hecu_marine | (no subject)

There was a board in the room adjoining the main White Forest garage that'd once served as a casual communication center. Lost and found notices, non-urgent messages, and the like had been tacked to its surface when Shephard first saw it. These days it was still covered in paper, but the papers were divided into groups- the names of Resistance fallen and wounded, the names of confirmed other dead, and the names of people rescued alive. The first list was the longest, but the fact that the other sections existed at all… well, that was something.

Shephard didn't need to look at the board, exactly. He didn't have a whole lot of names to look for. If anything happened to Chell, he'd know about it, and he didn't need to take off his shoes to tally the number of people he knew on the ground. He stopped anyway, though, each time he went out and each time he came back. Just because he couldn't put faces to the names didn't mean they weren't worth remembering. You had to remind yourself what was at stake.

There was usually someone eyeing him from a distance when he turned away from the name-board. Linda, sometimes. Jake, the old section security head from Black Mesa. Others. Most of the time they turned away as soon as he saw them. Sometimes they just looked at him first: I'm watching you, their faces said. Go ahead. Say something. Make a comment. Make a move. You won't get away with it. He'd gotten used to it by now, let it roll off his back mostly, but damn-

"Ado?"

Adrian rolled his eyes and turned to face his brother. "Should've smelled you comin'," he said. "Evenin', Danny."

Dan offered a smile and tugged at the bill of his Mountaineers cap. "Figured I'd find you here," he said. "After I swung by the hangar'n Eleanor said you'd been and gone, anyway. You doin' all right?"

Adrian shrugged. "Last I checked, sure," he said. "Why?"

"Eleanor said you got sick after the mission-"

"Aw, I always get sick after flyin'." Adrian waved a hand in dismissal. "Got me a routine. Git down'n pray, git up'n fly, git down'n give thanks, stand up'n puke. Like clockwork. It don't mean nothin'."

"Mm." Dan lowered his eyes, shoved his hands in his pockets. "Never did think I'd be callin' my big brother a pilot."

"Wasn't exactly my idea, Dan."

"I know, I know." Dan glanced up at his brother. "Listen…."

Adrian'd figured something was coming almost from the start. He squared his shoulders, cocked his head. "Yeah?"

"Ado… you ever think about goin' home?"

That… wasn't what he'd figured on. His voice didn't quite want to work; he just stared.

Dan went on. "I ain't been here long, Ado, but I've been here long enough to see things."

"Name 'em," Adrian said, straightening a little more. His mouth felt oddly dry.

"Well, we c'n start with the helicopter," Dan said. "You never liked flyin' even before Black Mesa, and now they got you doin' a pilot's work-"

"Nobody else knows how," Adrian pointed out. "We got to have some kind of air support."

"Yeah, I know, but- they got you 'n they got your gunner, and that's it," said Dan. "What happens if you get hurt? Anybody here ever say 'damn, we'd better see about trainin' ourselves some backup'?"

"You can't blame 'em for that, Danny. I didn't think of it," Shephard said. "I should've."

"Folks in charge ought to be thinkin' 'bout that kind of thing, though," said Dan. "Not just leavin' it for you because you're there'n it keeps you out of their hair. Long as you're flyin' that thing they don't have to look at you."

"Dan-"

"Hell, they don't even have a backup gunner for you, do they?" said Dan. "Just Chell, right? They don't need to let you anywhere near their people."

"Dan." It came out more like a bark than a word; Dan went silent. "Me'n Chell're a team. We work damn well together. I wouldn't want no one else in the gunner's seat."

"Even so." Dan jerked his head back towards the main part of the garage. "I'm no soldier, but from what you told me there's about half a dozen ways you could be doin' a hell of a lot more. You fought your way out of Black Mesa, you blew up most of the Scab-"

"Wasn't me. Chell blew the hangar, I just fucked up flyin' and the gunships hit buildings tryin' to follow me-"

"That don't matter- Ado, you've done everything you're damn well supposed to'n you're damn well good at it. You got trainin', you got know-how, but they ain't usin' it. They got you flyin' a goddamn helicopter and babysitting the gate guard and the demo man. You could be doin' a hell of a lot more if these folks'd let you." Dan leaned back on his heels. "I don't think they're gonna let you. They'd've done it by now if they were."

"Hold up there," started Adrian, raising a hand in protest."They been in this fight a fuck of a lot longer'n I have'n you know it. Black Mesa was my first fuckin' combat mission. Any one of 'em's got at least ten years experience on me."

"Fine," Dan said. "Fine. I understand that. Point in their favor. But how's that different from Dr. Freeman?"

Adrian was silent at that.

"These folks ain't the only game around, Ado. You made it out of the wild'n into the Scab alive. I made it up here from Rowlesburg. You and me set out to head back, I bet you we can make it through. Might be tight since I don't reckon we'll be able to use a Stalker car again, but I bet we c'n do it. And I can guarantee you, folks back home'll respect what you got to offer."

( "It's not that I don't think you deserve a promotion? But I'm not sure I'd feel right…" )

"I promised Ms. Vance I'd stay with them," Adrian said. "She's tryin'. It ain't the Corps, but it's somethin'. Gave her my word."

Dan looked at him for a long, long while. "All right," he finally said. "All right. 'm sorry. I ain't gonna ask you to go back on that."

"Fuckin' well better not. Brother or no I'll break your ass if you do."

"I'd like to see you try."