Time was running out. It had been two whole hours since Lexa had contacted the Dominion, and there was still no word. Jessie Quick was getting restless and paranoid, acting as if Zoom could pop into Sanctuary any moment. Jesse was reviewing Lexa's medical files while Lexa hovered in her office for the Contact. Lexa was growing impatient as a new thought rang in her mind, maybe it wasn't Zoom that was taking so long, maybe the old man couldn't find anything for Lexa's problem.
The entire business about her expiry date was a Catch-22 for Lexa. Nearly two months ago, Lexa argued with Jesse that mutants were a mistake - they were to die out and let mankind evolve on its own. Rather immaturely, Jesse called her a "self-loathing mutant," though a different argument entirely, it was almost true. Why should she enjoy being a new mutant? Sure, the powers were unbelievably useful, but it was because of those abilities that Lexa and Leo were abandoned by their parents, that Lexa was picked up by the Dominion and the GSA, and the only reason that Leo was sick.
These abilities weren't gifts, Lexa realized, they were a curse. And with these thoughts in mind, Lexa wasn't sure if she wanted Jesse to cure her. So she could live a longer life, helping about Darwin's Law of "survival of the fittest"? Not this girl. However, Lexa felt really depressed about leaving the world so early in her life. Lexa was sure, if she tried, she could push out maybe fifty to sixty years of her life before dying. Twenty-seven and already worrying about dying from "natural causes"? It didn't seem real.
Lexa wanted to live, and though she traveled the world and taken some major life-threatening risks, she hadn't done a lot of things … especially she didn't want to die now. Lexa finally felt like she belonged somewhere. Search all the time for somewhere to belong, and you find it, only to have it taken away. That's me, Lexa thought bitter sweetly. Also, another reason kept her from just letting her expiry date take its course, and there was no doubt who that special person was. Nearly a year of ignoring his blatant advances was killing her on the inside, but finally, she felt as if they could finally be together. Lexa wasn't a stranger to heartache, and it felt a whole lot better knowing her heart was reinforced by steel walls, or as Jesse put it: Ice. Lexa knew, or finally stopped ignoring the fact, that Jesse would never hurt her, and would never stop caring about her. Lexa almost laughed out loud, why did every train of thought lead to Jesse?
"Lexa," a raspy voice called her, the old man looked at her from the screen. She didn't look any different to him, however, the man could see the light and excitement for life fading away in Lexa's eyes.
Lexa turned to the computer screen, waking up from her thoughts. "It's about time. What have you got?"
"On Zoom, I have psychiatric evaluations and med files especially, and some information regarding what he was working on recently."
"And on the other matter?" Lexa asked, trying to mask the desperation in her voice.
"I'm sorry, Lexa, not yet. I'm working on it. Here's the dossier on Zoom." Lexa confirmed the download, and the file was being uploaded into Sanctuary's system.
"If I make it through this, will you tell me your name?" Lexa teased with a smirk, but he could see the vulnerability in her eyes.
"If you make it through this," he began. "My name isn't what you should be caring about." The line ended with Lexa smiling.
Lexa sat at her desk, sorting through all the information on Zoom when Brennan walked in and sat down across from Lexa. The awkward tension between them was like electric bolts. Lexa hated awkward silences, too, and it was very awkward.
"Listen, Lexa," Brennan finally began. "I really am glad that Jesse is curing you, you're a great asset to the team and you can do some good here …"
"Can do some good?" Lexa repeated. Where had he been in the past six months? Other than running misguided missions for the Dominion, Lexa gave up everything for Mutant X. Especially for Brennan, who necessitated the choice she had to make to kill Leo. Brennan was silent to Lexa's question. "Listen, Brennan," she snapped. "I really thought we got off on the wrong foot before, but maybe I was wrong. I gave up everything for Mutant X," she breathed, "I turned against the Dominion, trusting Adam's word even though we had some trust issues. I stayed with Mutant X after my brother died." Lexa couldn't believe he was still treating her like the enemy! "I've worked my ass off for this team, yet you still think that I don't deserve to be here!"
Brennan interrupted her by standing on his feet. "You don't think I know that? Damn, you killed your brother to save my skin. I get it, alright? And I know you don't think I trust you, but I do." Lexa was taken aback at his speech, and Brennan saw her reaction and he lowered his voice. "I might not like you as much as the others do," he recovered. "But if any of us deserve to dodge this bullet, it's you, okay?"
Lexa exhaled. "Okay."
"I was just mad that Jesse thought if he'd told us we'd stop him from saving your life," Brennan sighed, "and you're not so innocent of that, either."
"Okay, I'm sorry," Lexa shrugged. "We didn't know how you'd react."
Brennan exhaled and put his hands in his pockets. "God, you never let anyone say anything nice to you," he sighed, "and I forgive you."
Even if she was temporarily powerless, Shalimar couldn't help but notice Jessie Quick's speed as she anxiously paced the Sanctuary and it was getting rather annoying.
