenade arcing too near, fragments bouncing off the barrel, slicing into him. Blurred, falling back, firing with his right hand, blood pouring out of the left shoulder.
“Run faster kiddo, duck sooner, shoot straighter.”
“It’s just a game, Dad.”
Turning, he sees the traitor, standing with a raised bloody machete, bodies of the nurses at his feet, firing, feels the blade slice into him, the bullets raking him and the traitor both…..Smittie’s last brave act.
“Sure it is, kiddo, sure it is.” He leans over her, kissing her on the top of head. “Gotta go ta work. Love ya.”
“Love ya too, Dad…….yer blockin’ the game.”
He keeps it together as he steps into the hall, breathing deeply.
His eyes flutter, voices in the background. “Next one. Multiple gun shots to the back, chest lacerations, punctured lung, punctured liver, ruptured spleen, fragments peppering the left side.”
“Black tag that one…..make him comfortable.”
“He’s still breathin’ nurse……”
“We got one doctor left Private, black tag him.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
The memory sparks through him, his head splitting apart in an instant headache. It was new. A change to the same old nightmare. He should have died. He should have died 
before he ever met Amelia.
He staggered through their door to tell her before he left for Avalon.
“Hey cowboy, lookin’ for a good time?” as she tossed her book to the side, throwing the blankets aside, revealing her tanned athletic body, her long legs and nothing else covering her.
“Maybe…..know someone looking for a good ride?” as he ripped his sweats off. As he slid into her, he shifted, the scales darkening across his body, and she moaned as he bent his neck at an inhuman angle, his forked tongue scraping its roughness along her aroused nipple as she shifted her legs to wrap around his hips, allowing his shaft to slide deep inside.
As she gasped, “Nooooo…..but maybe a hard ride, yesss…..”
He could tell her later. And Avalon could wait. You needed to take time to enjoy the good things in life. One never knew when they could be taken away.
Last Dreams 