A/N: Oh my god! Last chapter! So sad... but kinda happy. I can't believe I've finished two of these now. Wow... I'm sorry... I'm just so pleased :D I'd like to thank you all for your reviews. You made sure I kept going, and that's something worth thanking you all for! :D Okay... now this chapter could be taken as kind of predictable, or kind of cheesy... or you could try and accept it as what I intended for it to be... something emotional and my attempt at a beautiful poignant scene. I'd like to know whether or not I've succeeded. Now for the final shout outs...
drowchild: Aw, hope I didn't make you too sad. As for him leaving... you'll have to read and find out.
Sethoz: I'm not a monster! Put yourself in the poor guy's shoes. I'd feel a bit useless if I were him. Buttons? You'd better hold to your promise...
Capt. Cow: Go back to Becky? That would be kind of sweet, but with all the guilt from reliving Huckleberry's death... yipe. He'd fall apart. Love story, eh? Aren't many of those on here.
Leigh S. Durron: Muahahaha! Ah yes, aren't twists fun?
RogueSparrow: Oh, now, now, don't whine. I've written the end, see? You can be happy now... or cry... up to you. As for the depressing stuff, I've realised that. All my stuff seems to be doom and gloom. Hmm.
Beck2: *watches you hanging* Need a hand there? As a lifeline, here's the final chapter. Hope it satisfies. :D
Niani: Your favourite chapter? Wow. Cool. I did write it, and then realise how sad it was. *gives you box of Kleenex*
Graymoon74: Skinner... I've grown quite fond of him, so I thought I'd stick him in there and have him try to cheer our dear Tom up. He's a good guy deep inside, isn't he? And once again... have you been reading my notes?! *looks behind her* Hmm... *throws you a rope*
Rayne: Yay! Go Mina! Ah yes, the 'hug Tom' syndrome. I'm spreading it quite rapidly aren't I? The amount of times I've opened a review and seen the mention of wanting to hug him is amazing and sweet. Ah yes... the new story. You checked out the trailer? ; )
angelic katty: Cliff hangers... I can't seem to help it. Well, this one ends nice and smoothly, considering it is the last chapter. No cliff hanger this time :D
Enjoy!
Skinner had gone to Mina after visiting Tom, with the news that he wanted to leave the League. Needless to say, she was now marching down to the infirmary to try and turn him from this insanity. He needed to realise he had no reason to leave... everybody made mistakes... she herself had made mistakes much worse than his by a hundredfold.
She walked in, and Jekyll was then on his way out, perhaps to get something to eat. He said hello as she passed him, and she simply inclined her head, and closed the door after him. The room was otherwise empty, and she spotted Tom sitting up on his bed, his eyes closed and breathing deeply, as if trying to soothe a pain. There was a pensive furrow in his brow.
He opened his eyes and looked at her. "Mrs. Harker-"
"Skinner told me what you said."
Tom hung his head for a moment, taking a rather audible deep sigh of a breath, and then looked back up at her. "I had a feeling he would." He paused, and then shrugged with his left shoulder, the right too painful to move. "I've been thinking about it for a while... I never seem to do much around here anyway."
Mina came up to stand in front of him. He looked up at her, wincing slightly in the harsh light overhead. She crouched down in front of him, completely ignoring the presence of the available chair close by. "Listen to me," she said carefully, taking his hand in both of hers to get his attention. She was gentle with him, more of a subconscious act than a registered one. "You are important... we need you here."
"You don't need me," Tom replied plainly. "Look at the rest of you."
The rest of us? Has he separated himself from the League already?
"You all have your abilities. What can I do? I can pull a trigger."
Mina sighed. "Tom... we don't just need you here because of your abilities, do you hear me? We need you for a very different reason." He looked at her as though she were insane, and she persisted whilst she still had his attention, "You're more what the rest of us would love to be than you realise."
