"Come on, people, let's move it. We don't have all day. We have exactly o' twenty-four hours before take off. That doesn't leave us much time. Move it!" Master Sergeant Apone shouted to his Marines. Only, they weren't his Marines anymore, only his team. A new lieutenant, the rank higher than Apone, was assigned to lead out the special armed force Space Marines to colony, LV-426.

The new lieutenant was late.

"Where's this guy at? And what's the op about?" Comtech Hudson, the goof of the Marines, asked.

"I said don't ask questions." Apone hissed.

"No, you said hurry our asses up." Hudson laughed. "What's the op, Top?" He walked closer to the Sergeant with an ugly smile across his face.

"Hudson, get your white ass out of my face. Get going!" Apone shoved the young mischief across the locker room.

"I'm just asking, Sarg." Hudson's voice echoed from the other side of the steel locker room.

"Hudson, knock it off!" Apone screeched again. "Get in line, marines! Let's go!" his voice carried like a missile in the air, falling.

The eleven Marines, male and female, white and black, lined up in a single file line against a steel wall. The ceiling fans were spinning like crazy, sending artificial wind through out the large locker room. The Marines were cold, wearing only boxers, and the women wore tank tops and shorts.

"I hate this job," Private Luke Frost mumbled. Frost was as young as Hudson but better looking, or so he would insist to anyone who would waste time listening. When it came time to bragging, the two troopers usually came out about even. Hudson tended to rely on volume while Frost hunted for the right words. "Every time, they make us do these fucking tests to see if we're okay to go out in space or not. Why don't they just keep a fucking medical record, or something?"

"They do," Corporal Dwayne Hicks said softly, standing beside him. Hicks was the squad's senior corporal and second in command among the troops after Master Sergeant Apone. He didn't talk much. He kept his counsel to himself while the others spouted off.

Young, twenty-two year old, Private Hudson's voice rang through out the corridor metal walls. "Left. Left. Left. Right. Left. Left..."

"Knock it off, Hudson." Apone said in a more calm, but strict tone. Knock it off, Hudson was the phrase he used more than any other chain of words. Hudson was a complete screw up, but he had a tough, macho appeal about him.

"Whatever you say, Sarg." Hudson chuckled.

Private Drake stood beside PFC Vasquez. "Give me some fucking clothes, or hurry this fucking medical test up." Drake hissed out to his Marines - mainly speaking to Vasquez.

"Assholes, you know the drill. Keep still and wait for orders from Dr. Callie," Apone answered, sharply. He shoved a thick, brown cigar in his mouth, which looked like he already had his way with it when the end of it was raw with saliva from his mouth.

"What's Callie going to do? All she does is look us up and down as if she's ready to pounce on us if we make a sound." Private Crowe groaned, and wrapped his arms around his chest to keep warm.

"We're naked, Crowe. What do you expect from a gorgeous doctor like Callie? You know she has her fantasies." Hudson laughed again with a cough following. He coughed several times to get the itch free from his throat. It was too damn cold.

Hicks closed his eyes, wishing Hudson would shut up but the next remark about the doctor nearly shot him to loony town.

"Yeah, I wouldn't mind smacking that ass a couple of times while she's bent down in front of me." Spunkmeyer laughed out loud, as he demonstrated the act of ass smacking in front of his boxers. PFC Spunkmeyer was the dropship crew chief, the man responsible along with Pilot-Corporal Lisa Ferro for safely conveying his colleagues to the surface of whichever world they happened to be visiting, and then taking them off again in one piece. In a hurry if necessary.

With a quick and smooth undertake, Hicks grabbed Spunkmeyer's neck, and squeezed. Hudson, Apone, Drake, and Vasquez jump toward Hicks but Frost stepped in the way.

"Hold on," Frost said and put his arms in the air.

"Hicks, come on. We don't have time for this bullshit!" Apone hollered. "Frost, get out of the way." He took charge and shoved his comrade out of his line of walking distance toward Hicks.

Hicks stared deep into Spunkmeyer's childish green eyes.

"Don't ever put the doc's name into your mouth again, you hear?" Hicks whispered coldly. "Stick to your own fucking amusement without her."

Spunkmeyer breathed uneasily. His blond buzzed haircut glistened when the shaft elevator doors opened. Three people in white uniforms stood out, and the other four were dressed normally, except one was dressed in a Marine uniform.

Hicks released his hand from Spunkmeyer's throat, and shoved him against the metal wall. It was bitter cold to Spunkmeyer's bare back.

"Shit, that's cold." Spunkmeyer whined, stepping away from the wall. Hicks never dropped eye contact with Spunkmeyer. He curled his hands into fists and when he breathed, his breath was clearly visible.

One of the people in the white uniforms stepped ahead of the others. Her long, back-middle length, brown hair blew behind her shoulders as she made her way to the livid Corporal.

She set her arms to her sides with a silver clipboard hanging in her left hand. "Is there something going on here that I should be aware of?" her voice was sweet, but the bitter bitchiness of her tone stood out more.

Hicks closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. He slowly opened his eyes again, ignoring the woman standing at his side.

"I take it by your silence there is nothing going on. Get back in line, Corporal."

Hicks stepped back in line without hesitation.

"That goes for the rest of you, Marines." The new lieutenant spoke. His voice was scared. Almost like he didn't want to be in the same room with the Space Marines. Like he wanted nothing to do with them.

"Dr. Callie, would you like to introduce the new Lieutenant?" Apone asked the doc.

The woman in the white coat, now recognized as Dr. Jody Callie, stepped back and glanced at the eleven Space Marines. "Yes. This man to my right is your new Lieutenant. Lieutenant James Gorman."

The Marines took in the small, puny man acting like a gigantic, dangerous Lieutenant. His oversized Marine uniform draped his slinky arms like a sheet. As they took him in, none of the Marines thought of him as their head leader, only a boy dressed up in big kid clothes.

"Shit," Hudson breathed. He leaned in toward Vasquez and whispered. "I could break this little man in half with my pinkie easily."

"Hudson." Apone hissed, overhearing Hudson's comment.

Ignoring Apone's call out, "Uh, Lieutenant?" Hudson raised his hand.

"What is it?" Gorman acknowledged.

"How long have you been a Lieutenant?"

Vasquez hit Hudson upside the head. "Goddamnitt, Hudson."

"I'm just wondering, because if I'm gonna be trusting this man with my life, I better find out every question I ask." Hudson pumped his arms, showing off his muscles.

Callie laughed in spite of herself. "Not much to show there, Private."

Hudson stood straight up in military form after the doctor's comment. He was in love with Dr. Callie. Anything he did, he did it for her. Hudson knew a great deal of information about the doc, and would love her until the day he dies. Not only were she smart with quick skills and a smart-ass tongue, she was also beautiful and held her own.

Perhaps it was Gorman's youth that bothered them, even though he was older than half the troopers. More likely it was his appearance: hair neat, slack creases sharp and straight, boots gleaming like black metal. He looked too good.

"All right, that's enough." Gorman grunted. "There will be no asking questions until Dr. Callie is finished with the medical examines. Then Sergeant Apone and I will brief you on the mission. Is that clear, people?" Gorman slid his military cap off his head. He turned around to have his back to the Marines, and waited for Dr. Callie to speak.

PFC Vasquez looked to Gorman's left and spotted a tall, thin woman with dark curly brown hair, and an unyielding expression on her face. She appeared to be anxious, yet convinced with why she was there, but no else knew why or who she was. To Vasquez, she resembled Snow White. It was the first name that popped in her head. Snow White.

Callie went through the Marines, looking them up and down. It took great courage to volunteer for a mission like the one they were going to travel on.

She came from a small background. She had a good home life in the small town of Lost Nation, Iowa. Raised with five sisters and two brothers. She had done well for herself. Graduated from high school with honors. Graduated from college with a Master's Degree in the medical field, and she was known for being the youngest female doctor to have ever entered the Space Marine Corp to become a specialized doctor for Marines needing special care. But Dr. Callie wasn't always as confident as she was today. One man inspired her confidence. A man she loved, and still loves. He taught her not to be afraid of her fears, and go forth with them: eyes wide-open, mouth closed, and without a smile.

"Corporal Hicks," Callie spoke gently. Awkward feelings. She leaned her clipboard into her stomach, jotting down a few notes. "Why did you volunteer for this mission?"

Hicks looked up from the floor. He gazed into Callie's brown eyes. He missed looking into her brown eyes.

"Do you mind answering?" Callie asked another question when Hicks remained silent.

Hicks puckered his lips out, not caring to listen to his ex-fiancée. Four long years, they had been together, and two years ago... well, you can guess what happened then.

"Corporal?" Apone glared. "Answer the doc."

Hicks looked at Callie. "These are my Marines, and I will stick with them to the end of the earth. If that means costing my life, then so be it."

Callie's breath was taken away, but the reaction was not visible. "Then that shows you have pride. But does it also reveal you can abide by your words and lead these men into battle with victory?"

Hicks studied her carefully. He knew she wasn't going to keep the incident they had with one another out of the conversation. Hicks left her, promising her a new life, but he walked right out the door and left her crying on the other side.

"Whatever it takes, doc," Hicks closed.

Callie shifted her weight with a half grin. She loved looking at Hicks. He had the softest skin. Big, puffy lips, and a body she once sank into for warmth on cold nights. Callie walked to the end of the line, starting at the beginning.

"All right, listen Marines. This is the last line of the tests. I know how much you love to receive your shots, take the pills, and drink liquidity gunk, but this is the real deal. I'm not messing around, and don't mess around with me. This will be painless and over with if you allow it to be."

"Uh, doc?" Private Drake poised.

"Yes?" Callie turned around and stood directly in front of the marine.

"You're talking to us like we're children. We've been through these tests dozens of times."

Callie laughed. "Then maybe in the past you all shouldn't have acted like children and made me think you can't act any different."

"Doc, that was a good one!" Hudson hooted. "Good one, doc."

"Knock it off, Hudson!" Apone snapped from the end of the line.

Callie moved one high-heeled shoe in front of the other. "Now, I will start from the beginning and work my way down. No horse play, got it?" There was a long enough pause to make her think no one would reply to her comment. Then she said, "Okay." She made her way to the first Marine, closest to the elevator doors. She held up her clipboard, flipping to the second page.

"Corporal Cynthia Dietrich," Callie pronounced. "Age twenty-five. Born in Pinetown, North Carolina. Hair Color: light brown. Eye color: green. Height: 5'8. You've been in the army for five years. Earned a purple heart at the age twenty-one for performing CPR on a man whose lungs were filled with black smoke, and almost died yourself." Callie looked down to the woman's medical file. "No other injuries have occurred since."

"They always say the second time around is the best." Corporal Dietrich smiled. She was arguably the prettiest of the group except when she opened her mouth.

"If you say so." Callie couldn't help but smile back. She looked back at Nurse Adam, standing directly to her side. "Okay, moving right along. Private Luke Frost."

"At your service, madam," Frost sneaked.

Callie moved forward then, and Frost looked down at Callie. He was a few feet taller than her, but no matter how tall she was, she knew just how to kick a man down with words.

"Ease down, Private," Callie said mildly. "You're not at my service, and don't call me madam. It's doctor to you."

Snickering caught the Marines all the way down the line.

"Assholes?" Apone warned with a grunt following.

Callie looked down the line of marines as well. She huffed out a snort, and continued on with her list. "Private Luke Frost. Age twenty-four. A colored Marine. Raised in Sebring, Florida. Colonial Antonio Frost is your father, and Captain Marg Anderson-Frost was your mother." Callie looked up from her clipboard. "I'm sorry to hear of her passing. You have my sympathy."

"Thank you," Frost sternly said, keeping a straight eye on the lockers in front of him.

Callie persisted. "No current medical treatment. No broken bones of any kind for being a private for five years."

During the years of tragedy and pleasure, Frost was the last man who stuck by Callie's side through the darkest hours of her life. He was like a brother to her. Only now the cruelty of her past had served its time, and it was up to her to return the ugliness she held deep in her heart for a lone Marine. But the only ugliness she revealed, she revealed to others who didn't deserve it. For the past two years, she dug herself into a deep hole, and ever since those two years passed, she's been constantly trying to dig herself out. And by this point in the game, Callie grew weary.

"Doc?" Frost spoke up. "I heard you were promoted to Chief of the Space Marine Medical Clinic."

"Yes. I plan on adding a hell of a lot more bedding quarters too, and shower stalls. Since we are getting new recruiters everyday," Callie paused. "Well, you know. We'll need all the space we can get."

The painful images of young and elderly Marines rushing into the hospital for quick surgery, amputation, or stitching haunted the doctor. Callie held onto her clipboard, studying the young Private in front of him. The private she spent most of her years talking to. Her own private, private you could say.

"Congratulations, doc." Hudson spoke up from down the line.

The moment Callie had looked over and seen Hudson she felt wanted. She took in all the Space Marines, and at last nodded at Hudson, unable to speak.

Callie looked up at the private in front of her. "Thank you, Private Frost. Moving on." She stepped over to the next marine. "Private Janette Vasquez. PFC. Age twenty-three. Hair color: Brown. Eye color: Brown. Born and raised in-"

"Redlands, California." Vasquez said for her.

"No brothers or sisters. Both parents deceased." Callie took in Vasquez. She was a female. A woman. She knew her place in time, and became well known to her guns and ammo. Everything that happened in her life, she took nothing for granted, and nothing was as serious than a shot to the brain. Nothing would be sure except the point of view of the barrel of a gun. It meant taking another life in combat, and never letting her fears take control.

She was broad but nicely built. Not an ounce of fat covered her body, only muscle. She wore a red bandana around her head, and her green muscle shirts were her trademarks. She was also a smartgun operator.

As Callie maintained the short conversation with each Marine down the line, it took nearly an hour before she reached her final destination to Corporal Hicks. Callie's heart skidded as she took in Hicks' strong features.

"Corporal." She sucked fresh air into her lungs, and looked directly into Hicks' eyes.

"Doctor." Hicks replied coldly. The strange thing was, he didn't know how else to act around her. The more he kept his eyes on her, the shyer she appeared. She had the need to glance down at her feet to release the tension between them. Hicks saw the girl he knew from long ago. She definitely wasn't the same doctor when she first walked into the room and stood right before him with a rigid tone and stern eyebrows. Hicks knew her. He knew all about her. They had a long six-year intimate relationship, and of those six years, he was madly in love with her. He would never stop loving her, even now.

It was his fault.

Callie looked down at her clipboard. "Corporal Dwayne Hicks. Age twenty-five. Born and raised in Anniston, Alabama. No current family members living, and no place to call home. Correct, Corporal?"

Hicks closed his eyes, annoyed. "Correct."

Callie, you could say, knew every little thing about Hicks as well. His entire background, his childhood life, his distant relatives and ancestors, and the family relic his father gave to him before his passing in the tragic house fire.

"I understand you still have your M-41A 10MM pulse fire?" Callie questioned.

"Yes."

Callie paused in silence, remembering clearly every moment of her last close confrontation with Hicks. Yes, he said to her two years ago. Yes, was the last thing he told her before he slammed the door. Callie hummed. Twelve Marines in total including Lieutenant Gorman. Callie stepped back from Hicks. She closed her eyes, then opened them almost immediately. Anything was better than staring at the black backsides of her lids.

"Okay, the information prep is finished. You will be given a series of multiple shots, and one last good evening to yourselves before indulging into hypersleep." She broke, taking in the Marines. "Any questions?"

Hudson raised his hand, and when Callie saw he was about to speak without permission, like he ever listened, she quickly sped up her next line of sentences. "Good, no questions. Just what I like. My assistant will lead you down to the clinic. You will all meet back here, and be given further instructions by your new Lieutenant." Callie winked at Hudson. "My work here is done."

Hicks looked relieved.

As Nurse Adam assisted the Marines down the long, steel corridor to the clinic, Hudson whined. "No, Callie, you aren't done here yet. Come back and party with us before we take off. Come on." Hudson stepped out of line, and wrapped his arms around the doctor's waist. He bent down on his knees, droning like a baby. "You can't leave me."

"Hudson." Callie let out a laugh. "Go on."

"Say you'll come back. Say it."

"Hudson, I have lots of work to do. I can't."

"Don't say it. Don't say it." Hudson stood up. "You'll have plenty of time for work later. Come stay with us."

Callie pulled the young private away from her. "I'll think on it."

"Not good enough." Hudson replied with another wail.

Hicks walked past Callie and Hudson exchanging friendly conversations. He looked at Callie not once as he disappeared down the corridor. Hudson slapped a wet kiss on Callie's cheek once the other marines were out of sight. Callie hit Hudson on the arm to catch up to the others. Once Hudson was gone she looked for Hicks, but he was nowhere in sight. A shear of depression crept in her heart, but she snagged her clipboard off the floor and turned around to talk to Gorman.

"Got a wild bunch here, Lieutenant. You think you can handle 'em?" Callie questioned.

Gorman swallowed, "We'll just have to wait and see." He looked down the corridor. "That young private, what's his name?"

"You mean Hudson?" she inclined her head in the direction of the departing private.

Gorman nodded.

Callie let out a small laugh. "He's harmless. He just likes to talk a lot to make him look tough. He's really not though. Don't worry." Callie reassured the new Lieutenant. "But you'll need him at your beck and call when you need it. He's the comtech and one hell of a marine."

The Lieutenant raised his eyebrows and nodded swiftly. It was clear that he was not convinced. The beads of sweat that dotted his forehead made his uneasiness pain and obvious to anyone that would bother to look. Not her problem, she reminded herself. Callie didn't have time to feel sorry for him. He had done his training and should be accustomed to knuckleheads like Hudson. He was a curious one, though, this Lieutenant. He reeked of inexperience. Strange.

"And the others?" the Snow White lookalike asked the doctor. "Are they as tough as I was informed. It was the only reason why I came along this mission, to be protected by those Marines, and-"

"You must be Lieutenant Ripley," Callie interrupted. She jotted the name down on the clipboard. "I've heard. And these Space Marines are the best you will ever find in a lifetime. I know these men and women well. They won't harm a living creature." Callie paused, thinking about what she just said. "I take that back, they will harm any living creature they come up on, but other than that, you can't trust anyone else with your life."

The Company representative took a step toward the doctor. No one really knew him except as some cheese dick sent by the Company to assist Lieutenant Ripley. He looked bored like a stuck up prick just trying to get the job done and over with. He tapped his shoe on the metal flooring, waiting for Callie to take notice of him.

"Everything looking up okay?" he asked the doctor.

Callie spared a moment to look at him. "Yes, and who might you be?" she took in the small height man, guessing he was in his thirties, maybe late twenties. Young Company man. He was good-looking, she had to give him that, and without being flashy about it. And he wasn't dressed in his usual gray bluish suit.

"Hey, Burke, you actually look like the rest of us grunts," Spunkmeyer nudged as he strolled by. The Marines were starting to come out from the dark corridor one by one, rubbing arms from the shot injections.

The representative's smile was no more or less real than Gorman's when he first arrived at the Marine base.

"I'm Carter Burke." He looked like a country boy sent out of his home life to be apart of something bigger than his plantation. He was living a surreal life.

"And what is your purpose with these Marines, Mr. Burke?" Callie asked, looking back at her clipboard.

"I'm here from Weyland Yutani Company to assist Lieutenant Ripley and the Marines." Burke looked at the puzzled doctor. He wasn't sure if she was paying attention, or staring blankly into the aloofness. "You know, building better worlds."

"Yes, Mr. Burke. I am aware of the info commercials," Callie spoke softly. Lieutenant Ripley laughed to herself, remembering she said the exact same words to Burke.

All the Space Marines were finally back. That didn't take long.

"What happened in there? You guys weren't back there for very long," Callie said.

"Two shots in both arms and one long injection in the upper thigh. Not much to it, doc," Drake informed her. He bent down and rubbed his thigh. "It fucking hurt though."

"Come on, Drake, don't be a wimp. You've taken bigger blows than that. I'm sure."

Master Sergeant Apone ambled back into the massive locker room, ready to prep his Marines hard. He stuck out his chest to show off his toughness, and he kicked out his arms and legs for a quick stretch.

"All right, Marines! Get going. Get to work," Apone howled. "We don't have time for laziness. We have exactly twenty-four hours before we're whisked off into hypersleep for three weeks."

The Marines scattered in disarray around the locker room. Each Marine found his or her locker, grabbing clean clothes and dressing quickly into heavier material.

"Damn, why is everything so cold?" Hudson whined. He tip-toed to his locker, which was across the room. The very last one. Hudson was always cold.

"Chilly, Hudson?" Callie laughed as she watched the comtech race across the room to keep his body alive for warmth.

"The entire place is metal. There's no use in running, private. You'll be cold no matter what." Apone joined in laughing with the doctor. "I'm not gonna fetch your slippers for ya."

By the time the Marines dressed into real clothes, and covered their bare feet, Burke and Lieutenant Ripley left the locker room to have there own medical examines. Nurse Adam chauffeured them down the corridor like he did the Marines.

Vasquez slipped a heavy sweatshirt over her muscled, tan body, and tied her boots tightly. "Hey doc? See anyone you recognize?"

Callie slowly turned her head to look at the smartgun operator. Once she knew Burke and Ripley were gone, she could act like her old self and have fun with her friends. The Marines were her friends. Good companions.

"I think I may recognize a certain corporal. Why you ask?" the doctor slinked her body from stuck up bitch position to really talk to Vasquez like a comrade.

"He recognizes you."

An arm reached around Callie from behind, and she nearly jumped. "Hey, why so jumpy, doc?" Hudson leaned his chin on her shoulder and Callie identified the creature that crept behind her.

"Thought you were someone else."

Her heart leaped when the corporal came out from behind a row of metal lockers.

"I see someone I used to have familiar relations with." Hudson leaned heavier on Callie's shoulder. "It hasn't been that long, doc."

Callie swallowed hard. Hicks was still getting himself dressed. His pants were hanging open. Zipper unzipped. Green t-shirt hanging off his elbows as he wrestled with it to cover his bare chest. His revealing six-pack. His tan, muscular body. Oh, God, the fantasies ruptured. Only, they weren't fantasies. They were never dreams. It all really happened. She once touched his chest. His bare, soft skin. His firm arms. Everything she took in right in front of her, she once touched and held close. Once a long, two years ago.

"Vasquez? Hudson? I don't see any work going on around here." Apone marched right up to the privates standing by Dr. Callie.

"Because we're not doing anything." Hudson acknowledged. He took a quick glance at the doc. "I'm working on my date for later tonight, isn't that right, doc? We're about to come to an understanding."

Apone chuckled sarcastically, then shoved his wet cigar in his chops. "That's what you think." He grabbed Hudson's neck. "Now move it, private, before I get you a date with the surgeon to take out that smart ass tongue of yours." He let out an overwhelming blow from his mouth, making Hudson's eyelids flicker. Pretending to faint.

"Hey Sarg, you know you can actually kill someone with your breath. You won't need any guns on this mission. Just breathe through your mouth."

Apone yanked the comtech practically off his feet and dragged him down the corridor with the other Marines.

"Vasquez!" Drake hollered from the corridor entrance. He motioned for smartgun operator to be at his side.

Callie looked around the locker room, and the Marines were gone. She missed Hicks. He must've walked by her, but she didn't take notice.

And sooner than expected, she was alone. All alone in the oversized locker room. "Four long years, huh?" her voice trailed.

---

Six years ago...

The Marines' tents were full. Every Marine needed some kind of doctor or nurse to aid them. Humans were rushing past as if they were on drugs. No one bothered to stop, or look for people in the way of the aisles. They just ran.

