Rain or Shine | Soulmate AU 1.5 |

10

I get approximately one day to myself where the entire team leaves me alone before Cecelia is practically knocking the door to my bedroom down, demanding I join them for a team dinner. I spent most of the day in bed, getting up in the morning only to take a long, hot shower before burrowing back under the covers. I'm insanely lucky that my increased healing is so fast and efficient because my current state would be very different if it weren't. The team may not have found me at all and I sure as hell wouldn't have been able to fight my way to freedom like I just did.

The bottle of pills I jammed into my bedside table when I got back to my suite last night are practically burning a hole in the wood. I throw a guilty glance back at the closed drawer as I allow Cecelia to basically drag me onto the elevator at her side.

"—I mean, it's not really much of a dinner as it is just eating together," Cecelia is rambling as she presses the button for the common floor, "we figured why subject you to Flint's cooking so soon, since it would be his turn, you know."

She looks over at me at my abnormal silence, a red eyebrow quirked in curiosity. I've never been one to just not say anything, even if it's some filler words to make the team know I'm at least passively following on with any one of their rants. A captain is supposed to be someone who can listen well even if their agents aren't talking about anything very important. Damien was always good at it, and I guess I subconsciously picked up on the skill.

"Are you okay?" she says gently. I school the startled expression that almost makes its way onto my face. The team doesn't ask me that question very often. Most of them, excluding Lake, are used to me being the rock they can hold onto. There have certainly been times with the team when things definitely weren't okay for me, but I never let that show for good reason. It all comes back to captain things for me. I need to be someone to look to, and their reaction to my temporary disappearance the day Bella went missing only further proves that they view me as some kind of faultless leader. Being reminded that that's not true only causes them distress.

I flash her a weak smile, shrugging my shoulders lazily.

"Just tired," I reply.

She opens her mouth to say something else, but the elevator doors open before she can get the words out. I step onto the common floor and don't look back because I have a feeling the conversation she was about to start up isn't something I want a part of right now. Or ever.

The team is already all huddled up on the couches by the TV, boxes of pizza open on the coffee table. Wendy and Cally are once again absent as I expected. Wendy is on maternity leave since her girlfriend's expected to have their baby within the next couple of weeks or so. Cally got permission to take an extended leave from the League so she can work on some crazy classified project with NASA. Everyone else on the team is here, though, and they crow in excitement at my presence.

Cecelia slips into a spot beside Tony that they must have left her while she came to retrieve me. Bella is sitting on Rowan's lap with a plate of pizza, looking pretty good for a kid that was just kidnapped a week ago. She wasn't even gone that long, according to the team. I went missing in the first facility, but there was a small group of kids down one of the wings where they found Bella. They freed everyone else while they were at it, as well. D.C already assigned another team to dismantle the facility in New Jersey that's currently fronting as a pharmacy and, for once, I'm glad that they didn't pick us. I'm more tired than I've been in years, this unsettling exhaustion that almost feels as though it's settled into my bones.

"There he is!" JD exclaims, thrusting a paper plate with a slice of pizza on it towards me.

"Yeah, hi," I say, accepting the plate and slotting into a space between JD and Flint.