"What are you talking about?" Tom took his hand back from her as though she were scolding him physically, and she pulled away as well, sorry for anything she had done to him in that moment. He moved to stand, and Mina poised, ready to catch him if he toppled. He managed to balance though, after a moment of unsteadiness.
"I'm talking about the very fact that you are mortal, and you have no curses weighing you down from being normal, Agent Sawyer," Mina informed him, and though she had not intended to sound harsh or chiding, she couldn't help the tone.
Tom turned on her, and he almost fell, but he braced himself on the foot of the bed. She could see his breathing now, irregular and still a little weak. She wanted to support him, but was unsure as to whether he would push her away, so she kept her distance.
"You do not have anything keeping you from normal society," Mina pressed on, "you can walk among humans because you are one of them. You do not have Skinner's invisibility to single you out, Nemo's piracy, Dr. Jekyll's curse of Hyde, my vampirism... don't you see? You keep the rest of us from giving in to our urges, because you remind us of why we are even here!"
"That's not exactly an excellent reason to stick around. Look at what I'm good for," Tom retaliated, and his weakness was clear in his voice.
"What do you want me to say?" Mina asked of him. "Do you want me to tell you I do not blame you, because I will... and I don't. How could I? How could I hold you accountable for anything that happened? It was never supposed to involve anyone other than Amelia and myself, but she took it too far when she attacked someone I care about."
Tom halted at that point, and regarded Mina cautiously. Care? She cared for him? He realised it should not have mattered right then, when he was in pain and seriously doubting his usefulness in the group... but it stunned him that she had admitted it, even though she did not mean it in the way he desired.
"You might well say you should not have let her into your mind, but all I can tell you is that -wounded or not- I did the same thing. You are not invincible, Tom, and no one expects anything from you other than what you are capable of. I certainly don't, and for anyone else to do so if extremely unfair." Mina paused, and considered Tom in an almost respectful way. "I admire that you endured as much as you did... and I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your fighting her to try and save me." Her voice had quietened.
Tom swallowed, not thirsty, but feeling rather awkward now... not to mention the fact that he was now reconsidering standing up. It seemed like rather a bad idea now. One of his knees was deciding it would rather not hold him up.
Mina was there in an instant, and she supported him carefully but firmly. He looked her in the eye. Did she really mean what she had said? Did she really appreciate his efforts? Did she really find him useful? Would she rather he stayed?
Did I only threaten to leave because I wanted to see how she would react? He banished the thought for foolishness, even as she helped him perch himself carefully back on the bed.
"I couldn't just let her destroy you," he managed to say after a few long, deep breaths to calm his aching body. "No matter what she claimed happened," he saw Mina's look, "and even if it did happen, I don't care. I didn't care what they did to me, so long as they didn't hurt you." He held a hand to his side and winced when his ribs started to burn slightly with all the deep breathing. He started to take smaller breaths, and the pain eased.
This time, instead of crouching before him, Mina took the chair and settled it so she was facing him. She sat down, and said; "You know... that is a prime example of why you are important here."
"Any of the others would have done it too."
"Not necessarily... they underestimated you because of who you are. Perhaps they thought of you as a weakness in the chain, a fragile link that they could abuse." She seemed to be picking her words very carefully, and Tom returned the favour by paying close attention to her meaning and her expression as she spoke; "But they did not take into account how strong you are because of what you have encountered in your life so far. You past experiences have made you mature more quickly than you should have; you're faster and stronger; you're more intelligent than most men your age, let alone Americans in general."
Tom thought about taking the last comment as an insult, and reconsidered. She meant it as a compliment, and that was how he was going to take it. "You think I should stay."
"Of course I do. You are a part of the League, and although it may seem the easiest way to try and forget what happened, it will only make it worse. You won't have anything to remind you of why what happened, happened."
Tom closed his eyes, flashes of what had happened returning to him, and he shuddered involuntarily. Mina seemed to notice, and Tom felt her hand on his knee gently. He took a soothing breath, and opened his eyes, amazed to find them swelling with tears that threatened to fall.