Doctor. Nurses. Assistants. Blood. Guts. Organs. Body parts.

You name it she saw it.

Newly graduate, Dr. Jody Callie, leaned against a white surgical tent to get out of the way of the racing stretchers and intact Marines. The horrible screams, the burns, cuts, and shots the Marines caused, and there was nothing anyone could do about it. The screaming eased the pain in someway. The doctors were used to it, as well as the men in combat. Screams all around them.

The young doctor leaned too hard into the tent. She heard a heart-pounding scream, and blood splattered all over the clean white tent flap. Her brown eyes widened, and her bottom jaw trembled.

What does she do? Marines are counting on her to save their lives. What does she do?

"Doctor?" an older Marine Officer barked as he sternly walked up to her. "Doctor?"

Callie snapped her head up and looked steadily into the old marine's eyes. "Yes. I'm a doctor."

The marine took in the young, petite woman. His eyes dropped to her white canvas shoes, all the way up to her knitted white collar. "Good. We need you right away for an immediate surgery."

Callie opened her eyes as wide as she could open. "Surgery? I... I can't possibly." She stammered out her words. She didn't mean to. "No."

"Doctor, you have to. This man could die if you don't operate now!" the Marine was tired, and Callie could see it in his gray eyes. "Now!" he urged.

Callie was stricken. The General just threw her into this entire mess, knowing she was a new doctor with a brand new license, and now they wanted her to perform a breathtaking operation already?

The marine could not wait any longer, so he grabbed the young doctor's hand and dragged her to a dirty green tent at the end of the first of many tent rows. The very last one. Why did it have to be the last one? No other doctor was around to perform surgery on a conscious Marine screaming for some kind of relief?

"Sir, please." Callie literally stopped walking, and it was the heavy-duty Marine who was dragging her white shoes in the dirt and grass. "You cannot allow me to perform on the injured Marine. I have no real life experience on a breathing human being. You can't..."

"You're a doctor, aren't you? That's why they gave you the name 'doctor' on your nametag. Now don't bullshit me with this I can't do it speech. You can do it!" he had to shout the last sentence to get it clear to the young doctor.

"Let go of me." Callie managed to yelp. But before she knew it, the Marine had a hold of her neck, and he shoved her into the tent with the doors flapping behind her.

She wobbled on her tiptoes when she about lost her balance. Within the tent, Callie could hear screams from many tents down. She could hardly see a thing in the dirty tent she stood in. She didn't want to be there. She wished on her life she wasn't there.

But she was.

She looked to her left, and saw what seemed to be little light coming from within. She then glanced at her right, and there stood another tent with small light illuminating inside. She was stuck in between two screaming marines in both tents. She wanted to scream herself, and almost did. She looked at her feet in the darken room, and a bright red bloodstain stood out. She hiked her shoe on top of her knee for support and spit in her hand to get rid of the unidentified blood. She wanted to gag, but she had to keep strong since she was a doctor. Doctors couldn't gag. That's what they were paid not to do. Gag, or puke on the job. It was one of many rules of being a high-qualified Marine doctor.

When she wasn't looking, but she knew, one of the tents' entrances flapped open. Callie stood up straight, kicking her shoe with the bloodstain in the grass to continue to get rid of it. Another doctor, an experienced and older looking one, glanced up at the young doctor. He was out of breath. She could tell. The screaming had stopped behind the tent flaps he just came out from. The Marine was dead. Or he was just sleeping. But Callie thought dead.

"Your name, Miss?" the doctor breathed uneasily, wiping sweat from under his double chin with a clean piece of white fabric.

"Dr. Callie, sir."

"Doctor, huh?"

Callie lowered her voice, "I recently graduated from med school." The way the older doctor examined her, the more Callie wanted to dig in a hole right below her feet and bury herself.

"Are you familiar with surgery yet?" No answer. "Have you had an experience with surgery yet, doctor?"

"That's what I was told to come in here for." Callie didn't want to perform surgery on anyone just yet. She just arrived. She felt the same as she did the first time she had to dissect a cat in her junior year of high school. Squirmy, and sick the whole way through.

The doctor nodded, "Very well." He pointed toward the other tent opposite of him. "A Marine nearly got his leg blown off by a grenade. Bad thing is, the marine positioned behind was shot as he was about to throw the fresh grenade, and it fell to the ground. The Marine in there ran for his life, but not in time before the last flick of blow knocked him on his belly, and realized he couldn't feel anything below his waist." The doctor limped toward the water canal in the back of the open tent. "But it was just his head making him think his legs were blown to bits. It was only one leg that was mangled." He grabbed for another washcloth, and wiped his wrinkled face. "So, see if it's too badly injured, and if it is, then make the decision to have it amputated or not. Can you handle that?"

Callie looked at the aging doctor before her eyes. She couldn't possibly make the accurate decision to amputate a Marine's leg or not. What if she makes the wrong decision? The Marine would have to live the rest of his life without a leg when he didn't have to lose it at all. She couldn't make that kind of decision right away.

"Doctor?" the mature doctor strongly spoke. Callie looked up to meet his eyes. He took a deep, heavy breath. He knew she was new. It was probably her first assignment for all he knew, or it could have been her hundredth. Either way, she didn't look nearly as tired and old as he did. He had been doing his duty as a doctor for nearly thirty years. She just graduated.

He made up his mind, "All right. Go into this tent, the tent I just came out of and stitch up a Marine. I'll handle the surgery this time."

Callie looked at the tent where the doctor came. She hesitated and her voice trembled. "No, I couldn't..."

"You're a doctor. You can at least do this for now." He begged with a slight of anger in his voice. Callie shook her head. "Either this, or I can do it, and you take the position for surgery next door." The old doctor stared into her eyes. She didn't make a move. She knew she couldn't do the surgery, and her eyes gave him her answer. "I didn't think so. I approximated exactly twenty stitches." He looked at his wristwatch. "Be in and out of there within ten minutes, and send him on his way. We'll need the space as quick as possible."

Before Callie could respond, the male doctor was back on his feet, rushing into the surgery tent.

"Okay, this won't be so bad." The young doctor reassured herself. At least you're not making a life changing decision. Leave that up to the real, real professionals.

Taking a large breath, Callie opened the tent flap and peeked her head in. She saw nothing except a fresh corpse on a metal table with a sheet over it. She poked her head out, wondering what was there to stitch? Surely not the dead Marine. Why did he need stitches?

Callie backed away from the tent, and was startled by another Marine rushing inside.

"What's going on here?" the Marine asked, still wearing his metal armor, and helmet. Callie stared blankly at the man. "Where's the marine at?"

Callie started to stammer again, but she stopped to regain her jaw. "Sir, I think he died." She didn't know what she was talking about. Another huge duty she had to do. Tell the surviving family member or other living soul that their companion, loved one had passed away.

"No, miss." The Marine argued. "There were three Marines in all that came through this tent. Where are they?"

Another heartbreaking scream sounded from the other tent. The tent she was supposed to be in performing surgery.

"Well," Callie was confused. "One Marine is in surgery right now, and the other is on a metal table with a sheet over his head, and the other Marine, I don't know where he is."

The Marine pulled out a piece of paper from his armor pocket and read the names he jotted down. "I am looking for Private Mackenzie, Private Luca, and Private Hicks. Those three Marines were under my command, came into this tent no later than twenty minutes ago. Where are they, doctor?"

Callie wanted to cover up her nametag. Mostly the name 'doctor'. She was scared shitless, and already Marines were demanding so much of her since she arrived. She's been dragged, grabby by the neck, and blood staining her shoes. What else could happen? She closed her eyes, wishing she never thought that again. Things could have been loads worse.

"I told you what I knew. I was just assigned to this tent."

The old Marine walked to the tent Callie peeked her head in. He stood in the tent's entrance for several minutes before taking his head out.

"There are two Marines in here. One needs stitching, the other is dead." The Marine walked up to Callie. "Be careful when you stitch up the living Marine. He's too important to be jacked up by a new, uninformed, young doctor. Got it?" Without waiting for a response from Callie, the Marine turned his back and raced out of the tent.

"Sergeant Apone?"

Callie overheard the exchange of dialogue from the other side of the tent outside. "We need you down to breakage right now. Right away!"

"I'm on it, private. I'm coming. Over and out." The Marine, high ranked Sergeant Apone said into his mouthpiece. "Let's move it. Marines are dying." At once, when Apone left the tent opening, a hurdle of uncut, clean Marines raced behind him.

It was finally quiet except from the low humming of a dying Marine across the path. Callie rolled her eyes and stared at the tent roof. She took another breath, and slowly walked toward the tent with the dead Marine contained, and allegedly another breathing Marine, needing stitches.

Within the tent, the young private played with the deep cut on his upper arm, just below the tattoo that gave away his Marine information. The man knew tragedy was all around him. He was such a youngun', and had seen more blood spilt which could last for five lifetimes. It was more blood than he wanted to see. His green, camouflage t-shirt blended in with the tent background dye, but his soft colored white skin smoothed the two colors out.

Callie walked in, causing a din with the tent flap behind her. The young private glanced up soullessly. The doctor almost smiled, but did nothing in its place when she gawked at the young Marine. A smile wouldn't have been appropriate.

"Hello." Callie spoke gently. When the private looked at his cut again, with the sleeve of the t-shirt dripping wet with his blood, he appeared disgruntled. The doctor was young, he could tell, and he had no idea if she was experienced or not. Callie reached for a clean bowl from the top shelf above the sink, and filled it with fresh water and tossed a washcloth in it. She turned around, and tensed up when she made her way toward the quiet Marine. She walked past the corpse and reached for the nearest stool to sit upon.

"How did this happen?" she asked him.

The private spoke up, "Where's Dr. Mattocks?" But never looked up.

"He was due in surgery. I will be taking over. Is that a problem?"

Ignoring her, the private peered down at his cut again. Callie gazed at the young private. He was good-looking. More good-looking than most men she knew in her life. His hair was short, but not army buzzed. It was long enough to run his fingers through, and short enough to keep out of his eyes. He was sweating around his hairline, his ears, and below his nose.

In that moment, Callie wanted to know every little detail about him but she knew she could not. She had to stay calm, and strong like a doctor, not a girl in prep school.

"I got into with a friend." The private swallowed, still examining his cut. For some reason, he found blood fascinating. Mainly his own. Remembering when he was a kid growing up in the outskirts of Anniston, Alabama, whenever he got a cut or scab, he would automatically pick at just to watch the sore bleed. He didn't know why but blood always made him smile. He was never going to become a mass murderer, and no one else's blood enthralled him besides his own.

"Another Marine? Who won?" Callie examined the cut with the private.

He caught himself off guard and smiled. "You should see him."

"Is that right?" Callie was comfortable for a moment in time, and place. Even though she did not even know the young private's name, she could tell he was a good man. A joyous man to be around.

When her thoughts ran away, she didn't notice the private's blood from the cut slid down his arm, to his wrist.

"Doc?" the private murmured.

Callie opened her eyes, in fact her mind, and caught the blood starting to seep on her white skirt. She stood up quickly, grabbed the washcloth, and cleaned his forearm, elbow, and hand.

"Sorry." She apologized.

"No need to waste apologies on nothing," the private whispered.

Callie threw the washcloth back in the bowl. She looked at his wet, bloody sleeve. "Here. Take this off." She indicated for him to remove his t-shirt. The private leaned back and with the other hand, he began to lift his shirt. He yelped in pain when he was using too much of his injured arm, and it caused Callie to heave her hands toward his shirt, and assist him.

The private finally looked deep into the young doctor's beautiful brown eyes as she pulled the shirt off. Callie didn't notice, but once the shirt slid past the private's beaming eyes, she caught his warm stare.

Silence broke in the tent. Nothing could be heard. Nothing else mattered. Callie forgot her place, and said nothing as she stared into the Marine's blue with a tint of green eyes.

Callie gave a faint smile. She shook her head, and sat back down on the stool. "What are you doing anyway fighting someone on your side, and not the real enemy?"

"It was training." The private paused. "It got out of hand."

Young face, old eyes, she thought. She hardly knew the guy. He must be a very hard-hitting Marine. She pulled out a stitching needle and thin stitching thread. The thread looked weak and breakable, but it was strong and sturdy.

Before she began to stitch, she came across the tattoo just below the cut. "US Colonial Marine." She gaped. "You look young. How long have you been a marine?"

It all made sense. Every Marine the young doctor came across was incredibly young. Most of them looked as if they hadn't hit puberty yet, and already they were fighting in an unbearable war. Waiting for a reply, Callie inserted the needle into the Marine's arm. He sucked up the pain by biting his bottom lip.

"A year," he managed to gasp. "Back home, they'll take whatever age. It doesn't matter, and they don't care. It just is."

Callie agreed. "That's how it was for me. I'm probably not any older than you are. Maybe younger."

"How old?"

Callie pulled the needle out and tied a knot on the end. "Nineteen."

The private looked at her in disbelief. "A doctor already too?"

She shrugged his question off. More like a statement, or joke. She wondered why she had the name 'doctor' before her first name. She wondered a lot of things. And all the wondering occurred once she stepped foot on the Marine base.

"Right now, I wouldn't consider myself a doctor. Doctors are calm, ready for anything. Never afraid." She breathed lightly as she continued to stitch up the Marine. "I'm scared."

"It's just a stitch." His voice was low, but it carried.

"This is probably going to leave a scar. The cut is too deep. Looks like it sliced through some muscle."

"Scars are good to have."

Callie incised into the last remaining flesh on his arm. "Just about done." That's when the tent flap flapped open. Callie turned her head, and the private looked up. Both watched as an older Marine wearing a crucifix around his neck, and a small bible in his right hand walked in.

Dr. Mattocks was right behind him, leading the way to the Marine lying on the metal table. The dead Marine.

Callie and the private were hushed. The Marine/priest started to hum prayers. He was aware of the doctor and private beside him, but in prayer nothing else matters except for the person being prayed upon and the person praying.

Callie's heart dropped. Her eyes were cold, and she found herself leaning in toward the private on the other medical table. She never saw a man praying over another man's corpse. The prayers he said. The soft whisper of voice. The gentle touch of the swinging crucifix over the dead Marine's face. Callie closed her eyes, drawing nearer to the Marine at her side. She wanted to hide behind him.

The private watched the Marine pray. It was calm, serene. Nothing like what was happening outside the Marine base, and everywhere else in the world. Praying was the only thing that could bring peace and hope to the ones trying to survive, or praying to die. The young private prayed to God in his thoughts that no one would ever have to pray over him. Not now. Not ever.

Once the priest finished, he slid the sheet off the corpse's head, and kissed his forehead. He re-covered the body, and walked out of the tent without exchanging eye contact with the doctor or private.

Dr. Mattocks left with the Marine, but quickly returned. "Doctor, are you finished here?"

Callie looked at the private. He looked at her. "Just about."

Dr. Mattocks' eyes were tired. He looked like he aged a hundred years. "Finish." And he left.

Callie turned around in her stool and faced the private again. "Tell me I won't have to see that again. I don't think I could bear it."

The private closed his eyes. "We all see things in life we don't want to. There's nothing we can do about it."

Callie tried to show a smile, but could not. She ripped off a piece of white bandage on the table at the rear of the private. She wrapped it around his arm, his stitches, and used her teeth to tear it off from the roll.

The private tried to look into her eyes, but she never titled her head up to look at him.

"All finished." She stood, and walked to a closet in the corner of the tent. She opened it, assuming there were either old clothes, or supplies in it. What she found was a shirt, a craggy one. She pulled it out and handed it to the private. "You can go now. We'll need this tent as quickly as possible." The doctor slumped, tired suddenly. She had no reason to be. She hadn't work as hard as most of the doctors who have been there for a long time. All hours of day.

The private buttoned the cotton white shirt. He fixed the sleeves, and rotated his head around every direction he could to have the young doctor in the corner of his eye. There was just something about her. Something he wouldn't naturally be attracted to. He didn't know her at all either, but a spark flew, and he suddenly snapped into fantasy and fell in love. Not even a name he knew, but he was in love.

From outside of the tent entrance, Callie heard Dr. Mattocks' voice.

"Doctor? Make sure you get down the name of the Marine you have in your custody. Jot it down to let General Curran and Master Sergeant Apone know the Marine is stabilized and strong enough to go back out there. Let them know immediately. I will assign you a nurse who will be your aide." A pause. "Don't disappoint me, Dr. Callie."

Callie. The young private smiled, but quickly got rid of it when the doctor turned around.

"Your last name is Callie? What's your first?" the private took a seat on the table again.

Callie's eyes swept over him. He carried a smirk with his beautiful, clean-shaven face. She wasn't sure if she should acknowledge his question or not. She was a doctor, he a Marine. Too close can mean big trouble. But as she looked directly into the private's eyes, how could she not become close to a man like he?

"Jody."

The private half smiled. He put a hand on the tender cut on his arm, outlining the stitches with his right index finger through the thin cotton.

"It's a good stitch." He flexed his arm, trying not to rip the new stitches. "Dr. Mattocks said you had to get my name." He paused, and watched Callie's chest rise in and out. "Ask me."

The doctor glanced at her dirty hands. Blood blemished her fingertips from the poor Marine's cut. She was evasive, unwilling to ask him. She didn't want him to leave, but on the other hand, he had to go back and fight. There was nothing else wrong with him. He was perfectly fine. At least from the outside.

"Can I have your name, private?"

The young man stood up, wanting to step as close to her as possible. He could see the fear within her. War was not her taste, so why was she there? She should be out of the war, off the Marine Base, and living a normal, healthy life. She was so beautiful, very attractive. Why was she surrounding herself with ugly people? Dying men and women? Why?

"It won't be private for long," the Marine stated.

Callie looked at him, deep into the cloudy depths of his eyes. "Either way, I must have a name."

"Hicks."

Callie dropped eye contact and jotted down the name. "Is there something else that goes with 'Hicks'?"

"Yes," the private, known as Hicks now, said. "Corporal Dwayne Hicks. USCM - 527 19 5251." The known corporal walked toward the fearful, young doctor. "I'm also nineteen." He whispered. "Write that down in your notes." His demand caused her knees to go weak. He made his way toward the tent entrance. "If I don't know you, you won't know me. You have my medical file. Find out about me, then come find me." His voice purred into her ears. He acted like an old soldier, trying to find some peace in the world. When he looked at her for the first time, he found his peace. He found his peace.

The corporal left the tent, leaving the young doctor behind.

---

Present...

His peace, huh? Callie slowly turned in circles, smacking her clipboard against her thighs. The locker room still remained empty. Not a soul in sight. She blinked, and started to walk down the metal corridor slowly.

Peace, huh?

It was like the air was warm, but the breath was freezing. His breath was ice cold. His eyes were like liquid, transforming into cat eyes. Double cat eyes. He was incredibly famous amongst the marines, especially to young Hudson.

"Bishop? Do the thing with the eyes again. That was fucking awesome! Come on," Hudson urged the android. Bishop was his name, and being an android was his game. His only game. He could never die. Only stop working. If something disastrously did happen it would be as if he were dead, but still an operating machine.

Executive Officer Bishop checked readouts and adjusted controls before the comtech interrupted him. An alarm sounded throughout the length of the massive military transport. Hudson must have pressed something messing around the switchboard.

The android turned to meet his eyes. "Not now, Hudson," he solemnly said. It was his attitude that quieted the comtech. Bishop couldn't readout humans' true emotions, so he tried to repeat every expression they shaped.

The long dormant machinery, powered down to conserve energy, came back to life when the dropship came to life within the Sulaco. Bishop sat up, pressing control buttons and working the switchboard. He set about the business of placing Sulaco in a low geo-stationary orbit around the colony world of Acheron. He prepared the ship, played with his fingers, and stationed his anti- human body on a stool to begin loading weapons and supplies.

Sergeant Apone walked past the android, looking over his shoulder at the complicated switchboard.

"Everything okay, Bishop?"

"Everything looks okay to me." He sat up further, turned his head, and looked into the Sergeant's eyes. His pupils malformed into two separate black holes. Bishop looked like a squid. His inner synthetic was coming out through his eyes. Apone shuddered.

"Damnit, Bishop. Don't pull that shit on me," he growled. But his growl was somewhat relaxing. He didn't care if Bishop was acting like himself. As long as he got the job done, worked hard, and stayed the hell out of his way. Things were going to look good.

Hudson bumped into Apone's shoulder nearly knocking him straight into the many buttons on the switchboard. "You see that, Sarg? That was fucking great." He could barely control his laughter.

"Knock it off, Hudson!" Apone screeched and shoved the comtech away from him. "Find me Hicks."

---

The dormitory was murky as night and it was not quite nightfall outside the complex. Everything marines did was sinister, and inexplicable. Everything doctors saved were brutal and horrific.

Nurse Adam opened his locker. A heavy gust of wind blew from outside the doctors' headquarters' main doors, slamming his locker shut. He cursed under his breath, and threw open his locker again. He grabbed for his black comb and brushed his blond hair. A crash caused him to jump, coming again from outside the doors. He slipped on another shirt and turned his head to see what he heard. He slightly opened the doors, and peeked his head in. He found Callie peering over a glowing microscope.

She was beautiful, he thought. Beautiful eyes. Beautiful skin. Beautiful smile. It had been a while since they worked on anything together. For some reason, she wanted him to be with her while they prepped for the Space Marines on their next, high-qualified mission.

Though, he sees her everyday, it was their first real contact for so long. She looked much older these days. Weak. Tired. Drained. She had lines around her eyes and her hair was longer than usual. The style didn't really suit her. It covered too much of her beautiful face, but it didn't matter much since she mostly wore it pinned back behind her ears, or in a secured tight bun.

He stood before the entrance, staring at her right outside the door. He wished she were alongside him, telling him her thoughts and why she had been acting the way she has. What was the reason for it? Why the sad face all the time? Why all of a sudden?

He walked away from the door, and back to his locker. He grabbed his jean jacket, and slid his wallet in his back pocket. He reached into the locker and pulled out a green ball cap and put it on top of his head. He shut the door of the locker and it caused the locker beside his to open.

A photograph album dropped out from the top shelf.

Last month Callie had brought a photograph album to the hospital. She had been trying to distract herself with it, and when Adam came in, she would quickly hide it.

Adam kneed on the floor and collected the fallen album. He opened it with care seeing as it was old, torn, and faded. Callie and a man on a beach somewhere. Callie and two men on an icy shoreline. Callie and three men, and another woman at some bar. Callie and the man kissing.

Many pictures full of happy memories. He looked at the bottom of the album, and found a date on the first picture. "November 17, 2174," he whispered, gently rubbing his thumb over the date. The writing was faint as if the pen was running out.

He turned the page, recognizing the man appearing in just about every picture with Callie. It was Corporal Hicks...

---

The doctor's memory was clear, and she remembered every moment she ever had with the corporal. He took her breath away. Every night she would toss and turn, knowing Hicks was just down the row of bedrooms from her. He would never come and see her, never stop by to say hello. Nothing. It bothered the hell out of her, and she wanted to know why.

As she made her way into the Marine Base to find Master Sergeant Apone, her heart rapidly took its course, pounding through her chest.

"Hey doc," Hudson smiled, making his rounds with Spunkmeyer in the power loader. She nodded and passed every Marine on her way to the Sergeant.

"Did you check stage three inserts yet?" a stressful Apone asked his marine standing next to him.

"Yeah," Hicks murmured, looking over technical papers with him.

"Let me see it." Apone said to the corporal, taking the clipboard from his hands. Callie's black high-heeled shoes clicked on the metal platform as she walked toward Apone. She spotted Hicks, standing beside him, calm and almost satisfied.

