The Price We've Paid

Drowning

Andy laid, sprawled out, in the brown leather armchair in the den. The walls were shaking as planes passed close overhead and the dim glow of the lamp illuminated the room just enough to give it an eerie feel. She inhaled a sharp breath, exhaling as she lifted her head and shifted in the chair. Her hands felt sore...more sore than they usually did after a fight.

That worried her.

She opened and closed her fingers, inspecting them as she did it. She balled her hand into a fist. There was no visible bruising, but something didn't feel right.

Suddenly, Nile gasped awake, startling everyone else that had been sleeping soundly beside her. Nicky quickly turned on the light, grabbing a gun from under his pillow as he did, and by that point, Booker already had his gun pointed at the door.

"What's going on?" Booker moaned, looking around at the empty room. His gaze eventually landed on Nile, who was gasping for air and attempting to calm herself.

Andy's glance shifted toward the bedroom. She did not move, but she listened in concern.

"What happened?" Book asked again.

"It's just a...a bad dream," Nile answered breathlessly, "I'm sorry." She looked at the men, slightly ashamed she had woken them up. Nile didn't usually have bad dreams, but recently, even before her first death, they had become a more regular occurrence.

Nicky and Joe each let out soft sighs as they shifted in bed. Nicky laid his head in his hand, squinting from the light of the lamp as he spoke.

"Tell us."

Nile shook her head, trying to remember every detail. "I saw flashes of it before. When I first dreamt of all of you. But now, it's clearer."

She hesitated for a moment. "I dreamed about a woman locked in an iron coffin...under the sea."

That caught Andy's attention.

Quynh...

"She kept...drowning and then coming back to life. She was hammering her bloody fists and knees against the iron."

Andy stood as Nile continued, slowly creeping closer to the bedroom, listening intently to everything she had to say.

"She felt like something insane, something furious. But she kept fighting...and she kept... drowning."

At this point, both Nicky and Joe had moved to sit on the edge of the bed. Booker sighed to himself as he looked at the boys. Everyone knew who Nile was dreaming of. Everyone knew the guilt that tragedy had brought down on you and Andy. It had put a significant strain on your relationship for some time, and had thrust the weight of the world upon Andy's shoulders.

"Her name was Quynh." Nicky said softly.

"She was one of us," Joe added. "The second immortal Andy ever found."

"The second?" Nile questioned. "You mentioned Lykon...was he the first?"

Nicky shook his head. "Lykon was third; shortly after Quynh. There was another before both of them but...we haven't seen her in years."

Nile tilted her head. "What do you mean?"

Nicky and Joe looked at one another.

"She left the team...a while back," Booker said as he sat up a little on his cot. "Her name is Zosime...Zo...she was uh...she is pretty incredible."

"Why did she leave?" Nile asked, as she brought her knees into her chest. She wanted to know more about these people. Andy had told her there were only four of them; come to find out there were three more...granted they were either dead, dying over and over at the bottom of the ocean, or gone...but still.