"They..." He paused, taking a moment to word his sentence carefully, "I saw... all of the mistakes I've ever made," he told Mina in a quiet, somewhat shaky voice. He hadn't expected recounting the tale would affect him so much. He felt even more helpless now. "Everything I've ever regretted, and everything that's hurt someone I loved... I saw it."
Mina cocked her head. She didn't understand, but was obviously too timid to ask in case she offended him, or brought up painful memories. Despite this being true, he continued anyway, not looking her in the face; "Huckleberry Finn... I saw him die to save me. I saw Quatermain die to protect me as well..." His breath caught in his throat, and a single tear fell as he managed to say, "... and my parents..."
Mina's face fell, and she wore an expression of deep sadness whilst trying to hide the swelling sympathy that was betrayed in her beautiful blue eyes.
Tom shook his head back and forth slowly as he remembered how he had seen his parents... the two people who had been lost to him for so long. He had almost forgotten them, by no choice of his own of course. "He used them to make me hurt you." Their eyes met, and it made it even worse. Tom closed his eyes against the overwhelming amount of tears that wanted to break free. "And it worked... and I'm sorry... I'm so sorry."
He couldn't hold it back then, the sobs and tears escaped him, and Mina was overcome with his grief as well. She took his head gently in her hands and embraced him as much as she dare whilst he cried and trembled. One of her hands rested on the back of his head softly, stroking his hair gently as one would a frightened child, or someone who had lost a close companion.
In any other circumstances, Tom Sawyer would not have welcomed her compassion and its embrace, but it was all he could use to keep from giving in completely to the grief and terror he felt. The sobbing was just on the surface... it would take him a long time to force out all of the horrible things Amelia and her friends had done to him. It would be a lengthy, painful process. The physical injuries were just the start of it... it was the mental damage he was worried about; what scared him most. He was frightened it would change him, stop him from being the Tom Sawyer the League knew.
As he cried against her, holding her in return now, trying desperately to stop the shaking that wracked his body; he heard her soft whisper to him, "If you leave... you will have no one to help you through this... your family are here to help you."
Tom didn't understand, and Mina seemed to sense this.
"It's what we are... despite our differences and adolescent bickering... the League is a family. Perhaps not in the most conventional sense... but it's what we represent and mean to one another. We care for each member as we would a brother or a sister... and we protect them to the best of our ability."
Mina urged him to raise his head, and though his eyes were red and his face was tear-streaked, he let her with the gentle use of a hand. She smiled at him sorrowfully.
"You apologise to me..." she began, in a voice so soft and soothing that Tom suddenly felt very dreamy and wished to sleep right then if he could only continue to hear her voice, "but I should be the one saying sorry to you. I failed to realise that you were not yourself... that you were wounded. I pushed my instincts aside, and you suffered for my mistake. I should never have let something so awful happen to you. I feel as though I have failed you somehow... though you may feel the same way in regards to the others and me. You shouldn't, do you understand?" Their eyes locked again, and she smiled. "What you did... I can never thank you for."
Tom had no words left. He knew what she was saying... and somehow he couldn't absorb any of it. It floated into his conscious mind, registered briefly, and then was gone... though the meaning was not lost on him entirely.
She wanted him... perhaps even needed him to stay, and she was telling him the only way she knew how.
"The simplest reason you cannot leave the League, Tom, is because I wouldn't let you... we wouldn't let you," Mina told him kindly but firmly, "it would be a terrible mistake. We would lose something extremely valuable... something irreplaceable."
Tom would have smiled if he hadn't been so close to the verge of collapse, both emotionally and physically. He closed his eyes as she stroked some of the hair from his brow, and then he did actually manage a weak form of a smile, something she almost missed.
He knew she was right... he couldn't leave. He would lose a part of himself, and it would have been almost like giving in to Amelia and the others, although they were dead. They would have won, by driving him away from the best thing that had ever happened to him... even though that had never truly been their aim.
Tom realised now how much he felt at home here... it was where he belonged.
And it was where he was going to stay.