"Hello," she looked directly into the Sergeant's eyes.

Hicks wanted to draw back away from the doctor's comforting welcome.

"Doc - hey," Apone acknowledged. Callie looked at Hicks, and he quickly turned his head. It was quiet. "Is there something I can do for you?"

Callie looked at her hands. She seemed to be struggling with her emotions. Finally she raised her head. "Yes, there is actually. I need you to sign off on the medical examines. Everything ran smoothly. No critical injures. No diseases of any kind. Nothing."

Apone chuckled, "You might want to check Hudson's file again before you wrap up, doc."

Callie caught the joke. "No, Hudson turned out fine. It would be a pretty bad position to be in if something were wrong." She handed her clipboard to him. Apone chewed on his cigar, examining the final medical form. He nodded a couple of times, making sure he wasn't signing over his soul. He made his signature, and handed the paper back to her. "Anything else?"

She shook her head, then glanced at the corporal. She gave a hesitant smile. Hicks quietly moved to the other side of Apone. He didn't bother to look her way. He much less did nothing.

"Well," she stuck out her hand to Apone. "I wish you all a safe journey, and good luck with the colony."

He took her hand. "Thank you." Was all he wrote. He looked at Hicks himself, and nothing came out of the sedate corporal. "Don't let the bugs crawl in your wide open chops, Hicks." He joked to his quietness.

She wanted to grab him and make him talk to her, but she strained from doing so again. She had to stay confident and in control over her feelings. She couldn't allow herself to let go and free her inner emotions in front of the crew. She just couldn't. "Goodbye," was all she said as her voice trailed off, along with her initial of excitement. As she turned on her heel, she didn't have to hear, but she did.

Apone looked at Hicks. "Don't start," the corporal mumbled.

Callie noticed the noise Hudson and Drake caused in the lead, and she bypassed them without looking on into the shadows of the corridor connecting to the Space Marine Memorial Hospital.

"Doc, where you going?" Hudson hollered. She ignored him. "Doc?"

With miserable eyes, and a guilty conscience, she turned around, gave him a closed smile, putting up a hand to wave goodbye. The comtech eased his wide grin into a grave stare and watched as the doctor pressed a button the size of a fist on the exterior of the machine level. A massive, thick elevator door shut the opening.

The door was sound proof, and she heard nothing but the calm whisper of the air conditioner behind her. She leaned her forehead against the smooth metal. Her eyes closed with teary eyes. She thought of all the romantic things Hicks did for her. Thinking how much she missed talking to him. Remembering their first date - first kiss - first meeting - love at first sight - her first stitch...first time making love. Everything she looked at reminded her of the marine she fell in love with. And now everything she knew was gone.

She kissed the metal door, and walked away.

---

It had been three hours, or longer. The day dreaded too long for Callie's taste anymore. The number of surgeries she performed that day. The numerous times she had been paged. The guts and spilt blood became overwhelming and more than she could take.

The marines' faces - their wrinkled, crunched faces - gritted teeth. And as the doctor takes their hands when she knows she cannot do anything else, she tries with great strength to ease the pain. She squeezes the marine's hands - closes her eyes - and waits until his grip weakens and lets go.

Many days were like that.

At last she was making her rounds at midnight. The usual hour for her to do her last duties before morning was ten o'clock. Things were too chaotic; she didn't have time for anything else except work, checking medical records, and recently keeping an eagle's eye on the special armed Space Marines preparing to hit the airwave in less than fifteen hours.

She passed door-by-door, block-by-block. She walked along the hospital bedroom quarters, checking on patients. Most were sound asleep snoring into the cool night air, and others were just preparing for restless slumbers.

She came across the last room, poking her head inside. "Commander Marken? Lights out," she said walking inside. It was no bigger than a child's bedroom with a heart monitor connected to the chest of the patient - a nightstand, a cot that barely passed as a bed, two burgundy visitor's chairs, and a spacious bathroom with a stand up shower, toilet, and sink.

In his late seventies, the retired commander rested in bed with two pillows behind his propped up torso.

"How's the heart?" Callie studied the heart monitor after giving him her warmest smile. "Doing well?" she tried to stay as calm as possible.

"I'm fine." He coughed, easing pressure off his chest. "I still can't figure how I had the heart attack." He put his right hand over his heart. "I've had pain go through me faster in combat."

"Tell me exactly what happened."

"Well, I was working in the garden, picking my tomatoes." He glanced at the doctor with a smile. "I love tomatoes." She smiled back, but with less enthusiasm as she listened to the commander. "Then what happened next was... well..." he slapped the back of his bald head. "Well, I can't remember what happened, but I opened my eyes and saw a pair of brown eyes staring down at me, asking if I was all right." Marken remembered the beautiful doctor. "I thought I died and gone to heaven because there was an angel smiling at me."

Callie shook her head. "You need to stop watching soap operas. It was just me."

"I need to catch up on what is happening in my world."

"Not by watching soap operas you won't. It's about fake love with fake people, who try to act, but they can't because they're fake." She left the monitor, and checked the ivy in his right hand. "Do you need another shot?"

"No. Let's wait till morning." He tossed the newspaper on the nightstand.

The early evening came to a close a few short hours ago, and the dark skies fell into later evening as the moon shined through the blinds from the facade of the room.

"Time to take your sleeping pills," she spoke dryly.

"Wouldn't you like to see if I could sleep on my own without the pills? I've been doing it for nearly eighty years."

Callie moved the pills around in her palm. "I would take 'em for you. I wouldn't mind a goodnight sleep, but I'd probably get my licenses taken away if anyone found out."

"You're the doctor. Prescribe yourself a bottle."

She thought about it, but quickly did away with the idea. She looked at the older man, drained. Her body slumped. Her eyes were heavy. And to ease ache from her feet, she took a seat on the edge of the bed, and fixed his pillows to play off she wasn't tired. Marken layed his head back, and gazed at the shadow of his baldhead reflecting off the wall in front of him.

"Is that better?" she asked after adjusting his pillows. He nodded and crossed his wrinkled fingers on top of his chest while she poured a glass of water from his left over dinner tray. She was half pleased to find the cold, six-hour tray of food still in the commander's room. "I'll have to speak to the nurse in charge of tray pick up. It's unnecessary for the dinner tray to stay here this late." She handed Marken the pills, "Here."

"I hate taking these damn pills. I don't know why you bother giving them to me now at this hour. The damn nurse will just wake me up to give me two more."

"You need your rest," she spoke as a matter of fact.

"I'm already asleep getting my rest. The nurse will be the one disturbing me to give me more sleeping pills."

"Give it up, commander. It's one of the many rules of being involved with medicine. We're just trying to keep you healthy." She tried to stay relaxed like the commander snuggled in his bed, but the memory of three hours ago with the corporal haunt her.

The dimness of the lamp on Marken's nightstand shimmered on her fair complexion. There was something about her that struck the retired commander. She was quiet, yet confident. Knew her duties as a doctor and earned the name, but beneath the doctor's uniform and truth behind her beauty, she never felt more alone.

"Doc, you're not speaking in your usual confident voice."

She looked up, "I'm fine. Just thinking is all." She reached for her clipboard leaning against the heart monitor to erase her thoughts. "Medicine? Check," she thought aloud. "Bed warm?"

"Yes."

"Check." She went down the daily list, and scribbled her initials at the bottom. She set her clipboard down again, and looked at the commander. "Looks like you won't be needing my services anymore tonight." She checked the time on her wristwatch. "Those sleeping pills should be kicking in pretty soon." She touched his folded hands on his chest. "Goodnight. I'll see you in the morning."

As she was standing, a voice bellowed WAIT. A tired arm reached out to grab the doctor's arm before she was weightless off the bed. Callie looked at the wrinkled, battle scarred hand attached to her arm.

"Sit back down," Marken ordered. She turned her head toward the open, bedroom door. The corridor was black as night with the exception of the lights above each room. She did as she was told when she knew he wouldn't allow her to leave yet.

"I see you, Jody," he whispered, watching the doctor. "I can see right through you." He released her arm once she settled on the rim of the bed.

Confused, she narrowed her eyebrows. "What-?"

He put his hand up to silence the doctor. He did not want her to speak a word - the same way she had treated Hudson earlier. "If you keep going the way you're going, will you be happy five years from now? To have done and ignored the one you want even if he didn't feel the same?" She watched him. He asked a question, and she didn't know how to respond.

He smiled - it was just how he wanted it. She understood - he could see it in her eyes. There was no need for her to react back to him, or for him to explain thoroughly. But how could he possible know how she was feeling, or what she was thinking without saying a word.

"You've been in love, and you're still in love. Are there concrete, practical obstacles in your way to get to him back, or are you sabotaging yourself?" Silence stung her wide-open eyes, and she allowed it. He continued, "Word from the wise, kiddo, when you feel secure, you better damn take risks." He rubbed his eyes, then smiled. "I use to be a great commander. I have medals to prove it, so listen." From the way he slurred his last chain of words, she could tell the pills were taking its coarse - but that didn't stop him from continuing.

"When anyone is under pressure, we close up and go back to old ways of behaving." He swallowed, taking in the sweet innocence of the doctor before him. "Go to him, or forget him, but never stop loving him." He layed his head on the pillow, still keeping his eyes locked on her. He was falling in and out of weariness from the dosage of the sleeping pills. He was talking sane, making sense - for the most part anyway, then what came out next made her smile.

"Have you ever taken a hot-air balloon ride? Have you ever lived on an island? How about watch a baby being born?" he paused, "I've watched a baby being born." He pulled out a folded eight by ten photograph from inside his sleepers. "My son." He handed the photo to the doctor. "My only son. He died shortly after he was born. SIDS they called it. I buried him in Red Creek Cemetery in Red Rock, Oklahoma."

Callie touched the picture gently, tried not to wrinkle it. The baby in the photo had a huge smile on his face. Bright blue eyes, and not one speck of hair on his head. He was beautiful.

"You should never camouflage your pain, Callie girl." He took the picture from her. "Life's too short."

It was if Marken knew her heart. The past she spent with Hicks. The ocean of tears she had cried over him. The countless hours she wasted waiting for him to come back.

Marken closed his eyes with a slight grin. "Callie, you are a beautiful woman. This corporal is some kind of character if he can't see what everyone else sees - but I must not know him like you do," paused again with a lift of his eyebrows. "Just go to him with a confident walk, and raised eyebrows, and feel alive through your body." He stopped talking, and the doctor watched him breathing heavily through his nostrils. His chest rose, then fell. Rose again, then collapsed. Then another chest rise, and another fall.

His words struck like lightning. He was right. The commander was usually right about everything. He used his words on her as if her conscious was talking right through him. Everything she needed to know, but didn't expect, she heard from him.

She looked around the room and listened to the commander's soft breathing. She lifted her numb body off the bed, and quietly slipped out of the room.

Just as she was leaving, she heard the commander's voice again. "One more thing?"

She turned her heel. "Yes?"

"Would you tell the nurse on duty to leave me alone tonight? No more sleeping pills."

She cracked a smile, "I'll have to shake some cobwebs to straighten it out." Without an answer from the drowsy commander, she left.

---

The hallway was fanatical, yet composed in many ways. The Space Marines were in the kitchen supply room eating food and celebrating before take off. Every doctor could hear them. The Space Marine Memorial Hospital was just a few tentacles away from the actual base where the marines prepared, yelled, and carried on like a bunch of hooligans. It didn't matter, and they didn't care.

Most of the doctors were on leave, or called on. Night shifts were hell, like most of Callie's work, and she loved nothing more to work alone than most. Her office was shoved in the corner of a corridor, just a few feet away from the kitchen where her friends were.

She looked through folders in detail on her patients. She paced around the room, trying to concentrate but the noise caused by the marines was unbeatable for the brain. She closed the folders, looked around the room, and then put her attention back on them, the elevator doors opened behind her. She glanced up, and four men walked in trolling stacks of white stone. The men didn't notice the doctor.

They were mumbling amongst themselves in the darkness of the corridor. Callie dropped her gaze from the men to the stones. They were huge like boulders, and appeared heavy like cement blocks. She knew right away what they were, but she couldn't convince her eyes.

Gravestones.

She felt her heart skip and as the men walked from one side to the other, she never let her stare drop from the stones - the haunting stones.

She turned on the sink in the corner of the room for a glass of relieving coldness to her throat. The water splashed and caught on her blouse. She glanced down, and a bloodstain marked its territory on her lower abdomen. It was easier to change to clean clothes than to try to scrub out the stain. It'd be pointless.

"Hey, where's Hicks?" she heard a voice call out.

Another voice answered, "I think he's in the showers."

Callie leaned her body to look at the Space Marines in the kitchen. She saw Hudson, chugging down a beer, and Vasquez and Drake wrestling. The other marines were scattered all over the place, trying to relax.

She paced herself. Should she pay Hicks a little visit in the showers? She didn't have time to think twice about her question. He was alone, and if she wanted it, if she wanted it so badly to look at him dead in the eye, and ask him to take her, nothing could stop her. It was a chance to make it right again. If it were only that easy.

She was afraid of the man she fell in love with. Why, she asked herself time after time, but what she found in the back of her head, she didn't like. And for that, she has been waiting for the right answer from her heart.

He was overwhelming, she remembered after he left the tent when she stitched him up. Unique with a quiet soul. So, this is what love looks like: light brown hair, rain colored eyes, muscular build, and warm skin.

As she neared the opening of the fourteen shower stalls, she graced her fingertips along the glass. The steam evaporated from her touch, and her heart quickened with every step. She heard only one shower running, and pictured in her head Hicks's wet hair as he ran his fingers through it. Hot water spilling down every curve on his back, dripping to his legs. His entire body soaking wet with soap. Just with the mental image, the doctor had to bite her bottom lip hard. Her knees weakened, her feet ached, and her tongue burned for the taste of his lips.

But what was she thinking? Even the most exotic fantasies about the marine on the other side of the wall, Callie cried inside with torment. Torment. Torment he gave to her two years ago when he left. She was torn between what she knew and what she wished never happened.

She touched the collar of her uniform, stroking her moist neck from the steam. She walked in beauty, like the night of cloudless dimes and starry skies. The closer she came to stepping in amongst the showers, the more steam heat blew in her face. She sauntered leisurely around the corner, feeling like a little girl sneaking up on someone for a laugh, only to have her breath taken away for the first time in a long time.

The corporal stood as naked as the day he was born. She looked upon his back view, wanting to grab him right then. She strained herself from doing so. Everything she pictured inside her head was true.

As she inched her body around the corner further, she wondered who had gained the most, and who lost the most in their years together. She wanted to reach out for him, but as she stood near the opening, she knew that wasn't possible without a fight first. Some talk, or maybe some laughs.

Callie didn't want to get too close to him yet when they haven't spoke to each other for two years, only when they were amongst other marines and doctors. What shattered her heart into pieces was he was stationed in the same complex as she, and he did not bother once to check on her, or stop by to say hello. But what was worse, she couldn't do the same either. She was such a hypocrite.

She leaned her head against the tile, admiring Hicks scrubbing his body. She wanted to touch, smell, taste, and hear every sound he made. She was waiting to exhale and scream - FINALLY! Finally he will allow her into his arms. Finally he will kiss her. Finally he will love her.

But finally hasn't happened yet, and she was without a reason to scream it.

He was a quiet man, and she loved him for that. He never hesitated when it came down to her feelings, but an emotional pain tugged on her heart that hung like a loose tooth when she thought about their last confrontation.

"Hicks?" her voice escaped her. Something inside of her body was tired of the belly aching of her depressed soul, and cried out his name to get it over with.

The composed corporal turned around, not expecting to find anyone else in the stalls. Callie opened her eyes wide when he fully turned around, revealing his entire frontage. She couldn't help but laugh like a schoolgirl. Her mouth hung open, and a short gasp escaped her lips. She wanted to step closer to him to get a better viewpoint, but she found herself locked by the opening. He didn't bother to cover up. He just turned his back on her as if she never said a word.

She lowered her shoulders after taking a breath. She found him quite beautiful. His lean body was as muscular as those of the sculptured male figures. A statue was one thing, a well-sculptured man was quite another.

Feelings deep inside her stomach ached for her to continue, and somehow her voice didn't hold back - having enough courage.

"Help me out with this." She whispered, taking as many steps as her legs would take her. "You've been away from me as long as I've been from you." The hot water splashed in her face as she neared him. "I'm here right now - behind you - because I want to know why you've been keeping me in the dark."

He rinsed the soap from his hair as he leaned his head back in the steaming water, his eyes closed. The soapsuds ran over his shoulders, and down his chest. He lathered the cloth in his hands and washed his elbows, then his lower abdomen.

Once she neared him for reaching distance, she touched his bare back. His eyes snapped open.

"The tears I've cried," she said quietly. "The long nights I've waited. The cold bed I've slept in by myself." She took a short breath. "The ignorance you gave whenever we passed each other in the halls. As if I was never in your sight." She pulled away from his back, and listened to his light breathing. "You hide behind yourself to feel comforted, but you've forgotten who use to comfort you, hold you, make you laugh, make you take it, and make you think you can take anything." She paused, taking in the battle scars on his back. "Hicks, I forgave you the moment you left on the eve of our wedding- I forgave you."

He tilted his head up to let the water soak his face again. He was fully aware of his past with the doctor, but things weren't the same.

"Remember that night?" her voice was innocent. "I was so happy we were getting married with Elvis in Las Vegas, but you were acting different the entire time we were out with Frost, Hudson, and Crowe the night before. You had something on your mind. But you didn't think to mention it to me until that night - later that night." The hot water soaked her shoes. "I was kicking and screaming - you were calm - just like now."

He spared a moment to glance up, and behind him.

"You left to fight somebody else's war, and you left me like it was nothing." She lowered her head with a sigh. "Like oh well- no big deal. She'll get over it." She reached out a trembling hand to trace the muscles in his back. "Then you told Frost it was over. And he told me the truth." She laughed, feeling the heat of a blush rise in her face to his stillness. "You know what I think, Hicks? I think it would be so much easier if you used words. I want to know all the things that happened when we weren't together. I'm really, really interested. But we need words for that, don't you think?"

He kept quiet, tried to hide his weakness by the guilt and her feather-light touch that burned worse than any brand. He tried to hide it, tried to pull together that wall that life had built around him. And all in the while he was thinking about getting away from her - getting out of the shower, towel around waist, and fall into a deep sleep. The doctor he loved was standing behind him, and he was afraid to talk.

Not afraid, really, he just didn't want to have to say goodbye to her again and see the tears in her eyes before being whisked away into hypersleep.

"Leave me alone." A feeble answer on his part, and he regretted it. Walls crumbled to dust. Willpower barely survived.

Ignoring him, "I was right, wasn't I?" before she spoke, she found the scar on his arm she stitched six years ago when they first met. "I told you it would leave a scar." She skimmed the scar with gentle fingers. "My first stitch."

The corporal felt the fabric of her uniform against his back, and tried to ignore her, tried to brush her off, tried to banish the haunting image of her pleading eyes. He tried to keep his ears from having to hear her tears, tried to...

She kissed him.

She touched the water falling down his spine, as she soothingly gave him butterfly kisses. Her lips were silk on stone, clumsy, innocent, and desperate, filled with more truth than any spoken word. She stripped the doctor's rules, stripped her confident role as chief doctor, and allowed her lips to run free down his clean back. She motioned forward to become even closer than before. The hot water caught her uniform as she stepped further under the water with him. He remained with his back to her as the water drained her make-up. Her lips never left his back as she reached for his hand - taking it in her own. It was slow. She was moving slow, and trembling as she took each step further.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Hicks began to lose care. And then there was only Callie and only the taste of her grasps in her mouth - only the dim lighting on her face.

She moved toward his shoulder with breaths between kisses. Water continued to pound hard on her head as they shared the hot water. The higher she kissed up his shoulder - the tenser he became. He tilted his head up, tried to resist not kissing back, but resisting was much harder than he thought. She was there, behind him, ready for action.

Fantasy became reality. The urge was too much. The world he left behind was too much. And the woman standing behind him knew him, and he knew she wanted him with every breath he took. It was only a matter of which one would make the initiated, sexual move.

With all his strength in his jaw and legs, he turned to face her. The searing water rained down on her face, and her bottom jaw hung open from the heat. Water dripped from their connected hands, and Callie wanted him to kiss her with all the sadness in his heart.

He barely opened his eyes as he watched her in the dim light. The water bounced off his face onto hers, and he knew she was nervous. Nervous about touching him, holding him, and having him again. She looked down at the buttons on her doctor uniform and slowly began to unbutton from the top. He watched as her fingers inched down from one to another. He didn't hesitate when she was moving slow for him to take his long fingers to action and begin at the bottom.

In the middle of her uniform, their hands met. She moved her hands on top of his as he unbuttoned the last button. She stared into the corporal's eyes and waited until she had a firm grip on the material under her arms. Once she had her grip she pulled on the uniform - pushing away from her shoulders, and the entire outfit came off in one smooth pull. It fell to her waist, down her legs, and wrinkled to the shower tiles. After the rest of her clothes were off, high heels and pantyhose included, she blinked suddenly in realization that they were both naked.

He felt a slight tremor racing through her, and he drew her close with his hand wrapped around the back of her neck, feeling the rapid pulse beneath his touch. She smiled faintly as his rough hands touched her for the first time. His hand gripped around her neck with hesitation. He opened his eyes more, tried to stare into hers, but they were closed, waiting for his kiss.

Everything he wished for, and everything he regretted was about to come true. He tried so hard in the past to pull away from the only woman he loved to fight his battles, and go forth with victory. But still, no matter what he did, she was always in his thoughts. His thoughts were all he had to do. No more pride, and no more pain.

He felt the ground for the first time, and stroked her cheekbone before immerging into their first tentative kiss. Tongues probing gently, tasting each other - their fear fading until they were plunging freely in joint possession - tongues entwining - mouths sucking deep and hard. She wrapped her arms around his neck, tried to deepen the kiss further - then slid her hands down to his shoulders, then his arms, feeling the water sprinkle down his back.

In a smooth motion, she tilted her head back, allowing the water to rain upon her face, and for him to have a better access to her creamy neck and chest. He gave a soft gasp before burying his face against the nape of her neck. She gave her own gasp as she felt his open, wet kisses travel before his mouth latched onto the soft flesh at the base of her throat. He couldn't stop breathing hard. The water, and the tingling in the pit of his stomach were too much to stand. He opened his mouth wide as the water suddenly became boiling hot. His hair flattened, and caught in his eyes as he tried to look at her curvature body.

Almost as one being, Hicks bumped into the shower bench, falling upon it. She covered him, then shifted her body and wrapped her knees around his hips. She nuzzled against his clean-shaven face before sucking on his ear lobe. She heard his deep moan as she breathed into the small shell of his ear.

She pulled away to stare into his eyes before kissing him again. He lifted her up by the waist, and she laughed from the strength of his force. She sat up high, and turned the nozzle of the closest showerhead on. The fresh, hot water splashed on their naked bodies. She lowered her head and found his salty lips again. She grabbed his face, and kissed him with all the potency she could muster in her tiny build.

He took her breasts in his hands, squeezing benevolently. The pale ivory of her arms seemed vulnerable against his own flesh as her splayed hands snaked around his waist, one trailing across his six-pack, and the other smoothing upwards along the ribcage.

She raised her head, their eyes meeting and holding, promises of pleasure flowing between them as any remaining fear seeped away. She licked his lips, savoring his taste with every breath apart. The kiss became too much for either to handle, and Hicks takes charge quickly.

