Jericho FanFiction

From: Shadowflame77

What a hero is made of...

Based on S1, E5 "Federal Response"

Mary's POV: Jake ;)

Disclaimer: I sadly don't own Jericho or one of its citizen... Part of this little story (the conversation between Heather and Jake) is taken from the show itself, the thoughts and feelings in between and all the other parts are mine..

Please - let me know if you like (or dislike ;) ) what you read - reviews are highly welcome and the fuel for my muse!

What a hero is made of...

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The early morning sun created pools of soft golden light, shimmering between the deep dark shadows cast from the surrounding houses on the main street. Wet leaves tumbled in the stiff autumn breeze which suddenly carried a cacophony of several ringing phones, disturbing the peaceful quiet of Jericho's town center.

Warm light shone through the big windows of Baileys when the door opened abruptly and a bunch of people emerged from the tavern, hunching their shoulders against the cool of the wind as they hurried to City Hall, exchanging concerned glances.

Back in the now empty bar, Mary's eyes wandered to the big TV in the corner, frowning at the announcement that had shown up on the screen a few minutes before, stating "EMERGENCY ALERT SYSTEM – PLEASE STAND BY", causing her to shiver involuntarily.

What the hell was going on? Every day they had to face new problems before the old ones had been solved.

Dragging her eyes away, Mary decided she needed a distraction before she snapped – there was only so much a woman could take.

But, as she polished the glasses, against her will, her thoughts returned to the events of this morning.

Jake (who was the long lost brother of her lover Eric), Stanley and this IRS person – Mimi was her name – had had an all nighter at Baileys, playing cards, drinking Moonshine and trying to ignore the End of the World outside….

They had even had some fun, but the early sun found them bone-tired and cranky. Worn out would be the better term.

No one was sleeping well since the bombs… but that seemed to be double for Jake.

She was convinced that she gone someway to finding out why the toll on Jake was so much higher than on everyone else.

Nursing her lower lip, Mary narrowed her eyes, rubbing harder on a stain as she tried to work out the "problem" called Jake.

There was no way not "to know" Jake.

First – Jericho was a small town, and secrets did not exist. That was a fact… a fact she personally feared, to be true… but well, that was another unsolved problem. A small smile tugged at her lips - maybe all her dreams would come true this evening! At least Eric had promised…

Heaving a sigh she returned to her original train of thought, almost happy to have something to distract her from what she hoped would happen this evening.

Back on track, back to Jake...

Ok, so she had known Jake since she had been a little girl.

She was only a few months older than Jake and she had seen him struggle through adolescence – struggle and fall. Hard.

It must have been a burden to be the first born of Mayor Johnston Jakob Green, to know it was expected he would become the next Mayor of Jericho, to fill into his fathers and grandfathers shoes.

Jake had brains (that had even added more expectation on his shoulders) and he had always been a worrier, questioning everything – but he had trouble accepting authority… And that – of course – could do no good with a father like Johnston Green, who was in equal measure a respected and a dreaded man.

Mayor Green was a fair, but hard person. He loved his family and his sons, especially his eldest, who had been so close to his father as a youngster. Of course, that was just Mary's gut feeling, based on the stories Eric had told. The boy Johnston favored did not resemble him in looks (taking after his mother with his lean frame, high cheekbones and dark almond shaped eyes, both of them having hints of her indian heritage), but he had been like him in manner and temper.

Having a head of his own and dreams of flying, it must have been hell for Jake to try to live up to the expectations forced upon him.

And then, when Jake turned into a teenager, he was not just obstinate and argumentative like others. No - Jake had started a full on rebellion!

During this phase, Jake had met Jonah Prowse, Emily's father. Under his influence Jake pulled out all the stops. According to Eric, living in the Green's house was dreadful at this point.

Johnston tried with all his might to shield his son from Jonah – which just led to Jake turning to Jonah even more.

Jonah – who really liked Jake and deeply disliked Johnston – found pleasure in this power game and slowly lured Jake deeper and deeper into his criminal world, donating him the Roadrunner, making sure he always had enough money to give Emily those little presents and treats she loved so dearly.

Mary sighed.

Emily… That was another chapter in Jake's book. Hopefully he would not take that road again.

Yeah, they were a nice pairing for the eyes, but they did not do well together, that much was clear…

Firstly – both were hot-blooded and Em was just… Em. Very good looking, of course, and brains, too. But all too often she was overbearing and unforgiving and had a tendency to lash out at those close to her when she felt bad. Of course, it was usually Jake who would suffer the brunt of her anger.

Not to forget her inherited liabilities – her father was a criminal, always in and out of prison and her mother was an emotional wreck who finally committed suicide, leaving Em to bring up her younger brother Chris. Em had always been an emotional rollercoaster, dragging Jake - who could not say no to her – down with her. She was just oil to his fire… and both were damned to get burnt.

After Chris' death, Jake had disappeared and it had been awful.