"God, will you stop?" Shalimar snapped. "I'm about to lose my mind with you pacing like that," however, Jessie's actions reminded Shalimar of her own behavior only an hour ago.
"Well if Zoom finds us, you might lose some other parts as well. Your sanity is the least of our problems, Shalimar," Jessie snapped.
"Hey!" Shalimar exclaimed. "We get it, someone's trying to kill us. And we understand that the man's out of his mind, but biting our heads off while we are trying to help you isn't going to make this situation any better. Okay?"
Jessie lifted her hands in surrender. "Okay." She walked to the couches and sat down. Shalimar sighed and swept some renegade silk hair from her face and absentmindedly hit a few keys on the keyboard.
Lexa and Brennan walked in from Lexa's office and Shalimar turned around. "Get anything?"
"Probably a whole lot of worthless bull," Brennan shrugged.
"Actually," Lexa snapped at Brennan. "There is something useful," Lexa established a link with Jesse. "Hey, Jess, are you in the lab?"
"Yeah," Jesse replied over comm link. "I have a really bad muscle cramp in my neck, though. What's up?"
"We got the information on Zoom," Lexa began.
"I'll be there in a sec," Jesse answered and the connection ended.
"Most of it's … like Brennan so eloquently put it, worthless bull, but there are some hints as to what exactly Zoom plans on doing with Jessie," Lexa explained, "if he ever gets her." She sat on the computer stool and opened the dossier.
Jessie walked up and shrugged. "The op said that he planned on putting me in a time-loop chamber like Uncle Barry's."
"Yes," Lexa began. "But we want to know how far he was in this project, if he's not finished with it, we have some time. Also, he'll need some way to pass his memories to you, right? Maybe there's some information on that."
"Especially if the Dominion supports personal vendettas," Shalimar replied.
"Trust me," Lexa began. "They don't, only if it benefits them in some way. And from what I've heard, losing one of their top recon operatives is not benefiting them."
"Awe, that Dominion, always complimenting a girl," Jessie said with a mock wistful sigh, recovering quickly to make sure they knew she was kidding.
Lexa chuckled and rolled her eyes as Jesse walked up. "Jess, why don't you look in here for any information on Zoom's recent work at the Dominion?" she suggested.
Jesse nodded, and Lexa got out of "his" seat and Jesse sat down. Flipping through the information at record speed, his blue eyes darting from the topics and subjects of all reports, and then he stopped. "Bingo," Jesse motioned to the screen. "Progress reports. However, there is a little side-note from your Contact that Zoom might have been keeping his actual progress from them."
"But it's all we got, right?" Shalimar asked.
Jesse nodded and he looked back at the screen and read the highlights. "It says here that he was working on the space/time continuum, of course … not a lot to go on here, just research projects."
"How's that going to help us? He wanted a replica," Jessie explained.
Jesse jumped. "Hey! Here's something, an invention project he was working on … called, hey, Project Time. Working on the, look .. Replica of a time-loop chamber."
"How far did he get into it?" Lexa asked.
Jesse looked on and then his brow creased. "Well, it says here that the Dominion canceled Project Time because they had already had a time chamber but it was destroyed when they released Zoom."
"So? If they destroyed it, wouldn't they want a new one?" Jessie asked.
"Well, hopefully they made the connection between time-loop chamber and his feud with Jessie's family and ended the Project before he finished it," Lexa suggested.
"We know that's not true, Jessie wouldn't be in any danger if the chamber wasn't completed," Brennan realized.
"The Dominion isn't sure they ended it, a guy like Zoom isn't going to stop because the big, bad bosses told him to," Lexa explained. "My Contact said that he could've been hiding his real progress, right?"
"So? Nothing is going to be in there, then," Jessie sighed, annoyed. "Zoom lied to the Dominion and used his research and their equipment to finish his job, we're looking at incorrect data, here, Jess."
"Well, what do you suggest we do, then, huh?" Shalimar asked.
Jesse clapped his hands. "I can loop through some ISP's, making our IP address untraceable and get Zoom's computer logs straight from the Dominion? A guy like Zoom concentrating the time continuum can't do some physics and make a working machine without using his computer, right?"
Lexa wasn't impressed with his idea. "Wait, you don't think my Contact would've done that already?"
Jesse smirked. "Yeah, well, your contact's not me."
Shalimar looked to the young girl. "What do you say, Quick?"
Jessie was silent and then she smirked. "Finally you're at least doing something," she said, followed by a series of rolling eyes.
Bad, Impulse, bad bad Impulse. I've been SO concentrating on J/L that I almost completely forgot about Zoom. So, for the past 2 chapters, I've been trying to catch up. I hope you don't mind the first 4 chapters being almost completely about Jesse and Lexa, do you? Nah, didn't think so. Also! Unlike my other fiction stories, This Is War will have a sequel, that's already in the works. So, look for it when I'm done with this one! Impulse. :-D