Raindrops sprinkled outside his window. The moonlight was perfect, glistening off her face as he layed her in his bed softer than a baby's kiss, breathless and insane, still locked in her arms. With a hand resting on her breast, he mingled his legs with hers, falling into her body. It took a moment for both to relax and become aware of their surroundings. They breathed together. Mouths wide open, ready to take on the world. Ready to take on the other.

She looked into his tranquil eyes, and smiled when lust of wanting rose in her throat. The dog chains around his neck clanked to her chest, sending fresh waves of pleasure fluttering in her stomach. As the cold silvers snaked her neck, she grasped the chains in her hand. She pulled tight. Tighter than she thought, and it brought his face closer to hers. That's what she wanted.

He still held her breast, as she tugged the wet towel wrapped around his waist. With infinite care, the corporal didn't pull away or stop her from doing so. He had no emotion in his face, but she knew what he was feeling, and how the whole thing made him feel. He put his hand around the back of her neck again and squeezed as he instigated the first thrust.

She closed her eyes and kept them closed as he studied every wince of her face. He must have known how uncomfortable the sensation of being filled was, the burn of the stretched muscle sending jags of pain radiating outwards. He strained to stop from burying himself deeper into the beautiful body, waiting for a sign that the pain was easing. At last, it came with a soft sigh as her muscle gave a little.

Second thrust.

She bucked beneath him, a quiet gasp of bliss and pain filling the air. Hicks wanted it to feel good for her, wanted her to feel the pleasure that came from willingly gaining control over another.

The corporal leaned his lips into hers - not kissing, but thrusting together. Her body clenched tight around him as his manhood brushed across her thighs. Their mouths hung open with more pleasure than either could take. He timed his thrusts to the pounding of the rain outside the window, slamming hard into her receptive body, his own cries of passion spiraling as the warmth spread from his gut to his thighs, and he put his hand on the mattress for more support with every push he made.

She sucked in her stomach. She gave a little cry when he could no longer hold back and plunged into her, then again, and again, holding himself in check, giving her time to adjust once more. Her back arched as she gasped and cried his name, biting his shoulder in the throws of her passion. His climax began to strengthen at that same moment. She wrapped her legs around him, accepting the pounding strokes of his manhood within her folds. She heard him cry out in completion.

She wanted to feel his muscles quiver, to feel the heat pumping out his pours. And to know, deep inside, that she had caused it.

Hard thrusts - whimpers - body closer than ever - feeling him deep within her. She raised her eyebrows with eyes closed. He moved down, kissing her neck - her eyes snap open - then close. Then open, then close with every thrust. Quick - yet slow pulling out - his body rubbing against hers. Every thrust burning. He sucked on her neck, sliding his tongue over the hollow of her throat. She bites his shoulder, knowing she would leave bit marks. She pulled on him while he tugged - pulling her tighter. He moved his hand in her wet, tangled hair as he thrust harder.

She lifted her arm and gripped the metal bed frame, but her sweaty palm and fingers slipped down, making a squeak.

Face to face again - thrusting harder. A throaty cry, a bite of nails on his back, a lightning surge of his hips. Breathing - mouths hung open. She tried to kiss him, but the rhythm of his body was too quick for her to grasp his lips. His body shifted and pushed harder - cringing his face. He graced her lips, and gripped his hands on her shoulders. She ran her tongue over her top lip, holding his hips, squeezing his ass, and gritting her teeth. His mouth came back over hers. He began to kiss her, moving slowly down her beautiful body. She did her best to relax as his hands and lips explored her body, bringing her senses to life. It made her tingle and caused a flush of warm moisture in her most private parts.

Hicks thumbed her inner thighs with his hands. It drove her crazy - her weak spot. A bubble of laughter rose within the corporal. The chuckle sent new warmth flooding through him. They laughed because the sensation was taking over their bodies. He couldn't remember the last time he laughed.

She moaned his name softly, over and over like a mantra, finally crying out as her pleasure overtook her. Liquid heat filled her, spilling over to flow like lava through her veins, sending her escalating into ecstasy at his eager touch.

In one heart-felt moment, they shared one mind, one body, and soul. He grabbed her hand from behind and squeezed with all his might to point of trembling uncontrollably. He kissed her deeply, slowly, and felt her respond to him. She laughed when he clamped his hands on hers and yanked her arms over her head. There was something very special about her hands. Something sensual, warm and safe and beautiful. The corporal ran his fingers along her palm, her fingertips, and her wrists. He knew the back of her hand like the back of his hand.

She let his hands trace the shape of her body, naked beneath the light material sheets around her, and he heard her gasp. He moved his hand down the length of her thigh, as she latched onto his back like a pit bull, scraping her teeth over his shoulder. She cried out as he thrust into her further, watching as he arched upright to the edge of pain. Then he would withdraw almost all the way out before dipping back inside.

His fingers tensed, and numbly ran them through her hair again, cupped the back of her head, and squeezed a fist full of her hair. She hiked her legs up. He was nearly on his knees, rocking her body with quick, shallow strokes, and deep penetration as they build toward their third climax.

She kissed his neck when he lingered over her head - up and down. Her senses were filled with the slight pungency of his aftershave, but then her body sang with desire as the underlining musk of manliness and of growing passion assailed her, intermingling with her own scent.

He bit her bottom lip before moving into another frantic kiss. He smiled, still biting her lips - his lungs gasping for air. His semen exploded out as his manhood demanded release inside her. He lay shaken and sated, still buried within her. Her face was his reward as he watched her mounting pleasure, and felt her responding beneath him, her body moving in unison with his. As her back arched he released his seed into her again.

They found each other's lips and kissed, only pulling apart when the need for air became imperative. He drugged himself with her until they both trembled. She could see him in the light that spilled from the window, and her heart leaped at the intensity of his face as he watched her. She ran her fingers in his wet hair as he struggled to breathe steadily. He lowered his head to kiss her mouth softly again, pulling away unhurriedly, his heart flipping over inside his chest.

She murmured inanities as she reached for him again...

Hicks didn't want to think. Thinking under the current circumstances couldn't be productive. It would be much better for him if he kept his mind solid blank and just enjoy the sensation of having a soft, sexy woman lying by his feet.

If he didn't think, he'd be able to not reflect about his mission for another good seven hours. But who knew how long it would be before he leaves again. Nobody really had any power over a mission to be green lit or not. Either an hour ahead of schedule, or an hour late.

The rain had stopped, allowing the cool wind to blow in the compact bedroom quarter. Callie lay, wrapped in a sheet, at the foot of the bed, admiring her view. The corporal rested his back against the bed frame, looking down upon the beautiful doctor. The moonlight still glistened outside, giving the hint morning was about to break, but the air maintained its moistness from the rain, letting the world know the sun wasn't ready to come out and play yet.

"Is that what I've been missing all this time?" Callie rested her temple against the palm of her hand, looking into his eyes.

"You reminded me." He nodded, satiated, tried to explain to himself what just happened.

Calm body, soft voice. They were taking it easy, catching their breath, and coming to realization they couldn't live without each other.

"Did I?" she felt so good. And not just from making love she thought, finding herself locked in his trance. Though that could hardly be discounted. She always felt good, confident, directed when she had a clear, well-defined purpose. Convincing Hicks that they belonged together was crystal clear after the result of her move in the bathing stalls. A move she always dreamt to make.

She had not a clue why she fell in love with him in the first place. She had supposed it was just his warm heart, and quiet soul. She had no desire to worry about the flaws with him. She only knew her heart had gone splat when she least expected it in the middle of a war, hearing men and women dying all around her - of all places. She had to admit also she liked the way he was spooked like she was.

When he finally managed to shift his weight and look at his wristwatch, it was nearly four in the morning, she'd sensed his fear of time running out as she'd sensed his desire to stay.

And when she noticed he was about to speak, but deciding not to, his chest rose then flattened, slightly restless, and she found herself sitting on the side of the bed next to him.

She held his hands and squeezed. "Oh," she spoke with a scratchy voice. "I hate this." She tried to hold back tears, then rested her forehead to his lips. "You're going to leave, and you might not -" She closed her eyes while sharp pains bled through her heart, and she tried to calm the activity in her brain. She needed that. And once the room was quiet enough, she could hear his heart beating. "Just to think you might not -" she couldn't bring herself to say it.

Her head leaned toward his lap, and he tipped her chin up to look at him. "I'm coming back." He paused to take in the soft texture of her skin. "That's my word."

He, in honest truth, had no idea what the mission was, where he was going, and what he had to do. Emotions ran through him, all too hot and fast to decipher. But layered all over that was sheer, sweaty fear. When she studied him with calm patience, the fear began to trickle into his throat.

She wrapped the sheet tighter around her body. A gasp escaped his lips - he tried to speak. He wanted to tell her everything would be okay, but he didn't.

She looked up, and he stayed as calm as the night outside the window. Thinking, possibly? He was. He had that look.

It never really hit her until then that he was leaving on the mission, and he was leaving in less than seven hours. And the thought came to her head that she never wanted to leave his bed with him naked in it. Never wanted to leave, get up, and dress, or continue with her life. What she wanted again she had.

An overwhelming pain struck her body, and tears corrupted the surface of her eyes more. She leaned her head this time against his cheekbone, unable to control her tears. As she moved away from his cheek, she found his lips and kissed him quickly - warmly. Adoring the man before her.

She pulled away before immerging into a further, demanding kiss. Their lips locked forceful, revealing more love in her heart than anything she could say with words. She eased away from his lips - hard at first - and wrapped her arms around his neck for an embracive hug.

His nerves strained and stretched. He felt it hard to speak but he let out a low, raucous voice. "I love you, Jody." She felt him tremble, stressing out his stomach from the shakes. "I love you so much." The embrace was deep as he tried to bury his face in her shoulder, never wanting to let go.

---

The earth was calm. The air was fresh. He worked carefully, tried to stay as synthetic as much as he could rely on. He looked back as he reached the final doors of the hospital, giving a disbelieving grin as he stared around the Space Marine base that had been his home for many years. His hands moved slicker than lightning, his legs operating smooth as he glided down the metal corridor.

Bishop held a clipboard in his hand as he swung it back and forth while walking. He was dressed normally in a navy blue jumpsuit, ready to strip into sleepwear. He checked his wristwatch for the time.

Seven a.m.

He skipped, trying to quicken his pace toward the Sulaco. Time was running out, and he was to prep the cryotubes for comfort and protection. He looked down at his watch again, not realizing he wasn't the only individual on foot in the corridor.

"Hey Bishop?"

The android's gaze came to rest momentarily, catching childish, blue eyes beaming in his face. "Nurse Adam - how are you?" he stopped walking.

Adam shrugged, "Fine. I've heard a lot about this mission. What can you expect will happen?"

Bishop imitated the male nurse by shrugging and repeating his facial expressions. "The dangerous I have ever been apart of. And quite the deadliest." He walked past Adam. "Nothing I want you to be concerned with though. I'll see you in the control room." As Bishop continued with his hike, he left the nurse wordless.

Adam was just a soldier's son, constantly running with the doctor's ever since birth. He - by no means considered himself a marine - just a wimp, and that's what many people took him as. He had a kind-heart, and tried to shield Dr. Callie with anything he didn't want her to hear. Anything.

And this was indeed news he didn't want the doctor to discover. Even though, she was chief of the launch and hypersleep preparation. And without finding the photos in her locker of Corporal Hicks, he would have never of known how hard it would be to stay calm.

The doc was very convincing.

---

The sun hadn't quite risen yet. Callie opened her eyes, feeling the warmth of the male body temperature against her back. The air smelled like summer roses. She snuggled in for a moment. The warm sheets carried the faint scent of her corporal.

But then reality struck her and she knew her duties. She looked at the clock placed on the nightstand beside his bed. She sat up, tried to not stir Hicks awake. She placed her feet on the floor. The carpet felt like icicles compared to the warm bed. She glanced behind her shoulder at the corporal. He was still asleep - looking passive and lacking pain. She turned back around and reached for her underwear and bra on the ground. She didn't remember doing it, but she must have grabbed them before they left the showers to come into his room.

Did anyone see them? That was another agonizing question she came up with. Quickly and quietly, she dressed herself back in her damp uniform. She ran her hands through her tangled hair. She slipped her shoes on and again turned to face the sleeping corporal on his stomach.

He was angelically beautiful. Strong of features and body, with his record showing he had far greater intelligence than the usual grunt. With a better education, or a finer start in life, he could have been an officer.

Callie admired the soft lining of his jaw and cheek and brow. His restless face reminded her of the images of male angels from paintings.

She watched his bare back rise and fall, and his lips parted from exhaling. She smiled and touched his shaven face. She then kissed his shoulder and left the room quiet as a mouse.

She didn't want to leave. Oh, how she never wanted to leave. But she had to. She had to keep doing her job, and stay as hard as she could. As she walked through the main doors of the bedroom quarters, her stomach fluttered with butterflies. She could barely walk. Her knees were still weak. The coast was clear as only a few doctors and nurses were walking about. She looked in both directions before rushing off to her own bedroom suite.

---

Bishop walked among the cryotubes while Nurse Adam stationed himself in the control room prepping the launching switchboard. Drake ambled up to Bishop smoothing down sheets in one of the many cryotubes.

"Hey can you massage my feet why you're at it, Bishop?" he teased with a laugh followed.

Bishop stood up to his full height. "Sure, Drake," sarcastically grinned. He looked at Vasquez and Private Wierzbowski walking out of the elevator doors. "Anything you want." With a short grin, he pulled a tiny plastic bag from his pocket and slapped it to Drake's chest. He didn't wait for a reply back and walked away.

Drake looked down and caught the bag in his hand. He narrowed his eyes to read the fine print. "Nose plugs?" he read aloud. "Oh, Bishop. Funny." He got the hint, not acting as stupid as he looked. The joke came down on him, stating that his fellow marines would appreciate it if he plugged his nose from having to hear him snore. "I didn't realize synthetics were such comedians."

---

Less than an hour - it came down to. The sun was in full bloom, shining like a bright beam down the bedroom corridors.

Hicks walked out of his room, and hit the back of his head against the door after he shut it. He had his eyes closed, exhausted from last night and early morning's commotions. He opened his eyes again when he heard talk coming from further down the hall. Hudson and Frost strolled up to the corporal after ending their short conversation.

"Hey Hicks, sleep well last night?" Frost smirked.

Hudson looked at his friend standing next to him with a confused expression across his face. "What are you talking about?"

Hicks didn't answer Frost's question.

"Let's just say it wasn't only the dogs keeping me awake last night." Frost snickered. Hicks looked at both marines. He drew in a quick breath and his sharp green eyes closed with a smile.

Hudson cracked a smile realizing the confusion between his marines. "Oh, you're breaking my heart." The comtech looked at the corporal. "You and the doc made up?" Hicks and Frost exchange expressions. Hudson didn't need an answer, and instead asked another question. "What did I do wrong?" he didn't understand, but knew exactly the reason. It was just his character.

Hicks heaved his tired back away from the door, and walked away from his friends. Frost and Hudson watched the quiet corporal walk, admiring the courage of the leader.

Frost looked over at Hudson who was frowning. "Hudson." He laughed, "You never had a chance." He wrapped his arm around the comtech's neck and dragged him down the hall.

---

Callie practically dragged her feet down the metal corridor, walking toward the Saluco. She was dressed in a clean, untouched uniform. Her hair was twisted back into a bun in the back of her head, and she carried her nametag around her neck.

As she neared the spaceship, her heart raced. Jumping in panic, spit caught in her throat, and a heavy dosage of cramps killing the pit of her stomach. Paining cramps she couldn't bare to hold anymore. The thought of her friends, her fellow marines leaving this day - leaving her behind to fight only God knew what.

She held her stomach as the double doors flew open to reveal the outside sun shining on her face. In front of her was the massive, dirty Saluco being prepped and ready for take-off. It was hard for the doctor to balance herself on her own two feet when the spaceship caught her eyes, causing them to flutter in panic.

She turned her head and spotted Nurse Adam standing by Bishop near the ship's entrance sliders. Corporal Ferro and Spunkmeyer were in conversation near the open surface of the runway, and Ripley and Burke were just walking through the other exit on the opposite side of the field.

She looked for Hicks, but he was nowhere in sight. Her fingers trembled, and she quickly drew them in her pockets. She ordered her fingers to stop shaking - but they would not obey.

"Dr. Callie?" she heard a voice speak, and looked to who questioned her name.

"Yes, hello, General." She stuck her hand out for him to shake.

General Curran took in the small, petite woman he knew for years now. He put his hands behind his back, looking down at her stretched out arm. When she knew he wasn't going to shake her hand, she played it off by scratching her knee.

She took in the tall General. He had a lean body, height six foot three, and stern brown eyes. He wore his blond hair slick back with ten pounds of hair gel, strict-straight uniform, and carried the body of a human vulture.

He worked his vulture eyes, "Where are the Marines?"

"Not yet here, sir."

"As I suspected," he mumbled. "Are they even trained for this sort of mission, doctor?"

"Well, General, I don't know anything about the mission. Nobody has informed me about it."

Lieutenant Gorman walked into the base field, looking around the open duct. He was mesmerized, as if he never saw anything like the Saluco or the widely, expanded field where it was stationed in. The clouds were visibly seen above the ship. A skyscraper he might describe it as. The sunrise poured a layer of orange sheen upon the surface of the ship. It was magnificent.

Private Crowe, standing outside the right wing tip, observed the gateway into the spaceship and said, "Yup, still can wait to lay my ass in that crusty, old ship." Vasquez and Drake walked in, and bent beneath the wings to stand by him, and when he least expected it Drake slapped his ass. "Bang. It'll be just like putting a baby to bed."

"Is that how your mother put you to sleep, Drake - she'd smack ya?"

"How do you think I came to be the way I am today?" he put up his arms, showing off his muscles. "My mama taught me well."

"It's all in your head, Drake." Corporal Dietrich said, slipping right past the tough marine.

"What? Is that a joke?"

Dietrich pulled the strap over her head and wound of her personal first-aid kit. "Let's get going, I'm ready to sleep. Callie's got some business she has to discuss and so does our new Lieutenant." She laughed, coming up with a gag. "We gotta soften up on him, and then when he least expects it -"

"I know, I'm in - he's going down the drain." Vasquez finished.

"I hate to say this, but Hudson's right. I don't trust him with my life." Crowe said, tossing his dog chains around his neck.

Gorman walked up to Dr. Callie and General Curran. He saluted the general as soon as they made eye contact.

"General."

"Lieutenant."

Gorman looked at Callie. He shook her hand once the coast was clear to make another move without disrespecting his higher rank. "Dr. Callie, it's good to see you again."

She smiled with closed lips, not speaking a word. The double, elevator doors flew open, and Hicks, Frost, and Hudson stammered outside. Callie smiled, but held back her joy when she spotted Hicks. Her heart did summersaults in her chest, and she opened her mouth to ease the pressure of her breath.

"Excuse me, gentlemen." She spoke kindly, passing Carter Burke on her way out of the vulture's pin. Burke was about to speak but Callie gave him a soft smile to show she was on her way to do something.

Burke didn't care. "You okay?"

"Yeah!" Callie said quickly. Then after hesitating she said, "Yes, I'm fine. I just need to speak to someone." She had to take a deep breath after departing from the three men. She didn't like company suits like Burke, and didn't appreciate or mind the new lieutenant either. They were tasteless men bringing together tough marines to do their battles. It tore her insides apart to know they were the ones controlling the mission, and keeping it a secret from everyone else.

The doctor looked around the field - aware she lost Hicks.

"I saw this coming," Frost sighed sneaking up behind her.

"I didn't." Callie whispered, keeping it cool in front of the top rank officers. "Wait a second, how do you -?"

"Come on, doc, you're a terrible liar."

She nodded, easing the tension she carried in the pit of her stomach. It was private. What she and the corporal shared was very private. But he was Frost - her best friend. She could tell him anything and everything if she had to. "What can I say - I never stopped loving him. I never will..."

For a moment there was silence between the two friends. Then Frost spoke up, "Sooner or later you two would have gotten back together, Callie. It only took two years, but it happened. Look how happy you are and how peaceful in the mind he is."

"He's always been peaceful in the mind, Frost."

"Yeah, but now he's real peaceful. And with this mission, he'll be more intact with himself and physically powerful because he knows he has somebody to come home to." Frost looked away and breathed the morning fresh air. "Thank you for giving that back to him. From a friend knowing the both of you well - just thank you."

Callie was surprised by the strength of his words. "You're welcome."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Frost nodded in agreement with her. "Good," he said. "And I promise that I will watch his back."

"Good, now get before anyone catches us acting human." She joked. He put up his hand to salute her before running off. She stood holding her clipboard to her chest, and took several steps along the path toward the Saluco. She saw someone ten feet away in the shadows of the aircraft wings. It was a form she knew, a posture hauntingly familiar.

It was Hicks.

Her body lost all its weight. She felt she was floating, flying, as the world tilted on its axis and the stars spun above her. She wanted to feel the strength of his arms, the solid reality of them as he gathered her to him, but she held back, knowing she couldn't express her love in front of the general.

"Round 'em up, sweethearts! On the ready line - let's go!" Apone's overbearing voice rang in the grass-layered field. "Steady people, steady."

At those words, Callie jumped from fantasy to reality. She needed that shock treatment. She backed away from the spaceship toward General Curran and Burke. "Any words, General?" she asked, moving her clipboard behind her back.

The general eyeballed the doctor, but nodded. "Yes." He stepped forward toward the lined marines: tired, hazy, and out of breath. "As you all know, this will be a top priority mission. Nothing I'm sure you haven't dealt with before in previous battles. Make it go smooth and by the numbers. We leave no man behind under any circumstances. I'm not here to tell you everything will be okay because that's now how the world works. Stay tough and alert to everything that steps in your way. Don't ever give up, and don't coward out. You are called Space Marines. Wear your name proud. Come home and come back to us. God speed your justice and remember to stay frosty." He paced his eyes along the marines, with another simple nod. "At ease, marines. God be with you all." The General turned and glanced at Callie.

"I hope he doesn't think that was inspirational." Hudson whispered in Vasquez's ear.

"Jerk off," she hissed back.

Warning lights flashed. The time neared to say goodbye. Stomachs lurched as they left the artificial gravity field of the Sulaco. General Curran nodded his thanks to the doctor and lieutenant. He didn't mind acknowledging the marines before he turned his back and walked back inside the building.

"Prick..."

"None of that," Callie strictly said. There was hysteria enough around the field to not have any comments mumbled or shouted.

"Hey," Frost muttered, "anybody check the locks on those cryotubes? If they're not tight, we're liable to bounce right out."

"Keep cool, sweets," said Dietrich. "Checked 'em out myself, and so did Bishop and the doc. We're secure." Frost looked relieved.

As Hicks and the other marines entered the Sulaco, Callie felt like a shy child looking upon her crush from afar.

Once inside the human cargo, there were fourteen cryotubes ready to have dreamers sealed in tight. Engaged into morphean fantasies, simple and straightforward, as the vessel would carry the marines through any void. A last sleeping under sedation necessary to mute the effects of recurring nightmares.

To become further in detail with how special the Space Marines were, they were a select group in that they chose to put their lives at risk for the majority of the time they were awake: individuals used to long periods of hypersleep followed by brief, but intense, periods of wakefulness. The kind of people others made room for on a sidewalk or in a bar.

Callie waited for Bishop in the outside control room with a fresh cup of coffee in her hands.

"You know all the rules with how to work the control panel, so I'll probably be just wasting my breath." He started.

