Book II - ch 23: Define Real in Three Words or Less

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Someone banged on the side of the van again, but Sarah didn’t move or let go of Pegasus.

“If it’s all the same to you and your moment, I wanna go back to base!” Scorpion shouted. “I’m tired of babysitting the friggin’ van.”

Sarah didn’t want to let go of his hand, not yet. There was a noise that sounded like Scorpion had banged her head against the door instead of her fists.

“Grunt if we can head back,” Scorpion said.

“We can, right?” Pegasus asked her in a whisper.

Sarah nodded. There was nothing left here for her.

“Go ahead,” he said louder. He still made no move to unlock the door.

“Don’t mind me,” Scorpion replied loudly. “I’ll ride in front with the geek you threw out of his own van.”

“Okay.”

Pegasus moved to the seat next to hers, pulling her into a one-armed hug when she refused to let go of his other hand. Sarah leaned against him, placing her other arm around his waist. Slowly, as if to confirm he wouldn’t disappear on her, she released his hand, wrapping both arms around him.

Pegasus held her, hands drawing soothing motions along her back.

The van’s engine came to life, and soon they were moving amidst shouted complaints from Scorpion.

The two stayed as they were.

“In case I forget later with all the madness that’s sure to be waiting for us back at the compound, thank you.” Warm breath tickled her ear. “However you did it, thank you for saving my life.”

“I don’t understand how that happened.”

“Start again from the beginning.”

“I already told you!” She pulled away to face him. “Asking again isn’t going to change that.”

“I know, but it would be good to organize your thoughts before we get back.”

Would her room have vestiges of her mourning him?

Fear still had her in its grasp, squeezing her insides as it did when she looked down from that rooftop. No dream should feel so real. Sarah shivered, but she couldn’t blame it on the cold.

Pegasus tried to pull her back into an embrace.

She fought him, even though she still wouldn’t let go of his shirt. Nobody said crazy people should be consistent. “You’re the sane one here, what do you think happened?”

Brushing her hair back behind her ear, he offered her a smile. “We’ll figure it out later.” His gaze was faraway, as if his mind was already busy at work. “It’s going to be okay.”

She wanted to believe him.

His thumb traced the familiar pattern along her wrist. “Just breathe for now.”

“I am breathing. It’s not helping.”

“You should be the one telling me that everything’s gonna be fine.” He leaned his forehead on her shoulder. “Hold me close and tell me to breathe.”

No longer able to see his smile, she found no trace of it in his voice.

“I almost died today.” It was barely a whisper.

Sarah suspected this was his roundabout way of getting her to do what he wanted her to, but she had almost lost him. No, she had lost him.

A shuddering breath left her. For that terrifying eternity of not knowing what was real and what was not, she had lost him forever. Holding on to him didn’t sound like a bad idea.

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She wrapped her arms around him tightly. Eyes closed, she focused on the rising and falling of his chest. Soon she found her own breathing slowing down to match his.

The adrenaline rush that had been keeping her on edge was winding down, exhaustion starting to replace it.

The van came to an abrupt stop that almost threw them from their seats.

“What the—” She thought the van might have been intercepted and they’d need to defend themselves.

“We’re home,” Pegasus said, probably unaware of the effect his choice of words had.

This wasn’t supposed to be home.

She was still coming to terms with that disturbing thought when Pegasus left her to unlock the door.

Scorpion was standing there, fuming. “Somebody wanna tell me why I had to deal with a dead body while the runaway needed hand-holding?”

For once, Sarah was glad to be ignored.

Pegasus wasn’t fazed. “That guy was gonna kill me. Sarah saved my life.”

His bluntness got them barely five seconds of shocked silence as a reprieve, but Scorpion recovered promptly. “Great, but what was she doing there?”

Pegasus shrugged.

Scorpion shifted her attention to Sarah like a laser beam. “What the hell were you doing there?”

Sarah froze in the midst of getting up, trying to come up with a better reply than Pegasus’, but she didn’t think Scorpion would like any answers she had to give.

Pegasus waved Scorpion off with such apparent indifference that Sarah couldn’t have been more surprised when the woman simply rolled her eyes and stepped back in a huff, proceeding to yell at Cypher instead.