The aftershock of what had happened had almost destroyed the Green Family and was still feeding the rumor mill in town, even after 5 years. But now, having Jake back, it seemed worse, especially as he seemed to carry even more dark secrets and heavy burdens with him than before.

Em had been a hollow shell for so long; Mary still wondered how the girl had pulled through, but she was convinced that had much to do with her newfound friend, Heather Lisinski, a kind soul - and with Roger, her fiancée.

Both had had a healing influence on Emily: Heather with her cheery spirit and easy manner and Roger by pampering her.

The red haired bartender took the next round of tumblers off the shelves and resumed her work.

Finally Em seemed to have come to terms with herself and her past. She had seemed ready to settle down and to marry Roger. Mary had been happy for them.

And then, with a bang, Jake came home and turned everything upside down again, for both the Greens and Emily. Then the bombs had fallen and Roger was missing…

And of course - certain as the sun rising in the morning - Emily and Jake were gravitating back to each other, building another black hole which would surely devour them. They were sure to burn their wings again. But at what expense?

Mary snorted quietly.

Eric had been jazzed since then, too.

He loved his elder brother, she knew it, but Eric hid it behind a wall of anger and hurt feelings. He had confided in her, it had always been about Jake.

Jake had been very close to their father, when he was younger. Eric had tried to find his place in their relationship, too – but he had never had a chance against his wild, stubborn brother, who made such high waves that their father always had his hands full with his eldest son, failing to register his youngest…

When Jake started rebelling against their father, Eric just decided to be the opposite of Jake. He always would do what he was asked, he would always follow his father's lead… he still did. Hell, he even was his father's spitting image!

After Jake had left town, Eric had doubled his efforts to please his father, but to no avail.

Johnston had been so angry and hurt by his eldest son that he just withdrew from Eric.

But it wasn't until the last two years that Johnston had slowly opened up again and he and Eric had started to work as a team at Town Hall.

And this new found and still weak relationship had been shaken to its core with Jake returning home.

Not that this was a bad thing. Not at all.

Mary put the tumblers back into the shelf and busied her hands with clearing the counter.

Now she was dipping right into the gist of the matter, right into the core of "The problem Jake", Mary was sure.

If it hadn't have been for Jake, many people would have died in the aftermath of the bombs.

First – on his way out of town on this dreadful day – he rescued a school bus full of children and their injured teacher despite having suffered severe injuries himself, not to mention the Tracheotomy he had performed on one of the third-graders.

Townsfolk still couldn't get over this – who could do such a complicated surgery just like that? - and they were still gossiping over all the little lies Jake had told earlier on that day.

Biting her lower lip in concentration, Mary counted down on one hand: serving in the Army, serving in the Navy, attending military school, playing Baseball for a Minor League team and being a Rodeo Star.

She shook her head slightly – what was Jake thinking?

Of course – she knew. He had never thought he would return to Jericho after this visit and so it did not matter what he told them. It would never bother him.

Never say never. The bombs drove him back into town and grounded him. Here in Jericho of all places - the last place on earth where he wanted to be.

Probably his only honest answer that day had been given to the kids in that bus - he had admitted to them he "was just a screw-up".

Mary frowned.

Because there it was: The all consuming blackness in Jakes nature, at least in his opinion, was surely a result of his miss spent youth. But maybe it had been made worse because of newer experiences over the last five years? She had to wonder, with all his lies about where he had been and what he had done and with the shown lack of self-esteem... it occurred to Mary, that there was something bad eating at Jake, destroying him from the inside.

She let her thoughts expand deeper, listing to herself Jake's heroic deeds so far.

So he had rescued the busload of children, than he had saved half of the town ushering them down into the salt mine to get them out of what they had thought to be radioactive rain (which fortunately proved to be just normal, clean rain), locking them in with just the right amount of explosives to keep the rain out of the mine (where had he learned this, Mary wondered). If that was not enough, he had left the safe shelter to make a mad-run to the Richmond's Farm to save Emily and Bonnie, who had been held at gunpoint by a couple of prisoners.

Jake had then been the first in line to volunteer for scouting outside town, to find out what was going on there. And he had found horrible things like the stranded planes on the highway up to Wichita, deserted, one of them crashed and burned to rubble.

Jake had shown another interesting skill: he had somehow tinkered with the black box, which had been retrieved from the wreckage, and managed to get to the messages on it, and this had given them proof that cities other than Denver and Atlanta had been hit by bombs. There was also a hint from the machine that the plane which had Emily's Roger on board had pulled through an emergency landing on a field somewhere near to Kansas City. This had made Em's day – just so, on the fly…

Then he had mobilized the citizens on a rescue mission to get contaminated refugees from Denver… this time he had run out of luck as they were too late and could only salvage their bodies.

Mary sniffed silently, remembering the devastated look on Jakes face, his hunched stance when they had returned with all the perished strangers… they had not been able to put names on each grave, some of the people hadn't had any papers on them, when they found them.

So it all came down to one question… did this man ever rest?

Recalling the worn out expression on Jakes face, the fatigue which seemed to ooze out of each pore led only to one answer: No, he didn't.