"It's fine. You can go over it with me." She examined as the slow, drifted troopers shuffled past the room on their way to the Sulaco.

After Bishop finished with his clean and focused instructions, he opened the glass door, held it open for the doctor, and they both walked out toward the spaceship. Callie paused with Nurse Adam behind her, and allowed Bishop to fall into the ship before her. He nodded with thanks. She looked back at Nurse Adam, a look of uneasiness seeping through the pores on her face, and they both walked in to meet the eleven marines settling down near the individual cryotubes.

"Too bad these things aren't double, you know what I mean, doc?" Hudson winked as she showed her company

Callie nodded with a smile, and snuggled her clipboard to her bosoms. She took in a deep breath, staring at the marines through her eyes. There were no supermen among them, no overly muscled archetypes, but every one of them was lean and hardened. She suspected that the least among them could run all day over the surface of a two-gee world carrying a full equipment pack, fight a running battle while doing so, and then spend the night breaking down and repairing complex computer instrumentation. Brawn and brains aplenty, even if they preferred to talk like common street toughs. The best of the contemporary military had to offer. She felt a little safer, but only a little.

Apone was making his way up the center aisle, chatting briefly with each of his soldiers in turn. The way he was barely dressed with his muscled chest poking out, and stiff arms, the sergeant looked as though he could take apart a medium-size truck with his bare hands. As he passed the doctor, he voice roared.

"Stop your conversations people! You had enough fun for one night, now it's time to get serious. Shank it!" he barked out again. "Strip the clothes and get ready to get sleepy."

"When you wake up from hypersleep," Callie began without thinking. The marines stopped talking. "I'm sure you all know this by now, but take it easy unless you can take the pressure. Your blood will be rested in your head. It will feel like a huge hangover."

"You've had a hangover before, doc?" Crowe teased.

She ignored him, "so, all I can say is take it easy and slow. Give it a few seconds for your body to realize its waking up and adjusting. Then you'll feel good as new."

Hudson batted his eyelashes at the doctor. "And then will you be there once I wake? I'd be ever so grateful if you were."

"Knock it off, Hudson." Apone for once chuckled, and resumed his walk toward the doctor with another line of voices. "And I don't want to hear any belly aching about how you haven't gotten enough sleep." He put up his hand showing three fingers. "Three weeks, assholes. Three weeks - you get."

"Round up people," Gorman announced, stepping behind Callie.

"Dr. Callie?" Bishop questioned as he watched the lost doctor in the midst of the marines.

She turned his way with a puffy, soon to be crying, tear-full face. "I got it." She looked at Hicks one last time before walking backward to the ship's entrance lock. She hated this. She hated having to act professional in front of her peers, and not be able to go to the man she loved, and show she loved him without secrets. She didn't want to leave him, and watch as he slowly fell into hypersleep and not being able to wake up for some time. She hated to see all this happen around her, and all the while she just wanted to hold him again.

As she backed up, she felt a firm chest against her back. She turned and found Nurse Adam staring down at her.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

Puzzled, the doctor asked, "what?"

"Don't just stand here - go say goodbye to him."

"How...?" was all she could say at first. "How do you...?"

"...Know?" he paused a long time, and it seemed to her that he was unsure of something - how to answer the question, how much to tell her. But then when he spoke again, the story came out with bare-bones economy, when it had clearly been such an adventure to find out the truth and depression behind the doctor. She wanted every detail, but did not interrupt because what she wanted most of all was for her life, which had suddenly lost all the predictability that had once given her a sense of organization and control, to make sense again.

"Just because you're chief doctor doesn't mean you can't be a woman in love too."

She looked at him - studied every curve in his face. She turned her eyes forward and found two nurses hooking ivies on Hicks's chest.

"Wait," she whispered at first, then spoke out another demanding, "Wait." She had pain in her eyes while the talkative marines shut their mouth and watched. And Hicks, seeing that pain, and having craved at the parched fountain of his soul for a fertile reunion, felt a dreadful uneasiness creeping into his belly. He sat up, and she said nothing further as she made her way to the corporal.

Hicks shoved the nurses gently and everyone else around him so he could get a clear running distance to her.

In one smooth access, the doctor and the corporal embraced each other strongly. She felt she lost her weight, and Hicks regained his ability to hold her in his arms. She drew unsteady breath. She wanted to cry and almost did. Her eyes felt hot, burning with the tension of fresh tears corrupting her eye rims. They didn't care if the others watched on. They had each other, holding tightly to one another.

"Please," she begged. "Come back." She had to almost whisper it.

"I promise, Jody." He kissed her cheek. She pulled him close and he felt every curve of her. When she looked at him there were tears in his eyes, and nothing else but love. Another hug he gave her. He pulled back and looked into her eyes again, finding himself tempted to forget all of his resolve and wipe out all the lofty aspirations of his mission, so tempted that he had to tell her, "I will come back."

She kissed him softly on the lips then buried her face in his neck, and he kissed her forehead before turning his back and walking back to the cryotube.

Frost and Crowe watched Hicks, who wasn't making eye contact with anyone. He sucked in his chest for a deep breath, and blinked several times to get rid of the cold tears.

Callie turned as well, moving into the revolving doors of the control room. When she was halfway through, she turned to look at him through the glass. Hicks was laying down again, tubes hooked to his flesh, and his head rested on the rock hard pillow as he stared at his reflection in the glass.

She wiped her tears away, but very proud she kissed the man she loved that she would have usually kept private from the higher ranks. In this case, she didn't care - not in the least.

The marines got situated in the cryotubes, along with Gorman, Apone, Ripley, Burke, and Bishop.

"All clear?" Nurse Adam spoke into the microphone. Bishop put his thumb up in the air to give the okay signal.

"Clear. Ready for dust off. Take off into hypersleep in five-four-three..."

Callie looked on as the marines closed their eyes, waiting for the strict stigmatism to strike them.

"Two...one," the button was pushed. The cryotubes turned into frost, ice capsules, and the marines were gone. Frozen for a good three weeks.

Wide-eyed, the doctor looked at the frozen cryotubes. It was like watching the dead sleep. Hicks barely breathed. He didn't move a muscle - he was just frozen.

"He's not dead, Callie. He'll make it through." Adam whispered, stepping toward the foot of the cryotube.

"Will he?" she said with teary eyes. "Yes, I suppose he will. He'll make it." She had to repeat it herself. She closed her eyes, allowing the tears to fall. She breathed quietly and pressed her lips to the glass. "I'll see you soon." She put her hand on the kiss smudge. "Page Huston and tell him the Sulaco is ready to hit the airwave."

Fours weeks later...

"So, what's the news? Are you going to sign for it or not?" Adam asked Callie as they circled around the construction site of the Memorial Hospital, dodging noisy, big yellow machines.

Twenty extra bedrooms and closing. Any more than that, and the hospital would be described to visitors as a small college campus. Construction machineries were everywhere. Trucks, blazers, and aircrafts were on the dirt and grass like some kind of auction show. Bulldozers were moving dirt and the rickety old tiles of the entrance walkway had been partially torn up to make way for the new. It was mind-boggling - but there was no one else around except the paid workingmen because it was either too humid, or the reverberation of the massive machines.

"Yes. I wouldn't want these men to stand around out here in the hot sun for nothing." Callie reached for the clipboard in Adam's hands. "I'll sign for it, and have the workers continue until late this afternoon. Say... maybe around five-ish?" she made her mark at the bottom of the page.

"Looks good, doc. Looks pretty damn good." Adam grinned.

"It better be with what I'm paying for it."

"You're not paying for it."

"No, but it is coming out of the budget that belongs to the hospital and I run the hospital so I like to think of it as coming out of my pocket." She gently slapped his cheek. As she walked away from him, he noticed she was dragging her body tiredly.

The golden sun beamed down on the construction site. The sun let alone was a challenge, and Adam wondered why Callie scheduled the dates for construction in the middle of September. But wait... isn't September supposed to be a fall month?

Adam looked at the sun, and was blinded. He didn't have sunglasses on, or a hat to shade his eyes. And he was sure he'd pay for it later. He looked around at the flat construction sight, tortured to have to watch the construction workers striving in the heat. It had to be the hottest day of the year.

Callie walked through the sliding doors into the entry-reception area. She leaned against the front desk with a clipboard in front of her. She checked her watch, and the date on the calendar behind the reception's desk. She looked up at the cathedral ceilings. They were massive and way up there. Beyond reach. She admired the men who built the actual hospital, but thinking how long ago it was. Certainly before she was born. There were carved arc angels on the ceiling. Callie liked to think they were guardian angels protecting the hospital and marine base. It was a real sight to see.

Suddenly, her stomach jerked - a straining cramp. She winced bringing her head back down to comfort level to ease the pain. It didn't help. She held her stomach, moved her hips to stretch out the cramp.

A nurse passing by caught Callie's peculiar face expressions and body movements.

"Are you all right?" the nurse asked.

Callie turned around, "Yes. Thank you."

Adam walked in the hospital as sweat covered his entire body. He pulled out a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead and neck. He walked up to Callie, still looking rather uncomfortable with ache.

"What's wrong with you?" he snickered, patting his face away from sweat. When she heard him, Callie immediately adjusted her blouse, pulled her clipboard to her torso, and walked out of the lobby ignoring him.

Together, she and Adam passed the first floor elevators, and down T2-Hall toward the cafeteria. It was quiet as Adam stuffed his handkerchief back into his pocket. He allowed the air conditioner to soak his face. But even when his eyes were closed, he could sense the pain she was in that she wasn't about to confess up to.

He opened his eyes and looked at her pale face. "You look like death. What's wrong with you?"

"I'm fine."

He looked at the clutched hand on her stomach. "Yeah, you're fine. I'm fine. We're all fine. But what's really wrong?"

Callie thought about it but remembered Adam was a nurse and knew many symptoms of pain. It wasn't just the doctors dealing with pain and tragedy.

"It was just all of a sudden too," she gave in and touched her breast. "I feel sore."

"What do they call it when women are going through that time of the month?"

She looked at him with a half smile, "Menstrual cycle?" She then laughed. "You've been a nurse for how long, and how many sisters did you grow up with?"

"I don't like saying it. Brings back bad memories. But is that it?"

They started walking again. "No, its just stress." That must have been it. She'd been killing herself over the construction blueprints for the past two weeks; add that to being beeped every two hours for immediate surgeries, and then worrying about the marines that hit the airwave four weeks ago... especially Hicks.

"I know this job's stressful," Adam said.

"It's only stressful when you have to make a life alternating decision. Why did I get into this line of work?"

At the end of the corridor, they landed into an entry where four other corridors met to connect into the cafeteria. Callie and Adam walked up in line with salads on ice, fruit, and vegetables. Adam grabbed for a juicy apple and Callie opened a tabletop refrigerator, storing bottled water. She grabbed one and they headed out of the cafeteria, passing a herd of newcomers.

"We got here just in time," Adam said.

They walked down UX-Hall, passing door by door, making their way down toward the Space Marine connected metal corridor. It was quiet again with the exception of lively children and adults in the cafeteria.

"Hey, I was thinking about what you said back there about stress and how you think you're cramping up because of it," Adam mentioned, breaking the silence. "I was thinking your symptoms, and-"

"Yeah?"

He bit into his apple, "Well, don't take this the wrong way, but maybe you're pregnant."

Callie nearly spit the water out of her mouth. "What?" she shook her head in disbelief. "No."

Adam looked at her dead in the eye as their walking slowed. She twisted the cap back on the water, and quickly removed the smile plastered on her face to a straight line. Lacking a smile on his face proved that her assistant was serious.

"But I don't know, doc," he shrugged. "Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't it take at least a couple of weeks if not more to know if you are or not?"

She didn't want to believe it, but it had been at least three weeks if not longer since she slept with Hicks. And after he mentioned she might be pregnant, she came to realization that she hadn't started her period yet.

"Remember, it's been four weeks, not three." He looked at his watch, "I gotta go. I'll see you later?" he asked quickly but didn't wait for a reply as he jogged the rest of the way to the metal corridor.

She was left alone again to think, but not for long until her beeper went off. Her clipboard literally fell out of her hands along with the water. She moved her hand down to turn her beeper right side up to face her.

"Shit."

She picked up pace and ran toward the elevator doors. Panic sprang in her throat and clogged with worry. It only took a minute before the elevator doors opened, sending her to the fifth floor. Once the doors opened again, she ran toward the room and rushed inside to find Nurse Anna standing at the foot of Commander Marken's bed. She clipped her pen inside her breast pocket and walked up to her.

"What happened, Anna?" she asked.

"His heart completely stopped and then would start beating again," he retorted, checking his vital signs every two seconds. Callie took the liberty of taking the nurse's spot. She touched Marken's hand. He was cold.

She turned and studied the heart monitor. "How long has his heart been acting up?"

"Just today. He would start twitching and that's when his heart stopped. His breathing was the exact way. It stops and starts."

Callie leaned down and listened. Finally she said, "It's apnea." But she was dumbfounded. The pounding of his heart was plainly responsive. An IV line, attached to a tiny needle was inserted under his skin, keeping a steady flow of the potent fluids into his body continuously, but his body was bloated, and his skin turned quite yellow.

"All right listen, here's what we're going to do," she began without turning her head to look at the nurse. Callie drew out a heart ticker from her pocket and fastened it to her wrist. Anna didn't ask questions and walked to the other side of the bed, settling into a visitor's chair.

"Okay, we have to do this slow." Callie took a breath. "Take his other hand and we're going to try and jump start his heart through the pulses in his wrist."

"Is that possible?"

"Yes. Doctors did this before they invented the defibrillator mechanism."

"Then why not just use that?"

"I don't think his heart will take it. If it doesn't work by the time I expect his heart to reach minimum beating level, then we'll use it. But for right now we have to keep it steady. Watch the heart monitor."

Anna reached for Marken's other hand. She and Callie bent over the commander as Callie tapped his wrist to get a vein. In the glow of the lamp on the nightstand, he looked peaceful.

"Okay, we have a visible heartbeat." Callie looked at the commander, "Marken, open your eyes. Marken, come on, open your eyes."

It was quiet... Real quiet... Too quiet...

The ticker came alive and worked rapidly. Callie switched her eyes from the ticker on her wrist to the commander lying beneath her and suddenly his eyes opened.

"Marken?" she whispered, taken aback by the vigilance of his eyes.

He could barely see her but what he noticed more than anything was a light. "There's a light." His voice sounded raspy. "See the light? It wants me to come." He stared into a corner of the room. Callie turned, half expecting to see brightness, but saw instead only a darkened corner. Her eyes returned to Marken's heaving chest.

"Nothing is certain, Callie girl," he whispered, not looking at her. "Let me go. My son is waiting for me." His body had become a prison, and his spirit was struggling to break out. Marken's body would have to drop away in order to release his spirit. There was simply no other way for it to be free. His chest heaved. Once, twice, then stilled. He was gone. He stepped beyond the room into a world without time. A place without pain.

Anna studied the heart monitor behind the shocked doctor, and the line turned into a dead trail. "Dr. Callie?"

Callie turned around, "No!" She cried, and her pupils blurred. She listened to the trail of his dead heartbeat. "Breathe!" she grabbed the defibrillator from the corner of the room. She turned it on without hesitation and threw the two controls at Anna. "Come on, do it!"

Anna looked at her with pain in her eyes. She didn't want to do it because she knew he was already dead. But Callie wouldn't give up so easily.

"Come on, come on!" Callie shouted.

"Clear!" Anna did it.

A thump followed the zapper.

"Come on, Marken. Aw, Christ!" Callie cried.

"Nothing." Anna said. "I'll check out 300."

"All right, do it again, Anna." She hovered over the commander's body, trying to see a sign of light in his unmoving body.

"It's going. It's going. Charging. Charging."

"Now!" Callie screamed, starting to sweat.

"Clear!" the defibrillator zapped, then a thumped followed. "No pulse." Anna's hands tightened and became very dry. "It's charging. One more time."

"Zap him again, come on!" all Callie heard was beeping. "Come on!" she couldn't give up. Marken deserved one hell of a fight back.

"Clear!" Anna shouted, getting more than she expected out of her quiet, normal days. She looked at the heart monitor, then the defibrillator screen. "God, no pulse. Callie, it's flat. It's flat."

Callie slapped the device out of her hands, pushed her away, and performed ZPR. "One, two, three, four, five. One thousand. One-one thousand, two-one thousand - breathe! One, two, three - breathe!" she exhaled rhythmically. "Breathe, come on. Three-one thousand, four-one thousand. Come on, breathe!"

There was staleness, a stagnation in the air, and Anna wondered if it was the smell of death. She wanted to fling open the window to chase it away but instead stood woodenly, staring down at Marken's motionless body. Anna pulled away and watched as the young doctor struggled to jumpstart his heart.

"Marken?" Callie said lacking emotion in her voice. "Marken?" she said a second time still without emotion. "Marken?" she squeezed his hands trying to get him to respond as the harshness of her voice began to break. "Marken?" nothing. "Please?" her voice cracked and her eyes filled with tears. "Marken...?"

Anna looked at her with solemn eyes. The scene caught her heart. The doctor's pink fingers wrapped around his frail wrist, as if she might somehow bring him back to life if she could only hold on tight enough. But Anna knew it was over and wondered how long it would take for Callie to understand that.

---

The two men playing ping-pong were going at it with a take no prisoners attitude. Both men were stationed Space Marines in their mid-twenties, and very fit; even when they had to run four miles a day for basic training.

Officer Graham Warner slammed the final shot, clinching the game. "Fifty bucks!" he yelled triumphantly in the gymnasium stock base quarters. "And I want cash."

Tim Mclean slumped against the wall. He was a sandy-haired man, with crooked features, a stocky build and a permanent tan. "Shit, Graham!" he complained, irritated at being beaten. "You gotta win everything?"

"And what's wrong with that?" Graham said cheerfully. "No point in playing if you don't plan on winning."

Tim stood up straight. "I might go to Vegas for the day tomorrow. Wanna come?" he offered.

"Nobody is going anywhere. You got that?" Lieutenant Jacks whistled from behind a glass wall.

"What about it, LT?" Graham asked.

"You're on a marine base. You can't leave the premises without authorization. You know that, Warner."

The place was dead much like a cemetery. The top Space Marines were on the mission yet without word from Lieutenant Gorman and Sergeant Apone, and the rest of the marines were like sitting ducks waiting for something to happen. But with the assistance of Lieutenant Jacks and other top ranks, the marines and officers would have no problem trying to find something to keep them occupied with their time.

Graham and Tim wrestled around with the ping-pong ball until Jacks cracked. "Get out of here. Go do something, but not around me. Just got on."

Okay by a shrug of the marines.

"I'm into work," Graham said forcefully. "I get off on power."

"I'm into getting my rocks off while I can get it up!" Tim laughed, their voices distant.

After the gymnasium was quiet, Jacks settled into a computer chair and rested his chin in the palm of his hand. He looked intently at the computer screen positioned in front of him. He thought to himself that if he'd been born with a silver spoon up his ass, he'd probably be enjoying the good life, too, as a Space Marine, and he wouldn't be on duty twenty-four seven with rookies like Graham and Tim. He would have been a perfect example as a Space Marine, but he'd broke both his arms when he was a small child, and the muscles would never fully recover to have the strength he wanted and needed to become a Space Marine.

But the weakness in his arms never stood in the way of becoming a lieutenant. He worked for everything he achieved - starting off with engineering and how to build spaceships like the Sulaco, and that's where he hooked up with the optimum, smartest, and quietest man he knew...Hicks.

A fortunate meeting, for the two of them had risen together, became good friends, and never left the other behind. But by letting their well-developed friendship get in the way of what both wanted to do in life, Hicks went on to become the Space Marine Jacks had always hoped to be.

But being a lieutenant was one thing, and Jacks had to make higher and accurate decisions in everyday life, but he never let his comradeship die with Hicks.

"Lieutenant Jacks?" he heard a croaky voice cry. "Lieutenant?"

"Yes?" Jacks poked his head out from behind a steel wall. "I'm here." He stood and met the young man running up to him with a file in his hand, out of breath. "Calm down. What is it?"

Mr. Tuttle caught his breath before he spoke. "We just got word a digitized report about the Space Marine's mission to LV-426." He moved his thick, black glasses up his nose, and shook his head. "It's not good, sir."

"What are you talking about?" Jacks took the file from his hand and read the report. "When do you get this, Tuttle?"

"Just now. A few minutes ago at the latest."

"Fuck," Jacks breathed, staring at Tuttle, who stood prickly in front of him. He looked at the report again, "No, this can't-" he quickly pulled it together and bolted for the exit, shouting into his mouthpiece fastened around his head as he ran toward Houston's. "Listen," he said knowing Tuttle was right behind him. "Don't inform Dr. Callie about this. I'll tell her myself but not until I figure this out and can get a visual satellite contact from the Sulaco. Understand?"

"Affirmative."

Jacks opened the folder and looked for the name that sent the report. "Lieutenant Ripley?" he spoke aloud.

---

It was unbelievably strong. When it jumped at her that Marken was dead and she couldn't do anything to save him, the pain managed to stab her a thousand times. There was so much she wanted to say, but she had no words for any of it.

"He saw a white light and all I saw was darkness," Callie said, her voice weak, barely above a whisper.

A more quieter, experienced and intellectual doctor took the responsibility of hushing the young doctor and performing a physical check up on her. It was more like psychoanalysis the way Callie looked, as she couldn't keep her head straight, her eyes from tearing, and the sense of insanity waiting for her right around the corner.

Dr. Maria looked at her and stuck a clear, plastic tube in her arm and conducted blood from it into a small cylinder. She drew the needle out quickly.It wasn't easy to pull away from her tactic schedule, but when she found it was Callie asking for the request, Maria didn't hesitate at all.

"Here," she handed her a plastic cup. "Go pee. Even if you don't have to."

"Why? I just came to you for a check up," she persisted with a pleaded worry.

"This is just a check up," Maria lied and managed to keep a straight face. Callie looked at her suspiciously as she slid off the bed and into the bathroom. It only took a minute before she came back out with the cup filled with urine.

"So, what do you think is wrong? Nothing serious, I hope." Callie waited patiently, still messing with the tears in her eyes.

"I'm not asking you to pee into a cup for nothing, Jody. You know the procedures of performing a pregnancy test," Maria said without any reflection in her expression. She blurted it out quickly.

Callie opened her eyes wide after she heard the aging gray, haired doctor loud and clear. "You told me it was just a check up." Pregnant?

"It is."

"No, it's not. I don't think they give regular check ups everyday that includes pregnancy tests, Maria. You lied to me."

"I never lied to you. I am simply giving a check up to see if you're feeling all right. If anything is broken or cramping, and ask the normally asked questions like how long has it been since you had your last period? This is normal for any woman, and-"

"Who do you usually give check ups to? The mother's to be? I am not pregnant, Maria. There's no way. I just told Adam I wasn't feeling well, and-"

"Adam was concerned and I was glad when you came to me rather I come to you."

Callie was mad at herself and at Adam for not keeping their mouths shut. It was just cramps. She didn't see what the big deal was, and she didn't understand why she had to do a pregnancy test. Cramps were a natural symptom telling the woman her period was on its way.

"It's just a precaution, Jody," Maria stated when she could see the boiling tears in her eyes.

Callie took a deep breath when so many things ran through her mind at once. "Then thank you for doing this," she babbled through a trembling voice. "I guess I didn't have anyone else." She was in pain she knew wouldn't fade away.