Sarah didn’t move until Pegasus reached in and pulled her out of the van. She stumbled, cursing beneath a breath when she put weight on her left foot. By the trail of blood she was leaving behind, she’d cut it pretty badly on something.

Pegasus asked for the first aid kit when Scorpion was grabbing some of their gear from the other van.

With a grumbled complaint, Scorpion threw the kit at him as if they were dodgeball opponents, but he caught it easily enough.

Medical kit in one hand, he offered Sarah his other arm for support.

He shrugged his way past Mermaid’s cacophony of questions, exchanging a brief look with Griffon. “She’d better talk to Zeus first.”

Whether the mention of Zeus or the seriousness in Pegasus’ expression, Griffon let them pass without challenge.

Sarah’s hand hesitated over the keypad. If she got her re-entry code wrong again, she’d be screwed this time.

Pegasus gave her some space, more as a precaution than anything else, she was sure. She didn’t turn around, afraid she’d see him pointing his gun at her.

She took a deep breath, trying to go back to the moment when she left that morning, hurried and terrified.

Rainbows End Where They Return East Never Turning.

To her relief, the code was correct.

Pegasus typed in his code in a tenth of the time.

As if afraid of being cornered if they stood still for too long, Pegasus got her moving right away. His concern was not unfounded. Guards intercepted them as soon as they made it through the second set of doors.

“I know,” Pegasus said before they even got a word out. “We got the bulletin. I’ve got it.”

Were they here for her?

They checked something over their coms and eventually let them pass.

Regardless of the pain in her foot, she moved faster until they came to the elevator. “What’s going on?”

“You abandoned a car in the middle of the road. Them doing a verification on you is the least hassle you’re gonna have to deal with.”

The car! She’d completely forgotten about it.

She leaned back against the wall, watching the numbers as they changed in the little display. “Can I ask what you think?”

His lips twitched. “You can, but I don’t have an answer.”

“Do you believe me about the dream?” She didn’t realize how terrified she was of his answer until the words came out of her mouth.

He held her gaze, any trace of humor gone as if it had never been there. “Yes, I do.”

“You really don’t think I’m crazy?”

The smile returned, filled with mischief as it usually was. “I didn’t say that. But maybe we all are.”

She couldn’t help laugh. “That doesn’t help with what I’m supposed to tell Zeus.”

“Tell him the truth.”

“Even the crazy bits that don’t make sense?”

“Especially the crazy bits that don’t make sense.”

Groaning, she stepped into the elevator. “I don’t feel like telling him anything that starts with ‘So, I had a nightmare last night…’”

Once the doors closed, he placed a hand on hers. “I know you hate it when I ask, but are you okay?”

As well as she could be. “How are you feeling? You’re the one who almost died.”

“Not my first close call, not my last. Probably the only one with such a detailed account of an alternate outcome.”

Alternate outcome. Could there be a more unfeeling euphemism for dying?

“Do you want to talk about the part where you emptied a gun into someone?”

“I did?” True that she’d shot the man who was going to kill him and she vaguely remembered pulling the trigger more than once, but she hadn’t realized.

He nodded. “You’ll also have to talk to Athena specifically about that.”

Sarah expected as much. After she was done talking to Zeus, she imagined she’d have a long list of psychologists, therapists, and neurologists awaiting her. Dr. Blue might finally reconsider vivisection.

Stepping off the elevator, Pegasus walked her over to Zeus’ office at a fast pace. Pegasus exchanged a greeting with Tango, who was stationed outside and knocked on the door. Opening the door before any reply came, he went in. Sarah, who was still putting a lot of her weight on him, followed in his wake.

Zeus looked up at them, fixing his gaze on her. Many people had squirmed under that gaze during the years. She found she was no exception.

“Thanks for seeing us,” Pegasus said, maintaining a professional demeanor.

Zeus waved impatiently for them to take a seat.

Pegasus directed her to a chair, but he didn’t make a move to join her.

“I can’t wait to hear this.” Contrary to the words, Zeus sounded less than thrilled.

Sarah turned to Pegasus, hoping he would rescue her one more time. He was distracted, rummaging through the first aid kit.

“It can’t be worse than what I think,” Zeus said.

Pegasus scoffed. “Don’t count on it.”