Reborn - Pandora's Box (Book 2) AU

-.-The Nightmare Continues-.-

When they made camp, Nix held her mask, staring down at it. Something she no longer needed. She was considering putting it on, but then what was the point? What would be the point? Everyone already knew.

So instead, she handed it to Spider. "Here, you hold onto this, just in case."

"But-"

"Please, Spi. Just in case." 

He silently accepted and took the mask, clipping it to his belt. 

She could feel Q's eyes on her, a searing burn.

He said nothing about what had happened, their attempted escape. She recalled the threat to Spider about the ass-whipping: "-We hit the ground and you take off, I'll have you back here in two minutes and I will give you an old-school ass-whippin'. Understood?..."  And then there was her response: "Let me guess, you'll give me an old-school ass-whipping too?" which had shocked him into silence. It had never been confirmed or denied. But it seemed like he had decided on another form of punishment instead: breathing down their necks.

True to his word, he himself was absolutely keeping a close eye on them. Everything the squad did, he was right there with them. He wasn't having it any other way. How had this become her life? It seemed impossible - it should have been impossible. 

The next morning, Spider had a plan. 

"Well," he announced, continuing with the training because they were stuck here and what else was there to do? "I wouldn't say you've conquered the skies yet, but how about the trees?"

He offered to lead the way, and she was totally good with that. He called out 'encouragements' from where they kept a steady pace way ahead of the others.

"Keep up, losers! How's my ass look cause that's all you're seeing." She and Spider had more stamina for running through the branches. More stamina, and more skill. 

"Come on people," Q urged his squad.  He was in the lead once again. "This kid is pumping!"

Spider laughed as he and Nix ducked under a branch that the Recombs would have to navigate around due to their sheer size. "Whoo hoo! All day long! All day long!"

One of the Recombs hopped onto a branch the humans had just crossed, but with the extra weight it snapped and sent him slipping, barely catching on.

"A little help!" One of his team members reached out to give him a hand up. 

"Oh, that was harsh!" Spider only laughed, not letting this delay them.  "Let's go, let's go! Is that all you've got?"

She and Spi swung swiftly from one branch to another with the help of a vine - Monkey Boy indeed. One of the Recombs jumped for the vine, but missed and fell, this time plunging all the way down.

"Oops." Spider merely shrugged.

"Prager!" yelled Q. "Get your ass up here!"

Okay, that was pretty funny. 

Spider just kept on going, until he felt he had tortured them long enough and came to a stop. "That was fun!"

Nix moved to the side, leaning against a tree and catching her breath. It was pumping all right.

A tall shadow passed over her much to her dismay - her pain in the ass shadow.

He was breathing heavy too - their deep breaths almost in perfect sync. Almost. 

"I want to bathe," she announced when they reached ground level once more. The Recombs seemed pleased by this, to say the least. "We've been out in this sweat-slicked jungle for days - the kid's starting to stink so bad I can barely stand it, and I'm probably not much better."

"Hey!" Spider protested, but not so discretely sniffed himself and winced. 

But Q wasn't having it. "You can wait until we get back to base."

He held firm, but so did she. "No."

He stood there, observing her for a moment before he spoke again. "Z-Dog?"

"Yes Colonel?"

"Go with her to the stream and watch over her while she washes up. I'll take the kid." He turned back to Nix. "Happy?"

"Yes, thank you ever so much," she sassed back. At the very least she would be clean.

Zdinarsik followed her to one end of the stream, Q and Spider going to the other, where the Recomb sat on a rock, rifle across her legs, while Nix got to work. 

She emptied her pockets into a small pile on the grass and removed her jewelry, taking the blanket from the Recomb's kits that would have to serve as a towel. Her top was pretty disgusting at that point - damn, she'd really liked it, but after all this, she never wanted to wear these clothes again. Hell, she never wanted to see these clothes ever again. After all this, she would have to burn them. 

She scrubbed down the best she could, unfortunately having to put her dirty clothes back on afterwards as they were all she had. 

When she came back to her pile, dressed and squeezing her hair dry with the blanket, she found Zdinarsik was gone, as was something else.  

"Nice photo."

Anger flared up into her chest. "Give it back."

Q stood under the shade of a nearby tree, pinching the photo between his large fingers. It appeared tiny in his big blue hands. Her photo, the one she kept on her all these years despite her better judgement. 

"Give it back, you son of a bitch."

But he just turned away with it, chuckling under his breath. "I remember this, you know. Thanks to his memories." 

Seething and without anything else to do, she grabbed hold of his tail and yanked it as hard as she could. 

He whipped around, something flaring in his eyes, something dark and dangerous. His arm shot out and suddenly his hand was pinning her by the stomach to a tree.

Their angry gazes met, though something softened in them almost immediately upon connecting.

"Mom?"

Spider. How many times was he going to catch them like this? No more, not if she had anything to say or do about it. 

Q let her go, pressing the photo into her hands. She quickly tucked it away.

Then he leaned down so his mouth was right by her ear. "You say I don't know you, Sweetheart, but thirty years is a long time. I'd say I know you pretty well indeed."

A shiver swept through her, but not just of fear - of desire. A desire locked deep within her, being drawn out finally after all these years.

She had told Spider some of the truth, but certainly not all of it. No, not even close. No, some of it she was keeping just for her, torturous as it was.

(Some of this chapter is taken from The Way of Water deleted/extended scenes! I'll be using more from those scenes later too.

I decided I'm going to be dividing this story and my story for 'Fire and Ash' (and I guess any other stories based on the Avatar movies) into two parts, so stay tuned! 

Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed! :))