As night began to fall the quieter the hospital became. Callie rubbed her eyes, smearing her mascara. "God," she threw her head back on the pillow with a huff. "I didn't want to see Marken die. It was just a mild heart attack that led straight into a solemn heart failure." She gritted her teeth still staring at the ceiling. "I took his hands, and he slowly released mine." The tears had dried when she knew she couldn't cry anymore, or think she couldn't. She felt a jolt of unexpected excitement and wondered what it would be like to leave her body and wonder endlessly in the sky. She wasn't thinking clearly, and she knew it. She was in pain. Her body ached everywhere. And Maria wasn't helping any by sticking needles in her arm.

"We all see things in life we don't want to."

Callie ached but smiled to ease the pain.

"What?" Maria asked after catching the smile.

"Oh, it's just..." she closed her eyes, "Hicks said the same thing to me once." She wanted to explain, knowing she would never forget the moment they first met. "It was when I was starting out and he was the first marine I helped, and in that same tent with us was another marine who had died. A priest was praying over his body and Hicks and I were the only witnesses beside Dr. Mattocks. I told him I hope I never had to see that again, and that's when Hicks said it."

"Dwayne Hicks," Maria smiled with a nod. "Haven't heard that name in a while."

Callie sighed, "He's a good man. A good soldier. I don't know much about other men besides Hicks." She smiled now at the rush of memories. The thought of his face coming into in her mind and it caused a corruption of tears again. Her soft whimpers scared her, and it felt like she couldn't breathe. She sucked air, but nothing came much use to it.

"Would Hicks be the father?"

"Stop with the pregnant crap, okay? I'm not pregnant," Callie snapped. These were her feelings. "Bringing a child into this world is like an act of cruelty. I don't want a child to have to grow up with all this around him. To have to go through the things we as adults are still trying to deal with." She slumped her body on the bed and wanted to pull the covers over her head, and sleep. All she wanted to do was sleep.

Maria looked at her, taken aback. She started to extend her hand to touch Callie's arm but drew back when the white strip she put in the urine started to change color.

"Well," Maria's smile was a million-watt, brightening up the dreary room. "I know it's nothing you expected and I don't know what you'll do. Life isn't all about war and death. There's a beautiful world out there, Jody, so don't be afraid of it." She almost didn't want to tell her, but she had to. There was no choice. "You're going to have a baby, kiddo."

Taking a deep breath, she thought of all the work sitting on her desk that she should be completing. She pictured the growing baby inside her smaller than a peanut. She was going to have a baby, and she didn't know whether to be excited or livid.

---

She couldn't keep her mind focused on one thing; so, she kept switching back and forth. She hated wasting time. It almost killed her to sit through repetitive meetings and unproductive committee meetings.

But a baby? Hicks's baby? She needed to keep her pregnancy on the down low and not have anyone else know. Adam wasn't a problem because he figured it out for himself, and with the exception of Maria who performed the test.

"What a mess," she said, determined not to act swamped even though she felt it. She ran her hand over the spiral wire of a notebook half used. Suddenly she felt chilled, though her office was easily ten degrees hotter than the metal corridor that evening, and getting warmer by the minute.

Hicks. For a brief minute, she let herself imagine being with Hicks again. Closing her eyes, she could feel his hands on her neck - squeezing gently at first, then grasping tighter as his lips came closer to hers. He eased her down on his bed - his body covered hers. If she thought really hard, remembered really well, she could almost conjure the smell of him again - the utter masculine, alluring scent that was his.

Abruptly, the fantasy shattered when she heard commotion coming from outside her office door. The metal corridor was anything but sound proof, and every little thing could be heard. The fuss became louder. She heard footsteps, and two voices. One she recognized.

"I'm not going to leave until I see Dr. Callie, is that understood?"

"You can't see her right now, sir. What is this about and I will tell her when I see her."

"This isn't some brief message you can pass on, young man. It's an emergency."

Time to move. Callie hopped off the stool and walked out of the office. She stepped around the corner and found Adam standing before a man in a military uniform.

"What seems to be the problem?" she asked stepping beside Adam.

Adam turned to face her, "These men are here to see you."

Callie looked for the other men, but only saw one standing in front of her. "What men?" as soon as she said that, the other two men in military uniforms appeared out of the shadow of the darkened corridor. She took in the three men resembling grim reapers. She didn't know what to expect.

"Can I assist you with something, gentlemen?"

It was quiet between them all for a moment until the marine standing before the other two appeared further out of the shadow to have a single, overhead light shine on him.

"Don't you recognize me, doc?" he asked.

"The only marines who are allowed to call me doc aren't here at the moment." Callie narrowed her eyes with sass in her tone.

"I'm sorry then. You must not recognize me." He extended his hand out for her to shake. "I am Lieutenant Jacks. I'm a friend of Corporal Hicks."

She shook his hand, trying to remember the name, but nothing reminded her of him. "I'm sorry, lieutenant, nothing is striking me to remember you."

"Of course. I suppose our only connection is Hicks."

Callie looked at him distrustfully, and wondered what he wanted. She didn't have time to wait so she asked, "What are you doing here?"

Jacks sighed. "To be perfectly frank, we've surveyed over three hundred worlds, and no one's ever reported a thing like this." He looked at her with a grim expression. "The rescue mission to colony LV-426 has failed."

Time shifted, and Callie found herself following the men in uniforms down another elongated corridor. As they walked, they tried to explain to her in great detail the things they knew about the mission, and what went wrong.

Instruments and shining medical equipment surrounded her as they passed through the hospital, but as they neared Houston's the overhead lights became single high-intensity bulbs rather than the usual ceiling flares.

"Parasites. Alien like parasites. We don't know what they are exactly, but what we do know is that the company wants it. And they'll do just about anything to get their hands on one. Even if that means costing a life," Jacks said with utter shame.

Company men... what scum. She remembered when Hicks would talk to her about those men, and how they never appreciated the deathly labor the marines did just so they can have whatever they wanted. They didn't care about anything else, let alone anyone's life.

Callie knees sagged, and the breath went right out of her before she could do anything about it. As they advanced, she blinked sweat out of her eyes. Steam swirled around her, making it difficult to see more than a short distance in any direction. The corridor was still dark, but flashing emergency lights lit an intersecting passageway just ahead of the main doors to Houston's. A siren began to wail, and her whole body shuddered.

Even in the worst stages of being a doctor, she never once stepped into the danger zone of the Space Marine base, known as Houston's home landing systems. The area you don't read about in textbooks. It was highly secured, and only best of the best were allowed in.

Jacks led her through the main doors while the other two men stayed behind. She tensed in anticipation. She passed every man working in operations as they solemnly stared at her. She wanted to snap at them and order them to get back to work. But this wasn't her turf, and she had no authority.

Occasionally, Callie would try to ask something, and Jacks would reply as though she understood. He stopped walking, and allowed the doctor to take in the massive, colorless theater.

Houston's main control theater was located at the far end of the medical section. Much of its complex equipment sat in recesses in walls while the rest hung from the ceiling at the tips of extensible arms. A large globe containing lights and additional surgical instrumentation dominated the open glass ceiling where you could listen and watch the weather change. The room was sealed tight and had thick walls, but the fourth wall was placed with a thick lookout window, looking straight into the field base where the once dainty Sulaco rested just outside.

The much looked like high-tech vault scared Callie right down to the bone, as if she were on a ghost ship surrounded by men she didn't know.

"Why am I here, lieutenant? Why did you bring me here?" she asked with as much care as she could in her agitated voice.

"I-" but Jacks was cut off when the sliding doors opened again and in walked two men in business suits; one in navy blue, the other in black.

Great, Callie thought. They looked too good for her taste, but she had to know why she was brought down to Houston's and why she was receiving chopped up answers to her repeated questions.

The man in the black suit stepped forward with a briefcase in his hand. He began to pace, staring around Houston and listening. "Have you gotten anything on visual yet, lieutenant?"

"Not yet, sir." Jacks leaned off the wall. "Ripley said it would take a few minutes before she could reach us again."

"And why will it take a few minutes? The Sulaco is a well prepped, working ship." The man's voice was strict and nasty.

"She had to retreat the remaining survivors, sir."

"This alien parasite is more important than any human life, lieutenant. If that means taking a few lives of marines, then so be it. It cost the life of Mr. Burke, and he was a respected man. More valuable than any grunt, I assure you."

Jacks looked at Callie. She regarded him quizzically for a moment, then her eyes widen with uncomfortable fear and craziness. She didn't know who this man was, but she wanted to pound his face in until you couldn't identify him by just looking.

The man looked around his businessmen, and then finally landed his eyes on the boiling doctor. "Dr. Callie, I presume?"

"Yes," she answered coldly.

The man looked back at Jacks. He wanted to know he had told her already, but he figured by the looks of things, she didn't know much. "Look, Dr. Callie, what we have here is a highly classified situation on our hands. The mission to LV-426, where your boys were sent to, failed tragically."

Callie didn't hear correctly, "What?"

"The Space Marines, correct?" his voice started to rise into a shout. "The marines that were under your wing are dead along with the colonists, along with everything that they were suppose to rescue, but never did. They failed. The mission is done. Now what we are trying to do is get visual contact from the Sulaco since someone aboard has contacted us here and explained what happened. That's the only way we know anything."

"Funny, but that doesn't reassure me a whole lot," Callie said. "You got word from the Sulaco, already sure of yourself that everyone is dead? How do you know if any are dead, if all are dead, or who's left alive?"

"I do know because of what the lieutenant contacted us with." The short businessman set down his carrying case, and popped the lid. He fumbled a minute with the contents before producing several sheets of thin plastic. He separated the papers, relocating a yellow, crumbled paper. "States strictly right here. Would you like me to read it aloud to you?"

With hesitation, she nodded.

He spoke as he read from the paper, "Two a.m. on November 12, 2176. Rescue mission failed to colony LV-426. Entire colony destroyed. Survivors: Executive Officer Bishop - incapacity beyond repair. Rebecca Jordan; female, approximately eight years old - only rescued colonist. Corporal Hicks; injuries include acid burn from head to waist. Lieutenant Ripley, who is without injuries. No other survivors. Prepare to contact again. - Out DN3683." He put the paper away and looked at the starry eyed doctor. Callie couldn't believe or understand it. Why did this happen? Why? She wanted to ask, but didn't have the gut instinct to do it.

Instead, the man took her place and answered the questions that were written all over her face. "Dr. Callie, my name is Van Leuwen. I am head of the Company board at Weyland Yutani Enterprises. The best thing we can do is stay cool and unemotional."

Sure, she thought. All of her friends were dead, and she'd lost two weeks of reality not knowing if they were safe or not. Cool and unemotional. Sure.

But she had never been the one for small talk. Now more than ever, life seemed too precious to waste on inconsequential banter. Why couldn't people just say what they had to say instead of dancing for five minutes around the subject?

"What caused this, Mr. Leuwen? What happened?"

Leuwen glanced at his fellow board members. He might as well have been looking at mirror images of himself, for all the superficial differences of face and build. They were one mind.

"Well, I told you the bulk of it. There's not much else to say."

Callie tried to keep control. "You sent for me out here to tell me there's nothing else to say? I-"

"There isn't anything left to say," he interrupted, "They're up there. We're down here. All we can revive is a visual copy from Lieutenant Ripley."

None of it made sense as she tried to hold back her blazing tears, but worst of all she felt like she was being lied to. "There's something you're leaving out," she walked up to him and reached out to grab his collar, but Jacks stopped her. "I'm impatient. So humor me." She was ready to take aim to his wrinkled face.

"It's all here." He passed the paper over, studied Callie's face as she scanned the printout. "Everyone leads an interesting life, doctor, but everyone dies eventually. It's just life."

Jacks, who stood silent and tight-lipped behind Leuwen, put his hand on her arm and could feel her pulse beating fast.

"They said they'd come back, but it's hard to say when you go on a mission with eyes closed and not knowing what to expect." She was being lied to. All she knew was it was some kind of parasite, but they won't tell her what kind, and how it managed to wipe an entire colony and a group of highly skilled marines.

Leuwen nodded, trying to be sympathetic. That was difficult for him under ordinary situations. At least he had the sense to keep his mouth shut instead of muttering the usual polite inanities.

"Frost always thought he could make it up to me - later, you know?" she took a deep breath. "But now he never can. He never can." The tears came then. She stood there, in front of Leuwen and Jacks and sobbed softly to herself, alone now in a different kind of world.

Then her eyes fluttered open to the sound of Leuwen's voice. He had disappeared and was with the specialists working in the main control operations.

Formalities. The Company and its friends loved their formalities. Nothing wrong with death and tragedy, as long as you could safely suck all the emotion out of it. Then it would be safe to put in the annual report. They weren't human beings. They were expressions of technical disapproval. Phantoms. She was used to dealing with reality. The workings of politicorporate strategy were beyond her but somehow, in the end, Callie didn't lose her composure. She heard her questions and his answers. She was beyond caring what was said. And in spite of it all, she had to get the real truth.

"Why do I feel like I'm being lied to, Jacks?" she asked when he stayed by her side.

"What's to tell that hasn't already been told? You read the report."

"Leuwen is keeping something back. If it was nothing else beside the initial crash, why would you need me?"

"Dr. Callie-"

"My friends are dead, lieutenant. Please just tell me."

They looked at each other without mumbling a word. Across the room, Leuwen's voice interrupted the stare.

"You got a visual? Good. Send for Ripley right away."

Jacks motioned for Callie to follow him down another corridor. Neither of them said anything until they neared the stairs where a boardroom was located just at the top. Jacks opened the door and Callie walked in. In the room was a four-legged table with a screen monitor on top. The façade overlooked the entire surface level of Houston's theater, where she witnessed several more techs rushing through the doors.

"It's like they're preparing for another mission." Callie walked up to the glass window. "Only one problem, there's no spaceship or team." Jacks stepped to the opposite side of the room, also looking out the window.

"There were only four survivors out of fifteen?" she asked. Despite her determination, by this time she was anything but collected.

She leaned her forehead against the glass watching as the men scattered. A large videoscreen on the sidewall came out and brightened up the room more. As she looked at it, it was dragging constant lettering and numbers, and downloading several files until finally it stopped completely and started printing out mug shots and dossiers. She examined the photos more and noticed the familiarity - they were the faces of the Space Marines...

There was Hudson, grinning like a goon. And Frost, placid and bored as the camera did its duty. Gorman was there, too, and Apone. Vasquez, the hard gun operator. Drake with a slumped face, then Crowe with a cocky grin. Hicks...

Hicks.

"Do you have earwax or what?" She finally snapped after looking longingly at Hicks's photo. "Just tell me." She was tired with all the pleases. "I'm out of patience."

Jacks's expression was gray. "I'm just like you, doctor. I want the same answers like you. I just don't have 'em."

"By the look on your face, you're wearing the look of distrust, and I'm not feeling too comfortable around you. Even if you are a friend of Hicks." Trembling with frustration, she turned to face the window again. As she did, her eyes fastened on the picture of Hudson that was staring blankly back from the videoscreen. Comtech Hudson. Friend Hudson. Companion Hudson.

Dead Hudson. She wiped her tears angrily.

In that moment, Leuwen barged into the room. Callie turned around with her arms across her chest. She walked toward him with no expression on her face.

"Mr. Leuwen, you either tell me the truth right now, or I will find out myself by running down there and interrupting those men's precious jobs just to ruin your fucking day. I'll do it!" she raised her voice with every word.

Leuwen nodded absently. He was in a sticky situation, dealing with more than one matter at once. "Something took over the colony before the marines could do anything about it. The colonists were most likely already dead."

Callie broke off, staring at his hollow face, gazing stonily back at her.

Leuwen continued, "What the marines found has been questioned about before the mission even took place with Ripley, who suffered the same kind of incident that destroyed the Nostromo. Then we lost contact with the colony, and decided to go forth with a rescue mission. And after the news of the failed mission, it only proves that my superiors and I, and Ripley were correct."

"What is this thing?" she asked. Leuwen looked at her, as her eyes locked on him like gun sights: alert, intent, curious, and speculative. She was sizing him up.

"From previous recordings from the Nostromo by Lieutenant Ripley, I've dictated what I know." He pulled from his pocket a handful of tiny recorder disks. "There are some duplicates. You can read them now or in your room." He tried to hand them to Callie, but she wouldn't take them. She wanted answers from him, not have to read them and be confused later, and still not have a straight answer. "Here then." He placed them on the table behind her.

"I want to hear it from you," she said.

"Okay. First off, it's two creatures. The first form hatches from a spore, a sort of large egg, and attaches itself to its victim. Then it injects an embryo, detaches, and dies. It's essentially a walking reproductive organ. The embryo, the second form, hosts in the victim's body for several hours. Gestating. Then it emerges. Molts. Grows rapidly. The adult form advances quickly through a number of intermediate stages until it matures in the form of an alien. And we wanted it to study."

Callie ground her teeth as she struggled to stay calm. She had to swallow, fighting a sudden dryness in her throat.

"So, that's what the mission was about? The marines went to the colony by your orders blind folded because they thought it was a rescue mission?" She couldn't help but laugh sarcastically. "And you, of course, knew what the real reason was. You wanted the alien so you could study it for your school project." The time for being reasonable was at an end, and so was her store of patience. "What kind of man are you? You tricked those marines by not informing them about the mission until they were long gone in outer space."

"You knew what was on that colony, and you didn't once think that their lives were at stake for this fucking alien." She paused to take a breath while her eyes boiled with tears. "These people are dead, Leuwen! Don't you understand that? It's murder!" she was crazy mad, and she didn't have anyone to take it out on. Not even a pillow. She turned away not knowing whether to cry or laugh.

Leuwen looked at Jacks behind Callie as she looked down at her feet. Jacks nodded, realizing what Leuwen wanted him to do now. What they talked about before Jacks came and got Callie.

"If it's worth anything, I'm sorry. It's not the way I planned for it to happen." Then Leuwen left.

The room was quiet except for Callie's whimpers. She didn't know what to do. She encircled her body with her arms, staring out the window.

"Houston, do you copy? This is Lieutenant Ripley." The digital voice over surround sounded the entire theater.

Callie turned to look at Jacks, who was staring back at her, more bemused than upset, but trying very hard to look serious. He was anxious to see how she was going to react to what he knew was coming. "Down here, doctor." He motioned for her to take a seat in the only chair in the room. She did and the only thing in front of her was the screen monitor no bigger than an airplane window seat.

"Electrical systems primed."

"A.P.U. is set. Oxidizers are loading."

"Houston, we're outta here in T minus four minutes," Ripley's voice said aloud.

The screen was fuzzy. She didn't know what she was waiting for, and why she was alone in this tiny room with the lieutenant. She somewhat knew what jailed prisoners feel like. Jacks handed her a mike and connected it to the computer and left the room. So much commotion was happening around her, and all she wanted to do was cry hard enough to pass out. She stared at the static on the monitor. When the fuzz stopped, a man's face faded in and out. A face she recognized.

"Hicks?" she breathily chuckled with surprise.

A tired, pained corporal opened his good eye. "Hi Jody. Hi beautiful." Most of his masculinity had faded, and Callie saw the young man she met long ago but only now to find he was scarred and bandaged from the waist up.

"Oh," tears started to well up in her eyes again. "You need a doctor. Isn't there a doctor?" she looked around the room as her voice cried out and trembled as she tried to speak, "Could somebody please get him a doctor?"

"Jody, I'm okay. I have enough painkillers swimming inside me to knock me out for two lifetimes. And I can't see out of my left eye."

She smiled briefly through tears, "What happened, Hicks?"

She watched him take a deep breath, "I still hear their voices, Jody. I can still hear their screams. All it took was one bullet. One grab and they were gone. Just gone..."

From below, even when she didn't want to hear it she heard...

"What's the Sulaco's altitude?"

"Two million feet. Three minutes left."

The monitor started to fuzz again. The visualization was screwing up.

"Hicks, can you see me?" she nervously asked. She didn't want to let him go already, or stop talking. "Hicks?"

"Yeah, I see you. You get more beautiful every time," he whispered, trying to ease the pain from his chest.

"Look at you," she bit her lip. "I'm sorry, Hicks. I'm so sorry this happened."

He took a slow breath, "Listen, I gave you my word, remember? I'm coming home."

She touched the monitor, wanting to touch him. "I love you so much, Hicks. I'm proud of you." She took a big gulp of air, trying to hide her tears. "I was so scared that I lost you."

"I know it, baby, but there won't anything to be scared of soon." He sounded breathless and uncertain.

She smiled a little, forgetting where she was at the moment. All she saw was Hicks in front of her, and it was all she needed. Everything else turned to blackness, and then a green light flashed above the screen. It was the only green in a row of red lights. It was also the only one blinking; indicating time was near to shut down all communications.

"Does it hurt?" she whispered.

"Yeah," he managed to cough out a laugh. "I just wish you were here, or I was there." From the way she looked at him and the way he sat, he looked like he was in immense pain that was beyond description.

Earth seemed completely entombed in a dark, cold hell. She never felt more alone than in the past couple weeks, but now that Hicks was sitting in front of her, she had no reason to cry anymore. All her tears were gone and dried up.

She bit her bottom lip, then said, "Hicks, there are some things I need to say." She closed her eyes, "I have to wait and tell you these things when you're alone, a thousand miles away, and hurting." She laughed, catching herself off guard, "I'm sorry, I'm rambling."

"You always did talk too much." The screen was getting blurry again. The signals were failing rapidly, and from Hicks's point of view, he couldn't see anything. "You going away?"

Callie grabbed the monitor as if she were holding him. "No. No. Hicks, I'm not going away. I'm right here. I am right here with you, Hicks." She tried to stay calm when the screen was failing too.

"I can't see you."

"Listen to my voice." She started to panic, hitting the screen. "Hicks... I'm not getting anything."

Jacks entered the room, "Callie, we lost complete visual with the Sulaco. We can't see them, but they can see us. You have another two and half minutes before we lose the entire connection."

Callie turned back around and stared at the monitor, "Hicks?"

"Yeah?"

"They just told me they lost visual contact. I can't see you anymore." Her bottom jaw trembled.

"It's okay now. I can see you."

Callie looked around the room and found she was alone again. "Hicks, you have to live, okay?" her voice jumped without her, wanting to scream out and tell him he was going to be a father before she lost connection. Perhaps something to have good dreams about. "You have to come home to me because- because you're going to be a father, Hicks. I'm pregnant."

Did he hear her? The radio systems started squawking.

If she wasn't excited about the baby, she hoped he'd be at least and then she would eventually.

She never dropped her gaze from the screen. "Hicks?" she said through a scratchy voice. "Hicks, watch me." It was silent. He didn't say a word, which meant she was slowly losing the connection.

Callie wiped away a tear from her face.

"It's so beautiful up here. So pure." She released an easy breath when he spoke again. "I remember something I read once... The world is a fine place, and worth fighting for. I know that when I come out of this...I'll be a different man. No more war. No more dying. I'll do it. I'll do anything." He breathed calmly, stroking the screen, stroking her face. "I just wish I could have been there when you found out. But I'll make up for it."

"That might take a while." She tried to enlighten the tragic loss between losing friends and talking to the lone survivor.

She heard him cry. He cried so little in his life and never in front of her. She didn't know whether if it was the pain causing the tears, or thinking about the baby.

"Big boys don't cry, remember?" she teased a little. Another minute passed by. He didn't answer her, and she didn't know if he would again.

"Oh, God, Hicks?" she started to cry again. She needed to talk to him, even if she couldn't see him. She just needed to talk. "I'm with you. I'm always with you, Hicks. I promise that." A chill frosted her heart and made her stomach tighten.