Putting two and two together, Mary reasoned that having a stained past and carrying dark secrets could lead to nightmares and insomnia. Jake felt like a screw up and in order to prove that he could do better he put himself in first line of danger over and over again, not registering that he already had become the town hero - and surely this would add to his difficulties, not to mention the mental stress they were all suffering from because of the bombs.

And like it seemed Jake just couldn't quit being a hero, even when he looked fit to drop of exhaustion. But with each heroic act, Jake proved he was of tough stock. Jake was everything but a screw-up, that was for sure, but he just could not see it. And, sadly, his father and brother couldn't see it, too… (Jeeeez, that must be the typical Green stubbornness…)

Blowing away a grain of dust, Mary's thoughts finally settled on what she had witnessed in the tavern this morning, what had her convinced that Jake was a hero.

Being up all night gambling cards with Stanley and Mimi, Jake had involuntarily encountered a little question-and-answer-game with the dark haired woman, plastering a wide grin on Mary's face right now as she remembered the convo.

Finally deciding to call it a night (the sun had been up quite a while), Jake had asked Mimi, what she would be doing right now if she was at home in DC.

Mimi had answered: "Sleeping. You know the hardest thing about sleeping in this dump?"

Shooting her a curious, but tired look Jake had asked: "What?"

Heaving a deep sigh Mimi stated: "Quiet. I don't know how you stand it. It's like my brain is an echo chamber."

Jake's snippy answer had annoyed Mary, gritting her teeth together.

"Why do you think I left town?"

Then Jimmy – who had just entered the bar - had chimed in from behind "I could tell her."

Mimi had suddenly been wide awake and very curious, sitting up with an eager expression in her eyes. "What?"

Jimmy had grinned and clarified "…why Jake left town."

Jake's posture had suddenly changed, he was stiff and alert, his voice warningly: "Watch it, Jimmy!"

Unaware of the tension, Mimi chattered excitedly: "Let me guess, pressure got too much!"

At this point all of them had been watching Jake, feeling uneasy, not sure about what to say, or how he would react.

"Wow." had been the not very impressed answer from Jake.

Nodding proudly Mimi replied "See - I'm a people reader!"

Jake had visibly relaxed, stating an almost amused and somehow resigned sounding "Yeah…" which unfortunately encouraged Mimi to delve deeper into this topic.

"I'm betting... Captain of the Football Team. Prom King. Most likely to succeed. Am I right?"

That broke the ice, they all had to laugh at that, remembering all those things are what Jericho had expected of Jake. But remembering instead that Jake had ricocheted through the town like the loose cannon he had been, jumping from incident to incident, getting deeper into the morass of crime with each errant step.

"Don't quit your day job!" Jimmy teased.

"Why? What am I missing here?" Mimi was glancing curiously around, astonished to see laughing faces, but weary and even solemn eyes surrounding her.

Stanley was the first to answer that – of course with a big grin on his face whilst remembering : "I think he beat up the Prom King."

Almost looking taken aback, Jake stated "Oh yeah, I did."

Then Mary had become aware of Eric coming to stand right behind his brother.

Stanley had seen him too, and quipped "Oh Eric, you must have a million stories about your brother screwing up, right?

But Eric had reacted cautiously, almost sadly: "Yeah, at least that many…" and her heart had flown out to him, sensing those old stories had hit a sore spot. Jake's face mirrored the sadness, surely making him feel even more like a loser.

Mary had served Eric the ordered coffees-to-go and then – finally – she had caught Jake naturally becoming a hero again, reacting without thinking while others were frozen.

Without warning the electricity had come back, firing the Juke Box which was blaring out mercilessly "Taking Care Of Business" at a volume which had been appropriate in the days before the bombs, when "Baileys Tavern" was full of chatting, dancing and drinking peoples enjoying themselves - but after days of silence, they flinched painfully and stared in shock at the machine.

Scratch that… Jake was already moving and pulled the cable out before anyone else had so much as fluttered an eyelid.

Soothing silence flooded back into the bar only to be disrupted by another surprising, disturbing, repeating sound which made them all jump and face the old-fashioned black payphone on the wall, equally mesmerized as they had been with the Juke Box.

They were all frozen in place only to find that Jake again had been the one putting them all out of their misery – he had jogged around the bar and answered the phone, listening intently to the voice coming out of the speaker, to the voice talking for their government - or what was left of it.

It took them all some more moments to gather around Jake to listen what the voice had to say….

Bailey's had emptied quickly after that, which had left Mary time for cleaning up and sorting through her thoughts. Her customers and friends were all heading to City Hall now to discuss what should happen next.

Yes… even if he still felt like a screw-up – Jake WAS a hero, naturally… in each possible detail, on both – the large and the small scale! And as for the question about what a hero is made of: obviously part of it is the typical Green stubbornness, a good heart, selflessness and a sense of what is needed in that moment. Throw in a lack of self protection, handsome good looks, toughness, mystery and a bad boy reputation and you have the perfect ingredients for a hero.