valentine | the old guard

i. miss me?

Family is all that you have in this world.

The family that you choose. That loves you regardless of your faults and endeavors to protect you at all costs. 

That is my family.

Morocco, 2020

I let out a sigh as I follow Booker through a series of narrow alleyways. Why he had to choose this path, I do not know. 

"Stop huffing," Booker says, his voice a low growl as he maintains the lead. "Next time, you can pick the route."

"I will, Kiddo," I reply. I hurry my pace slightly and hover behind him, playfully jabbing him in the ribs with my fist. My fellow immortal spins around and lets out a chuckle, pinning my leg to the crumbling wall of a house by pressing one knee against my thigh. 

His mouth hovers mere centimetres from my forehead and I let out a breathless laugh. The two of us playfight all the time, something that amuses the others to no end. We fight over everything yet neither of us ever gets hurt; a plus side to immortality and a remarkably strong friendship. 

"We're gonna be late to meet Andy," I warn, more than aware of the minutes drifting by.

"Eh, she's been away for a year," Booker replies with a grin, moving his mouth down to my ear. "What difference will a few minutes make?"

I let out another sigh then nudge him off of me. Just a few meters up ahead is the garage that we've stashed our motorbikes in. According to Joe and Nicky, there just isn't enough room in the designated parking area at the hotel - possibly down to the fact that they've had to park not only their car there, but also mine and Booker's.

"She is expecting us. And you don't wanna piss the old lady off."

Booker backs off, hands raised to show his submission. He stops walking when his back hits the wall opposite and we both glare at each other for a short while. The stalemate is broken, however, when Booker slides on his Aviators and starts to walk again, making a beeline for the rented garage. 

The metal door opens with a long, creaking whine, but the two of us manage to slide it back far enough to duck inside. The walls of the tiny, converted shed are covered in peeling plaster and someone, long ago, thought that it would be a good idea to carpet the floor. I wince as the strong smell of oil and petrol hits my nose. 

"Here," I turn to see Booker examining one of the bikes. He unwraps the loose scarf from around his neck and tosses it to me. "Wrap it around your mouth and nose. It should do the trick."

I nod to him as he winks then start to tie it around the lower half of my face. The smell is much improved now; every breath I take filled with the sweet, woodsy scent of his cologne. Much better than the acrid stench of the garage around us.

Before I straddle my own bike, I slide my sunglasses from their position on the neckline of my white tank top and put them on. The last thing I want is to get dust in my eyes again . It took a full day for me to heal last time because my body didn't register it as an injury. 

Booker takes a few Moroccan Dirhams out of his battered, leather wallet and places them down on a small side counter; leaving our payment for the shelter.

We take off on the bikes, ducking under the low-hanging metal door and not bothering to close it behind us. I follow Booker through the narrow, winding stone passages until a figure comes into view, walking away from us. 

It can only be one person.

The confident walk; the all black clothes; the short hair as dark as her undying soul. Andy.

We speed up and Booker swerves in front of her, cutting her off from the stretch of alleyway ahead. I stick behind her and, simultaneously, we both cut our engines. 

Andy turns from Booker to me, one hand on the strap of her backpack. Even through her thick, dark sunglasses, I can see her familiar eyes lighting up, her mouth curved in a half-smile as she takes the two of us in. She hasn't changed at all in the period of time that she has been gone, accept for a new, glowing tan to her skin.

Despite the issues I may have had with her in the past, I'm beyond thrilled to finally have her back. Us immortals are meant to live as a family; we aren't designed to exist alone.

I dismount my bike as Booker does and lean it against the wall of the passageway. Smoothly, I take my duffle bag from where I had secured it to the handlebars, and sling it over one shoulder. As I turn back to my two friends, I push my own sunglasses onto the top of my head.

"You good?" Booker asks. 

Andy steps closer to him, followed closely by me. "Yeah."

"Good. You travelled much?" I ask, moving beside her and lazily draping an arm around her shoulders. My fingertips brush against the white cotton covering Booker's bicep on the other side. He smiles.

Andy nudges me, motioning for me to drop my arm. I do and watch with no small amount of curiosity as she unzips her backpack, pulling out a rectangular object. She hands a well-worn leather-bound book to Booker, the spine looking ragged from millennia of use and the edges of the pages yellowed by time. Whatever it is, it's seriously old. Before she zips the bag back up, she pulls out a second object and hands it to me.

My fingers close around the object with uncertainty but Andy gives me a reassuring nod. When I look down, I see a dainty, beautiful ring in the middle of my palm. The band is gold and aged by hundreds of years with a small, rugged sapphire in the centre. From personal experience, I would hazard a guess to say that it is English, late 14th century. For safety, I slip the ring into the side pocket of my duffel, making sure to zip it up tightly again.

"Thank you," I whisper, pulling Andy into a tight embrace. She lets out a surprised laugh right next to my ear and when I pull away, she holds my forearms, removing her sunglasses and boring into my soul with her wise eyes. 

"There's no need to thank me, Valentine. I saw it and immediately thought of you," she admits, grinning and adding, "A pretty, English ring for my pretty, English friend."

She releases my arms and we continue to walk. Andy flips her shades back down to cover her eyes; an old nervous habit after her six thousand years of life on the run. As we carry on through the alleyway, Booker starts to examine the book closer - something that he'd started doing whilst I was hugging Andy. He turns the thick, leather-bound rectangle over in his hands and lets out a small, stunned gasp when he looks at the first page. 

"First edition Don Quixote," he muses approvingly. "That couldn't have been cheap."

Andy smiles at me as I roll my eyes. "That's because it wasn't."

A moment passes before Andy breaks the comfortable silence between the three of us. "So, is anyone going to tell me why I'm here?"

I let out a small sigh. "You remember what happened in Surabaya eight years ago, yes?"

"CIA," Andy recalls, still striding calmly between me and Booker, not breaking a sweat.

Booker nods, looking across to her. "That one. The guy who hired us, James Copley, reached out. He's freelance now. He has a hostage situation in South Sudan -"

"No, Booker. We don't do repeats," Andy says, stopping abruptly. She looks between the two of us with the disapproving gaze of a long-suffering parent. "You both know that. It's too risky."

I step up, for once feeling the need to challenge her judgement. "Andy - come on. At the end of the day, hostages are hostages. No other team can do what we do." My eyes widen with conviction. "They need us."

Andy lets out a heavy sigh and turns her head away in thought. She looks back after a moment, her eyes on the ground as she chews absentmindedly at the edge of her lip. "Joe and Nicky?"

 My eyes meet hers through her dark tinted shades. "They're both at the hotel."

I watch on as she shakes her head then turns away from us, walking out into the open square of the hotel's forecourt. Booker and I exchange a look of triumph, his handing reaching out for mine before we take off after her.