In a hub of computers and tracking equipment, Jacks watched Hicks on a series of video screens on the main floor. Leuwen sat with rows of N.A.S.A. Techs. Jacks stood over him, arms on the back of his chair. He, Leuwen, flight directors, technicians, and scientists watched and listened to every word Hicks and Callie spoke.

"Breathe, Hicks, just show me that you can breathe and you'll be okay." She tried not to cry anymore, but having the pain of not hearing his voice ate her up.

A horrifying rumble sounded in the room, and the monitor vibrated. But then it stopped and in the middle of it all, she could hear him whisper. "Jody? I'm here. I'm always with you and I'll see you soon. I love you. No goodbye, Jody." She heard him take a breath and then say, "I hope we have a girl."

"Oh," she cried, knowing how excited Hicks was about the baby, and how useless she felt when she wasn't. Before losing contact she quickly said, "I love you too." She heard digital voices in the locale, and the four minutes were up. His vital signs were low, and the green light about the monitor blinked off.

Through the blur, he studied her face. "Moment of truth... I gotta go now."

"Hicks, no." She leaped her hands toward the blurry screen. From the Sulaco airwaves, Ripley pulled off the video link. Callie's monitor went black, as well as the others. She kept her hands on the monitor, crying more than ever.

"No, no, Hicks, no." She layed her head on the table as a hand still remained on the screen.

"Houston, we're coming home," Ripley's voice echoed.

"Copy that, Sulaco."

Eight months later...

Rush. A little rush, rush. Men and women, doctors or nurses, ran up and down the corridors of Memorial Hospital. Aches and pains everywhere. The entire complex was in whirl, and the patients cared less whether the next patient near him or her was in greater pain.

A few nurses rushed past Callie who stood in the main entry-receptionist area. She was eight months pregnant and she was big enough for twins, even though her stethoscope revealed only one fast little heartbeat. She'd been completely vulnerable to herself and anyone who bothered to take her in as a friend, and her reaction now was even stronger. Her body was changing as her baby grew within her. Her skin seemed to be more sensitive, more responsive as just so much as a handshake. But she was pregnant by a corporal who had fathered her baby and who soon would come out of hyper-sleep once she gets word. For right now, though, she was in a tangled mess without him on earth.

"I need assistance here!" Chief Landry yelled when the marine below him on a stretcher screamed out for drugs. Callie turned around, and quickly examined the wounded soldier. His face was darkened with smoke and dust.

"Get away from me!" he yelled at her and Landry. He soon gave up his fight with the Chief and layed his head back to down as Callie appeared before him. "Mommy!"

"What happened, private?" she asked.

"Fi-re..." the wounded man gasped. "Smoke and I-I can't breathe..."

Callie looked at Landry. "We need an oxygen tank over here right away! Give him air!" She yelled down the corridor for, "Dr. Mattocks, right away!" She then turned toward the chief. "Get him straight into the emergency room. Dr. Mattocks will assist you. And give him enough oxygen or he won't make it."

The truth be told, they were in the middle of a war. It was a war between civilians on the streets, in department stores, alleys - you name it. Civilians turning on each other, and taking each other lives over dimwitted matters such as breaking a girl's heart, cheating, or grieving. Nobody takes pain anymore.

Callie wiped sweat from her forehead and reached for the glass of water she left on the receptionist desk. She couldn't think about anything else besides the fact that Hicks was still in hyper-sleep without word, and she hadn't seen her feet for months.

"Doctor!" she heard a voice shout behind her. She turned around and met a young man wheeling in an injured marine.

"Here, this way." She ordered him to follow her into the emergency room and she cleared off a bed. She carefully aided the marine out of the wheelchair as much as she could with her big belly. The young man helped.

"Adam, fill every single syringe you can find with morphine!" Callie yelled.

"We got a bad neck wound here!" she heard a voice echo. She turned around and met another man and together they pushed the moving cot into surgery.

"Surgery! Move!" she touched Adam's arm to get out of the way. "Get him into surgery!" she looked down at the poor, injured marine lying on the bed. "Oh, God." She grabbed the cot, trying to control her tears. "In here!" They turned a corner and it was finally peaceful except the screams of the tired marine.

Adam watched as she wheeled the marine away, listened to the clack-clack of the wheels of his bed and the swish of the doors closing.

"He's still bleeding! Another hemostat!" Callie turned around and found Adam rushing through the doors. "Adam, hurry with the hemostat. Another suture." She pulled down the marine's collar and blood spurted out on her white uniform. The marine shuddered, making the cot vibrate. Blood continued to poor from the marine's neck and onto the green paper coverings on her shoes.

Hicks.

"Am I gonna die?" the marine asked through clenched teeth. "Doctor?"

Adam stepped beside her, catching the terror in her eyes. He took his index and middle fingers and plugged the neck wound.

"Don't leave me," the marine cried.

Hicks

"Callie?" Adam asked. "Callie, my fingers are plugging his artery!" he had to shout to knock her out of her trance. "Callie, come on, look at me."

She was shocked beyond repair, and for one second she had no idea what to do. She had no idea why she was a doctor, and what her purpose in life was. She was so scared and she just wanted to hide from the world and not be pregnant anymore. She didn't know what her place in time was. She didn't have anyone to cry on, and she found herself crying whether she wanted to or not.

"Callie! Look at me, what do you need?" Adam's voice was demanding as he watched her meltdown.

Hicks

"Hemostat," she managed to say.

"Hemostat." Adam repeated and turned to grab the surgery tool. He handed it to her and without thinking about her thoughts anymore, she began to work on him carefully and controlled.

"All right, look at me. You're going to be all right," Adam said to the marine, trying to assure him as painless as possible.

Callie walked out of the emergency room, tearing off her green slippers, and ripped the gloves off her hands. She hit her head against the wall. Sweat covered her body, and tears drained from her closed eyes.

"Jody, are you all right?" she heard Adam ask when he met her in the corridor.

"I don't want to talk about it." She lowered her head in shame when her eyes wouldn't focus. She saved the marine, but she couldn't save herself from crying.

"Listen-"

"No." She walked away. She wouldn't try to make him understand how she felt. She informed him about the crash, but she couldn't make herself explain anymore. All she could think about was Hicks's face when she last saw him on the monitor eight months ago. No word since and it ate away at her soul.

She didn't have any answers to her asked questions in the past with Lieutenant Jacks. He would try to help, but his voice just made her angrier.

As Callie walked away with her back facing Adam, filled with unanswered questions, what Adam saw in his own mind was a lost soul.

---

The days passed in a whirlwind of activity and blended into one another like colors flowing across the sky at sunset. Since the construction was coming to a close, Callie thought the hospital and marine base was too large, too busy, too filled with smog and exhaust fumes.

"And now we're down CV-Hall. All right, what's next?" Callie asked as she and Adam made corridor rounds.

"Why don't you go lay down, doc. Take a rest for a couple of hours." Adam suggested. "I'll finish up here."

"I'm way past my maternity leave. If I leave now with unfinished work, I'll pay for it later." She didn't want the others treating her any different just because she was pregnant and hating it.

"But your due date is in a week. Mattocks and General Curran I'm sure will understand."

The corridor was quiet, as they mostly were during evenings. She and Adam were opposite from each other, checking medical records and putting them back in the slots before each room.

"Well, you know what, screw 'em. If they don't want me here, then I'll just hang out with you," Callie said.

Adam swallowed and looked up from his clipboard, "Or you could do volunteer work."

For the past eight months, Callie had been short mouthed with everybody. Adam knew, along with everyone else, that she was dealing with a heavy situation that she didn't want to be a part of. But how could she not? The only man she ever loved was in hyper-sleep somewhere in space. It drove her crazy not knowing if he was still okay or not to the brink of crucial behavior to everyone around her.

As time passed, they were on their fourth corridor before the night was going to wrap up, sending Adam on his way home for the day.

Callie scribbled her name at the bottom of the chart and literally threw it back in the plastic slot. She took a deep breath and looked over at Adam, skimming the file he held. She leaned her head back against the door while he clicked his tongue to the top of his mouth, making an infuriating echo.

"Adam?"

"Yeah?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"Yeah."

"When you're with your patients," she looked away from him. "Are you this annoying?"

Adam looked up and at her, "Wow."

She leaned off the wall, "Excuse me?"

"Oh," he looked away from her smoldering eyes and back at the chart. "Nothing. Nothing. You've just been a little short with me lately. I wasn't trying to annoy you."

"Well, then, you must just have a natural talent for it." She cracked a smile. He shook his head, not understanding her. Not understanding the behavior of women -- period. He took a deep breath rather loudly to the verge of driving Callie crazy.

"Breathe louder, Adam, that's great." She spoke insolently.

Adam slipped the chart back into the carrier then said, "You know, I should ask Maria if she even knows how to deliver a baby that's half human, half pure evil." He scowled, then laughed. He tried not to look at her, keeping his laugh in. She looked at him unbreakably that she could burn a hole right through him. She was about to say something nasty back, but her pager went off. She tried to look down at the pager on her pant pocket, but couldn't. Her pregnant belly stuck out further than her breasts, and she hated the fact that she couldn't see her feet let alone the floor right below her.

She laughed with a scratchy voice and watered nose. "I am really just ready to try anything to get this baby out of me. I can't even reach for my pager anymore."

Adam walked toward her and took the pager off her pocket. "Hang in there," he handed it to her. He was being sincere while she was being a royal bitch.

"Look, I'm sorry for the way I--" she began to apologize.

He cut her off, "Hey, you're not being the doctor I know. You're just going through something nobody ever wants to go through. It's not easy, doc." He grabbed her arms gently, trying to give her comfort.

She looked at the male nurse, loving the way he was and how he put up with her attitude for the last eight months. He was gentle, warm, clear, and humble. She didn't deserve to have him in her life. He was more than she ever wanted in a companion in her everyday life.

Her pager went off again. "Ugh," she breathed heavily. She looked at the number. A number she didn't recognize. "I don't know this number?" she said, slowing her voice down in question.

He took the pager from her hands, "I don't know either, but you better go if it's already paged you twice." He gave her a tight hug, the only tight hug he knew he could give without putting pressure on her belly. She sunk into his chest while memories flowed through her tingled body. It had been a while since anyone had given her a hug, and she was very much gratified for Adam. If she could, and knew she would, fall asleep in his arms and never let go until Hicks tapped her on the shoulder to take her away from war and life...and the baby.

An E.E.V.'s gone down... Get down to the beach... There may be others...

Callie watched the activity of the final construction from a small clump of windows and clenched her teeth until the muscles in her jaw jumped.

Night or day made no difference to the number of tragedies she witnessed, and after being paged she wondered what was left for her to watch die. She shuffled down the long corridor, straightening her uniform over her pregnant belly, into the paged room. She grabbed her stethoscope from around her neck and placed it in her pocket.

Talk to me...

After she walked into the room, she realized it was pitch black except for the sunset smiling through the tall oak trees just outside the window. The oaks receded in ranks of gnarled trunks, as if death was a fantasy of some far-off land.

Then at that moment, Callie could see a man visibly in the sunset's blaze, but his back was facing her and she couldn't tell who he was.

For a brief moment, her heart stopped and her mind ran wild thinking it was Hicks. He was home and wanted to surprise her by leading her into a...but that didn't seem likely. She was really dreaming when she saw the man's face as he stood and the room suddenly brightened up.

"Lieutenant Jacks?"

Jacks turned with blazing tears in his eyes that he wouldn't allow to fall freely down his face. He shifted his weight and opened his mouth, searching for an appropriate response. He looked over his shoulder with a sigh of grief and pain in his swollen, red-rimmed eyes. He didn't want to look at her because of the way he looked. He wanted to hold back, but his conscience begged him to not give up.

He slowly removed the military hat from his head. "Callie?" Jacks was an affable man who could always find something to talk about, but in this alien setting he was lost. He had drama to spill that was too overwhelming to allow for ordinary discourse. He would need to be more sympathetic than he had been before. But Jacks soon realized that it wouldn't matter what he'd say.

Taking a deep breath Callie asked, "Did you have me paged, Jacks?"

He nodded, looking down at the floor. The lieutenant stroked one hand down the barrel of his gun. "How are you feeling?" he began, looking up to search her face for agreement. He tried every possible way to avoid why he was really there. His hands began to shake, and sweat broke out on his forehead.

Callie said nothing at first, and instead she and Jacks exchanged nervous glances. "I'm hanging in there, but enough about me. Is there something you need?"

His face was suddenly red and his entire demeanor had changed. Even his physical appearance seemed to alter.

"Jacks?" she repeated.

He would not look at her; he wouldn't let his eyes linger on her. There was so much he wanted to say, though he had no words for any of it. He was crying. Never had Callie seen a man of honor cry.

She took a deep breath, her own jaw trembling with fear, and her eyes took on an introspective look. "What? Tell me," her voice trembled. "Please, you can't do this to a pregnant woman...just tell me." Her nerves caused her legs to shake.

Jacks took a couple of deep, relaxing breathes, and tried to remember where he was, and whom he was talking to. After several attempts to overcome his cries he took another gasp for air.

"Poor guy." He traced the stitched lettering on his hat with his finger. He took a final look at the doctor before him. The supple surface of her face, the gentle touch of her hands, and then the concerned glare of her eyes demanding answers. But as he began to explain what his purpose was for being there, she didn't understand why he kept saying that this was a day of terrible grief for the Space Marines and their families across the country.

E.E.V. Unit 2650 Crash
Dead - 65321 - Cpl. Dwayne Hicks

"The Sulaco set off an E.E.V. into the Fury 161 waters. It crashed, killing everyone inside. There was only one survivor." He paused again, searching her face. "This happened seven months ago."

Seven months ago? She recited his words. "What does that mean?" she asked through hard tears.

He shook his head, "I'm so sorry, Callie."

Callie's eyes came to rest on the focal point of the room: the windowsill had a plant life hanging basket above it and flowers of white, pink, and blue garland across the window from side to the other.

"Callie?" Jacks knew he would have to hold himself together until she made the next initial move. But he couldn't wait. "Someone or some thing corrupted the interiors of the Sulaco and burned right through the core wires. It broke out a fire, woke the cryotubes, but they couldn't get out." He took a breath; "Their tubes were already distorted and fell down the emergency hatch into the E.E.V. The little girl drowned, and Bishop..."

Before long, Callie ceased to listen to his voice. The voice screaming inside her head became like a siren, loud and shocking, but just a noise. Her entire body was wracked with fear and grief and exhaustion, and the only word she managed to string together was, "Hicks?"

"Hicks was...he was impaled by a safety supporter," Jacks finished. "He wasn't conscious when it happened."

Jacks heard about the crash from Van Leuwen that morning on July 5th. His first thought was to intercept Callie before she found out. But as he narrowed down his options, he knew he had to tell Dr. Maria; she fell apart in front of him, and even though she grieved for Callie and the baby, she agreed that Jacks should go to Callie as soon as possible.

Callie closed her eyes and began to breathe deeply, in through her nostrils and out through her mouth. The first thing she noticed with her eyes closed was how much quieter it was in that section of the hospital than down in the busy, squawking emergency room. Everything was quiet except the sound of her own heartbeat in her ears.

Jacks saw the exhaustion in her face. She remained with her eyes closed, thinking a tear would fall, but nothing happened.

"Callie...?" Jacks asked after a minute. "Callie?" he stepped closer and wanted to reach out to her, but didn't know if it would be proper.

She stepped back and started to cry, fighting a rising panic. She shook with fear while a sonogram hummed loudly on the table beside her. She hit the machine and it crashed to the floor. Tears sprang to the corners of her eyes and all thoughts of bravery or helpfulness fled from her.

She backed further away from the lieutenant and toward the door. She moved her hands behind her back, feeling where she was going. She felt the cold, curved door handle with her hand and suddenly realized that this was a not a dream. This was not a nightmare. She was not going to wake up. The lingering sourness in her mouth and sweat on her forehead were proof. Hicks was dead.

Without warning, a wail started deep within her soul and rose, until it ripped its way out her mouth. Her whole body began to tremble and her knees gave out completely as she twisted around and would have crumbled to the floor, but Jacks caught her and wrapped his arms around her. He leaned his face on top of her head, crying with her.

---

The flame was searing. The matches on the marbled floor in front of the wall of Marine Memorials were either used or broken. Callie reached for tissues but never used them. She just allowed her tears to fall down her cheeks and drip off her chin to the floor as she kneeled.

The candle burning in front of her eyes was for Hicks. A solitary, ashen candle, but before she lit the candle, her hands shook, her fingers numb. She watched the candle never letting her starry eyes drop. She prayed, and prayed, but she didn't know to whom, and watched and watched the candle gradually die.

She'd been alone for what seemed like hours after Jacks left, but it'd only been one. She sat up and stared up at the many black, gold, and silver plaques covering every square inch of the focal wall in front of where she kneeled. She searched the plaques over and over until landing her eyes on the freshest plaque on the wall. As tears drained the color of her face, it was hard to read the fine-engraved listings of the marines she knew as friends for many years.

But Hicks wasn't on the list.

She read every name, thinking of a fond memory she had with them. Hudson and his crazy jokes and smiles, pretending to be a tough marine when really he was like a giant teddy bear. Gorman, who she never really knew and never wanted to get to know, but regretted for not trying harder. The Top, Apone, with his military voice screeching in everyone's ears whenever he walked down the corridors, knowing they were not sound proof. Ferro, Dietrich, Crowe, and Spunkmeyer's gestures and laughs, and Private Wierzbowski. She glided her fingertips across Drake and Vasquez's sculpted names. At least they were together somewhere far away where she couldn't visit yet. And Frost... his name was the last she read and immediately she thought of his brown eyes and how she would never see them look into hers again.

She struggled to find breath in her lungs, but came up empty. "Where's Hicks?" Her voice jumped, "Oh, you deserve to be on here, baby." She pulled out a scapula from her front pocket and with trembling hands she carved the letter C with what strength she had. Then O-R-P-O-R-A-L. She moved her hands for a space for the next carving.

D-W-A-Y-N-E

She let out a loud gasp.

H-I-C-K-S, and finished. She breathed a shivering breath. She dropped the tool, wanting Hicks to wrap his arms around her, but instead she wrapped her own arms around herself, and leaned her forehead into the plaque crying as hard as she could.

"Hicks," she cried. "Please! You can't leave me like this." Her throat ached and she turned around and leaned her back against the plaques. She looked straight ahead, and then she shut her eyes tight, praying to God it was all a dream. "Tell me this isn't happening. Tell me I'm gonna wake up soon. Tell me."

When she opened her eyes again, she was in the same dark, cold place. Nothing changed.

"God..." she cried out, her lower lip jutted. "Why did he have to die? Why?" she slid to the floor and layed with her arms draped across the marble long ways, and slowly bumped her head against her arms, and cried. She would never stop crying.

---

So she knew, and thought she never wanted to know. So many things. Even after both reactions from Jacks and informing Adam, and even herself, Maria couldn't come to realization that this was finally reality. It had always been reality. And no one knew exactly what caused the crash in the first place except for Ripley, and she was dead. The digital report stated that the inmates of Fury 161, where Ripley was held, were killed in a trial of multiple murders. There was no one else who knew, and that was the hurtful, tragic fact. The knowledge they had to accept: that these sacrifices had to be made so something beautiful will happen in the future. Over more than thirty lives were taken including the marines and survivors.

So now here she was, making her way into the memorial auditorium to just find a weeping doctor, scattered on the marble. Maria neared Callie as new tears sprung in her eyes. She wasn't making much noise. Not enough for Callie to turn away the floor and notice. Maria stopped in front of her and kneeled. Callie's body was trembling and the bones in her back stuck out because of the way she laid.

Maria's heart was broken for that girl. She gently grabbed her arm and lifted her off the floor. Callie tilted her head back and found Maria's tearful eyes stare back. She tried with all her strength to grasp the non-helping doctor to her feet, but it was much impossible when Callie's legs went weak and arms drooped out of her hold like a snake. Callie didn't want to be touched, but Maria wouldn't just allow her to lie on the floor eight months pregnant.

"No," Callie cried out. Maria tried again and grabbed for both her arms this time. "No!" Callie screamed, but didn't have enough force to pull away. She stopped fighting Maria and looked at her. "Not him!" she babbled, closing her eyes. "Not my Hicks, Maria!" she threw her face into Maria's chest, screaming out her cries. "I'm so sorry, Hicks! I'm so sorry!" her voice jumped without her and she was losing air.

"I know," Maria whispered, holding back her tears, but it was useless. She had already cried an entire box of tissues, but a few more tears wouldn't hurt. She couldn't bottle everything up inside. What do you want me to say? What do you want me to say? She repeated several times in her head. What could she say? There's no point in wondering.

What Maria did think about was how would this affect those who were left behind. She struggled to find the right answer, but only came up with lame reactions. But what she wanted more than anything was five minutes alone in a room with a butcher knife and General Curran, who couldn't have cared less about the marines. Though, there was no peace in the impending thought for her. And then moments later, she hated herself for her own viciousness. The emotional roller coaster was indescribable.

It's true.

On December 9, 2176, Hicks and that little girl died. That was the singular monumental fact. But in the end, Maria was bound by her feeling that Hicks and the little girl had been reduced from the people who did know and love them. Callie was one of them.

Maria shifted and changed her body from holding Callie to aiding her to her feet when she cried out a different cry.

"Ouch!"

Her water broke...

---

"Jody, you need to push now." Maria strongly said to Callie, who rested on her elbows. Her words cut right into her heart as another sharp labor pain rushed through her body, making her eyes water that were not the regular salty tears. Adam stood next to the bed, dabbing a cold washcloth on her forehead and neck.

"The baby is backwards, Jody. I need you to push."

"What?" Callie struggled to say through tears. She breathed heavily as Adam and the other nurses around her made her sit up further in the hospital bed. Sweat was pouring down her face and her legs were spread apart as the pain got deeper and deeper.

She struggled to keep her tears under control but failed when another contraction ripped through her intestines and she screamed out. She cried so hard thinking about Hicks and not at all thinking about the baby pushing its way into the world. She just wanted Hicks, and her screams proved it, not only the pain.

She pushed Adam away from her and he hit a metal table full of medical tools. The other two nurses backed away also with blank looks on their faces, but Maria stayed strong to deliver the baby.

Adam looked at Callie, struggling, when she was just about on her knees to push the baby out that way. She didn't care how it came out just as long as it was out and the weight was off. Adam wanted to be at her side but he didn't know if she would push him away again.

The room suddenly went completely quiet with the exception of Callie making her screams. Maria came in between her legs and Callie felt her hands reach inside her with the rubber gloves. She closed her eyes, begging Maria to stop and pull out.

"Callie, listen to me," Maria pleaded, looking up from beneath the blue tarp. "I know this hurts, but you have to keep pushing." She returned her focus on the baby's head barely poking out. "The baby's head is out. Keep pushing!"

Adam walked the short distance to be at Callie's defense again after hearing Maria's demanding voice. He didn't know if he was needed or not, but he was going to stay by her side no matter what the circumstances were. Pain or tears, it didn't matter. He was there.

Callie glanced over at him through tearful eyes and reached for his hand. She intertwined her fingers with his and squeezed hard. She did need him.

"Jody, one more big push! Come on!"

Maria's voice was just an echo to Callie. She gritted her teeth together, pushed, and watched as blood sprayed all over Maria's blue-green scrubs.

"One more big one."

Callie screamed, giving her last, final push and felt something get torn from her body. She listened to the small cries of her baby as Maria raised it in the air for her to see, but her eyes were closed.

Everyone cheered and relaxed when they heard the baby's cry. Not for Callie though. She let go of Adam's hand and fell back on the bed. She took a deep breath, still crying and catching her breath. She was the only one not laughing or smiling and could care less. Hicks was all she could think about.

"It's a girl, Jody. You have a beautiful baby girl." Maria tried to regain her breath and looked at Callie who was still crying hysterically with her eyes shut.

"Jody?" Maria handed the newborn to Adam and he took her away to be cleaned up. Maria walked up to the bed, telling Callie she was there, but the new mother still wouldn't open her eyes. Darkness washed over her and she stuck her hands in the air to do away with everyone around her.

"Jody, come on. Open your eyes." Maria spoke gently. Adam stepped behind her with the baby in his arms. She took the baby from him. "Jody, I have someone I want you to meet."

Callie eyes fluttered open to find a breathing baby girl staring at her. The baby was quiet, no longer crying. Adam walked over to the other side of the bed and stuffed a couple of pillows behind the crying doctor to sit up.

Maria gently put the baby in Callie's arms and backed away. The sun was slowly setting outside the blinds, causing the white room to darken. The other nurses in the room stopped talking and took in Callie with her baby, too, knowing the facts about Hicks and the marines.

Watching Callie with the baby, Maria could feel the rush of tears surfacing her old eyes again. After a few seconds, Callie was crying at her worst and looked as if she didn't want to hold her daughter anymore. Maria opened her mouth to speak but found nothing to say. She watched as the new mother held her newborn daughter, crying. She held her daughter a little longer then motioned for a nurse to take her away.

Three days later...

8:00 a.m.

He was not there, yet he was there.

The July morning air, crisp and cleared by recent rains, was still and silent, not yet disturbed by early risers who would soon turn the new day into frenzied preparations for work, school, and last-minute callings. For a welcome change, there was not so much as a hint of the taunting west Asheville, North Carolina wind that generally sent the region's summer heat factor plummeting. As Maria drove through the modest Black Falls neighborhood with the newborn strapped into a car seat in the backseat and Callie, sitting in the passenger side, the air was filled with a savor of sadness.

This was the neighborhood Callie was to make her decision to live and move out of the hospital. It was Maria's idea, in the early morning, for her to make such a decision. With the new baby and the sudden tragedy, Maria thought it'd be better if Callie dropped everything for a while and disappear.

But Callie didn't find it sensible to leave her patients in the dark like she had with Hicks when he was still alive. She didn't want to leave them behind and have them hunt for a new way of healing without her. Maria argued and eventually won that she didn't need to be around ill and dying men and women all the time and instead live her life with her new baby and not ignore the good still left inside her. Callie thought it was a bunch of bullshit.

Since the news of the loss, Jacks and Adam went forth to arrange the memorial service not needing her assistance.

"God be with you."

"Thank you for everything, father."

All Callie had to do was make the final assessment with General Curran, who could not have been more poignant about the whole situation, on which monument would be best to depict the loss of the deceased marines.

"I'm sure you already know, Jody, but Jacks found the carving on the plaque." The memorial plaque Maria explained, excluding Hicks from it. Callie's work. "He arranged for another to be made."

"Yeah, I've been grieving for the last eight months wondering why they weren't suffering too." She couldn't stand the rights of the General or anyone else who didn't grieve like she. "And as soon as I made my mark on that small, unnoticeable plaque, they wanna do something about it." Callie kept her voice low, watching the trees fly by outside the car window. American flags hung from many windows of the cottages and morning papers still waited to be retrieved from front yards.

After turning the corner onto Dark Star Road, Maria glanced over at Callie who was locked in a stone trance. The baby made cooing sounds that ruptured into a small cry from the backseat and Callie didn't flinch once.

"It's been three days, Jody. When are you going to recognize that little cry in the back?" Maria asked. She stopped the car in front of a brick layered ranch with crème aluminum siding. Callie rested her eyes on the small house, doing away with tears to look at it better. The flower boxes were already set as if the people who lived there before just planted them yesterday. But even if only a day went by, they looked as if they needed to be watered again.

Two birch trees, with thick bark, garlanded the front lawn that resembled paintbrushes whose tips have been dipped in rouge. The hedges beside the brick porch were neatly pruned. Lots and lots of greens. There was also a white picket fence and ancient gray stones lining the walkway to the front door.

Callie opened the car door and stepped out onto the mildew grass. She was dressed in a black dress with a long, gray raincoat over it. Maria stepped out of the car also, dressed in a similar satire, but her dress came to her ankles instead of her knees like Callie's, and she wore a diamond, marine broach.

"So," Callie mumbled, gazing at the rainy leaves stuck like emblems on the stones. "What's the deal on the house? Do you think I'll like it?" she heard the car door open beside her and noticed Maria taking the baby out. "Don't bother," she put her hand on Maria's forearm to stop her. "We're not staying long."

"Don't you want to take a look inside?"

"No." Callie returned her eyes back to the house. "A house shows character more from the outside than it does inside." She squinted her eyes, trying to examine every detail of the house in front of her. She couldn't do it. She couldn't imagine herself living in a quiet, sedate neighborhood when she was so use to being around chaotic, frenzied people in her everyday life. "I can't make this kind of decision now. Talk to me about it a week or so."

"It may not be available then."

"Then I won't take it!" Callie snapped. "We'll just live at the hospital like I planned to."

From the loudness of her voice, the baby started crying again. Maria looked at Callie, and again, she didn't move a muscle. She just kept her eyes on the tiny house in the distance.

"You know your daughter's been crying ever-" Maria began to say, but she didn't know whether Callie heard her or not. "Hey-"

"What do you want me to do?" she asked sharply.

"Check her. See if she's okay. Maybe change her diaper or feed her rather than have me do it."

"It's only been a three days, Maria." Callie looked down at her feet, "Just leave me alone, all right?" It was as if it was too painful to speak.

When Maria looked at the young woman standing beside her, her appearance resembled a lost soul trying to find her place in the world again.

Maria and Adam thought the same way it was almost frightening.

Callie lost the man she loved. She had a baby she never wanted to hold. She lived with death everyday of her life. Her soul needed to rise up and rip through her mouth and be free. She needed to be free to live and live with the loss, and somehow just move on. But she didn't know whether Callie understood that or not. And it would be very soon before her daughter grew up, thinking she doesn't have a mother to love. Maria needed to tell her that.

"You know, the way things are looking, I'd say you have about five or six years, give or take, of spending time with your daughter before she goes crazy thinking her mother doesn't love her. Maybe younger. You know how kids are these days." Maria looked up at the sky, feeling the cool, moist wind blow against her face. "I don't know what to tell you, Jody. I really don't anymore. If only Hicks could see the way you're treating what's left of him." She paused to look at Callie, who had her head facing the opposite direction, not wanting to listen. "If you think Hicks is gone forever, you are terribly mistaken. He's still alive, Jody. Open your eyes and you will see him clearly through your daughter's eyes. He lives through her. And if you love him at all, then love his daughter too."

Callie started to cry, but kept it in. A raindrop dropped on her hand as the sun began to come out in a tiny gap in the clouds.

"Well, Hicks doesn't see anything anymore. He's dead," she whispered.

Maria shook her head; disappointed she failed to reach her. "Yeah, he's dead, but you aren't and neither is that baby." She turned around and the baby suddenly stopped crying. Maria walked back over to the driver's side; leaving Callie curled up in a ball against the car. The sun suddenly disappeared and the sky turned the darkest shade of gray again. Callie crossed her arms over her chest, fastening her coat tighter. She thought it was peculiar that early July was cold to have to drag out the winter coats.

It started raining. Callie cried, but it didn't matter if they were noticeable or not. The rainfall would just suck them up.

---

The cortege of automobiles wound its way through the streets of Ashville in a slow, steady crawl to the cemetery. Jacks wanted Callie and Maria to ride in the funeral home's limo to the cemetery, but Callie refused, wanting to drive herself, but Maria would have none of that either. Maria insisted if she wasn't going to take Jacks's offer, then she needed to ride with her. Under the current circumstances of her late behavior and mind-set, Maria didn't find it wise to be unaided in a car, let alone drive it. Callie even refused her offer, demanding to be alone and drive to the cemetery. She didn't want to split the misery with anyone. Callie surmised that grief had an anesthetic quality to it. And here she was, not alone like she wanted, and coming to realization that she won't ever be alone again.

Callie stepped out of the car to greet Adam by the cemetery gates. He was dressed nicely in a black suit but no tie and wore dark sunglasses even when it was dark outside. She wanted to look at him like she always had, feeling comforted whenever she did, but now she found herself trying to avoid his facial expression, which was pain, and look on the brighter side of things like: the sun may be coming out soon, or hopefully this won't take long and I can go home and sleep. But she couldn't think about going home already. This was a day of grievance, and she had to show her pain and sorrow in all the ways she could.

As Adam walked up to the parked car, he wanted to take Callie in his arms and hug her tight, but strained himself from doing so because he didn't know if she would pull back.

Callie shut the passenger door and looked up and the sky was a dull shade of leaden gray still. The whole world looked black and white. Void of color.

"It's starting." Adam spoke gently.

"What is?" Maria asked, getting the baby out from the backseat.

"And I thought we were the first ones here," Callie mumbled as she turned, amazed by the number of automobiles on the street, waiting to drive into the cemetery. Traffic lights blinked and a police escort led the long, lonely precession to the memorial service. The marines' final resting place, only it wasn't.

Callie felt as dead as the weather. Empty as the stretches of newly planted grass between the headstones of the cemetery.

"We commit these marines to your keeping, O Lord. Their bodies have been taken from the shadows of our nights. They have been released from all darkness and pain. Do not let their souls wander the earth, but take them into the company of those who have preceded them. The twelve marines, Carter Burke, Lieutenant Ripley, Officer Bishop, and the little girl, Rebecca Jordan have gone beyond our world. Their bodies may lie broken, but their souls are forever eternal and everlasting. Let us pray..."

Her hands were clammy and her throat ached with unshed tears, but Callie forced herself to look at the beautifully carved marine, eagle momentum before her. It was gigantic and it glowed in the dreariness of the morning as rain poured upon it like feathers.

Hundreds had gathered, all dressed in shades of black and gray. Most of the immediate families sat beneath a canvas canopy or stood on the blue tarpaulin. Everyone was standing, with the exception of the elders sitting in black, wooden chairs.

Callie held Adam's hand without moving as he held her daughter in his other arm. Maria stood behind Callie, wiping tears away as they sprung from her eyes. Callie looked and saw love and loss everywhere. None of it made sense. She wanted to tear herself away from all the sad faces and be alone, but knowing she couldn't make an exit in the middle the ceremony, she needed to keep herself occupied when to everyone else; she looked like stone, knowing she was slowly killing herself with sorrow.

She flicked her fingers on sharp thorns of the single red rose she held in her hand. She looked around the crowd again, recognizing a few of the attendees standing across from her, and then people she didn't know. Hudson's mother and father sat stiffly in a couple of the black, wooden chairs. Drake and Vasquez didn't have any living family members, same as Hicks.

She moved her eyes, but not her head as she scanned the masses of funeral bouquets. She shifted her eyes again, falling upon Jacks standing directly in front of her. Seeing him suddenly made her throat tighten and tears threaten. Callie clenched her teeth, dug her nails into her palms. How could she make it through the entire service and not shed a tear and then suddenly look into Jacks's eyes?

Callie looked away quickly, trying to remain stone and numb. Tears ran slowly down her cheeks as she drew her eyes on the wet grass absorbing her black shoes. She was silent in her sorrow and remembrance, making no noise, issuing no sounds. There were only the tears and her hair in her eyes as the wind blew. She hardly heard the prayers the minister spoke, and she felt isolated and cut off from reality, not caring what was said.

"We who suffer ask the question: Why? Why are the innocent punished? Why the sacrifice? Why the pain? There are no promises. There is no certainty. Only that some will be called. That some will be saved. But these departed souls will never know the hardships, the grief and pain which lie ahead for those of us who remain. So we commit these bodies to you, O Lord, with a glad heart. For within each seed there is the promise of a flower, and within each death, no matter how small, there is always a new life. A new beginning. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust. Amen."

Amen, the crowd spoke in unison, and Callie also, not realizing she did. The minister's voice seemed to be coming from far away and she felt light headed. No words could make a difference. The marines were gone, and Hicks was gone and nothing could bring him back. Her movements were mechanical, like an elaborate puppet's. She went through the motions, but in her heart, she was hollow and empty. And cold. So very cold.

The wind blew hard. It was chilly wind, and Callie kept thinking why didn't she bring a heavier coat, but it was the summer she kept reminding herself.

Once the ceremony was over, the cries would never end. As the crowd thinned, so did Callie's care for the rest of the world. It stopped raining, but the sky was still dark as if it might rain again. Adam let go of her hand and handed the baby to Maria. Before Adam left, knowing Callie wanted to be left alone, he told her that the hospital was going to cater for the guests. He waited for her nod, but she didn't give one. He then kissed her head and left.

Maria remembered to take the holy card commemorating the marines. She took two and stuck one in Callie's lifeless hand draping about her hips. Maria's arms were crossed as she held the baby to her warm body. It was cold and she didn't want the baby to catch an illness since she was barely a week old.

"I'm going back to the hospital, okay? I'm taking the baby with me."

Callie was silent, not shedding a tear, her eyes locked on the golden monument. There was nothing Maria could do for her anymore. She was a lost soul in a dark room flying around searching for a light switch. Maria hoped she would find it soon enough to realize that she wasn't alone in the dark world anymore and that she had someone to love just as much as she loved Hicks: his daughter. But knowing the pain of loss and despair, Maria knew it would take time. It was just a question of how much time. Maria bundled the newborn up more and slipped the holy card in her prayer book and headed for the car.

Soon everyone was gone and it was just Callie standing before the monument. When she thought she was alone, she really wasn't. Someone stepped in her shadow floating at her side. She didn't bother to look at the person standing beside her and she didn't have to guess who it was either.

"I always thought he would be the one to bury me," she mumbled. "It's a weird thing, Jacks, how you can't stop death from coming. Not even if you tried. You'd just get swept away." She looked at her hands, "God, I wish it was me instead of him. I really do."

"Don't, Callie," Jacks replied, which he repeated several times and her sorrow deepened. There was a pause as though he knew she was listening. She didn't know why it was only when she heard Jacks's voice that something inside her broke just a little, and she began to cry.

"He's not even here. His body, I mean. There's nothing left of him." She shook her head frantically. "I just wish I could hold him again. I would never let go." The only thing sadder than life was death, but sometimes it seemed she had it backward.

Jacks glanced at her, watching tears fall.

"There's nothing like sleeping with him. Just sleeping. Lying next to him, all warm and sweet, and me wishing the morning would never come." She looked at her feet and once the clouds and shadows began to shift she realized she was alone again. Jacks left because he didn't have anything else to say and if he did say something, it would only make matters worse. Just not today.

Callie slipped her hands in her pockets and turned her back on the monument she never wanted to leave. She never wanted to leave Hicks behind.

She tilted her head back and allowed the spiting rain to soak her face. The clouds were dark and appeared as if they were full of rain. The sun wouldn't come out, she knew, and why would it? The sun didn't need to show its bright face today anyway. It wouldn't be appropriate.

Once she stepped on the other side of the gates to the cemetery, she looked at a lone car parked in the oversized parking lot. It was Adam's car. He must have left it for her to drive back to the hospital. Otherwise, she wouldn't have a ride. But she didn't want to get in just yet and go home to have the mourn of Hicks be gone and forgotten. As if it were just another day.

She tried to take a step forward, but it was impossible. Her feet were glued on the black pavement. The rocks. She turned away from the lot and began to walk along the black, iron gates. She slipped her hand in and out of the spaces from each bar. She watched her feet and she glided along what seemed an endless gate. She was thinking. Thinking of what, she asked herself repeatedly. Hicks? Her daughter? The future? Her life with her daughter? No matter how many questions she came up, one came across her mind she knew she could never replace. She thought long about needing to move on and figure out how to fall in love again.

She shook her head. She couldn't be thinking about this. It was too soon. It was just three days ago she found out Hicks was dead, who had been dead for nearly seven months. Seven months she didn't know.

Then an eerie clatter interrupted her thoughts. She looked up from the damp pasture and through the cemetery gates where she stood directly in front of the eagle monument just a few yards away. A red and white pick-up truck was parked on the grass with its brights on. She heard scarce yelling from the four men operating the truck. Two of the men were at the back, pulling the hatch down, and threw off a clear, plastic tarp.

Callie's eyes grew big as she watched from afar. The other two men jumped out from the front of the truck and assisted the two men. One of the men tugged and lifted with all his strength a single, white, marbled tombstone. The similar stone Callie witnessed a long time ago. The stone she wished she'd never have to see again.

As the men continued to transfer the stones to the ground in a row, Callie found herself gripping the gate bars tight in her hands. Each tombstone had the deceased marines' names on the front. Each individual so they could be added into the marine, SEALs, navy, air force's memorials. Among the ocean of graves of the white stones on the cemetery hills.

Then she suddenly turned away after reading the engrave stencil of Hicks's name on one of the stones the men set into a hole in the ground: Corporal Dwayne Hicks.

Corporal Dwayne Hicks

Born
July 31, 2151

Died
November 18, 2176

RIP

Every single tombstone had the date of birth and death of each marine she just barely an hour ago put to their final rest. Callie wanted to cry so hard, but found it in her soul that she could not. She didn't have anything else except anger questioning God about why this happened.

But since she didn't have the answers, and probably wouldn't get any, she just moved her head to the side and controlled the angry tears that were now corrupting her red-rimmed eyes.

With her head turned away and closed eyes, the men set the stones side by side in front of the monument that salutes the marines.

Epilogue

A month later...

It's been a month. Only a month. One long month.

Callie had packed her things from living in the hospital quarters for so long and headed for her new home in the neighborhood where Maria took her. Her bedroom at the hospital was empty, and as Callie looked around the small quarter, she couldn't remember the last time she saw the walls naked and the floor bitter. The deceased marines' quarters were like that too. Cold and gloomy and empty. New marines arriving needed the space. But before social workers cleaned out each room, donating their belongings, Callie had one last opportunity to see Hicks's quarter and lay on his bed where he last slept. The bed was left just the way he left it before going on the mission. Yet although it had been months since anyone had entered his quarter, the bed sheets still felt warm from his body, but that was impractical. Callie knew she was thinking more with her heart than her head. But there the sheets were, tangled and wrinkled in the folds of the comforter just as Hicks left it.

As she glanced around the living room in her new home that had become her alone since that morning after Maria left to drop a few groceries off, she realized the tragedy of the long road ahead stretching out before her. She pushed aside thoughts of the past; tried to forget all about the outside world, but knowing it still had the ability to sting her with its still recent loss.

And here she was, starting to settle into some sort of routine encircled in piles of boxes that filled half of the living room. Most of the moving boxes were her own belongings, and the others were Hicks's. The others boxes were donated to her. Furniture she didn't have. A basinet for her daughter. Clothes and other newborn accessories were also since she never had a baby shower. She didn't have time for one.

She worked hard but hated not being able to work more than she like. She'd get so confused sometimes when someone on the staff would tell her to go home. Someone she didn't even know. Whenever Callie did go home she'd lock herself in the bathroom, fall to the floor and cry.

But now time seemed to be running a little slow for her liking. She watched daytime soap operas a lot. Took her back to the days when she was young and full of life, and not yet witnessed death or fallen in love. You have it knocked when you're in your childhood years, and you don't even realize it. No responsibilities, no hassles, no doom. Callie stayed content with herself; she slept many hours on end, but every once in a while the sorrow would just overwhelm her and she'd see Hicks right in front of her in some fantastical way, and hear him and feel him and smell him and taste him. Then he would suddenly disappear and she would be so balled up in pain that not only would she want to be six or seven years old again, she wanted to go all the way back to the womb, but the initial aloneness in these strange surroundings soon became a distant memory.

Adam was another distant memory. How quickly he had faded from her mind as other concerns pushed him aside. Concerns for her continued well being both physically and mentally. How to raise her daughter, and how to move on from her home in the hospital for six years and leave everything she loved behind in dark quarters.

She opened the nearest box with a cutting tool, trying not to make much noise since the baby was sleeping in the basinet inches away from her. She opened the box, separating the scribbled name Hicks. What she found and pulled out was an antique quilt in reds, greens, browns, and yellows.

Something about the quilt took Callie's breath away, but she tried not to cry when she spent the last month not shedding a tear. She pulled the rest of the quilt out and it fell to her lap. Her fingers trembled as she touched it, smoothing down the fabric with her hands. She studied it carefully and discovered initials in the upper left hand corner.

She ran her fingertips across it whispering, "Grandma Hicks."

There was a knock at the door.

Callie shook her head out of the trance. She stood up and walked across the hardwood floor, trying not to trip over boxes. On her way to the knocking, she laid the quilt across a rocking chair. She turned to look at the living room. What a mess. But she knew worst of all she was the one who looked like the mess. There wasn't a peephole to look through, and Callie hated that the door didn't have one. She fixed her hair and straightened what she had on. She opened the door, trying not to be too loud because she didn't want to wake her daughter. After the door was open there stood...

"Jacks? Hi."

...Holding a box in his arms. Too big and heavy it looked for him to carry.

Jacks looked down at her pale face and half smiled, "Hi." But he didn't let his smile take its coarse and continue. "I just stopped by to see you. See how you've been."

Her eyebrows rose, "Me, I'm fine. But living on my own, not at all fine."

"Don't you want to live alone? After all that's happened?"

"Not even after then," she said glumly. "I always had..." she was about to say Hicks's name, but she held back. "Would you like to come in?"

"Sure."

She moved out of the doorway and caught the bright sun in her face, waiting for the heat, but it was cold as any winter breeze.

When Jacks turned to meet Callie in the eyes again, she had her back to him, admiring the sunshine when, for so long, she felt like a vampire. And pale like one too.

"I can't believe the sun's out. It's been hiding for the past month." Jacks opened his mouth.

Callie shut the door, "Sun even shines on a dog's ass some days."

"You're getting a dog?" Jacks walked toward the kitchen table and set the box down he carried. He looked around the living room. Boxes were everywhere; it looked as if she hadn't done a thing. Not so much as a dent.

Floor pillows were stacked along the couch base. A terrarium coffee table still sat bubbled wrapped. Leaded glass doors leading out into the backyard. She had bentwood chairs and hanging lamps, and then he spotted white birch logs in the fireplace.

"It smells like an old farm house in here," Jacks joked.

"I'm fixing to change that."

He turned to face Callie. She was dressed in a gray cardigan sweater and fringed jeans. She looked comfortable. More comfortable than he was standing in her new living room of the house his deceased friend would be living in with her and their daughter. He didn't feel right being the only man in the house.

The death smell was still fresh in their mind when it had only been a month since the funeral but in reality an entire nine months since Hicks's actual demise. It was in the way he and Callie held themselves, Jacks supposed, and the discomfort of their composed bodies. Since she left the hospital and Space Marine base, usually, Callie didn't bother to give any of the marines a second glance.

For the past month people came and went to visit her, asking the same old questions like how she was and she would be forever grateful to just scream out inappropriate words. But then there was Jacks standing tall, a slim man with dark brown hair and features setting the complexions of emotion, looking about the crowded living room at the sea of boxes like a child on a day trip to hell, all wide-eyed and innocent, but not knowing how to respond to anything.

Callie walked past him and into the kitchen. "Can I get you anything to drink?"

"No. No thanks. I'm not going to keep you. You look pretty tied up."

"Not really."

Callie fumbled around in the kitchen. She opened the single-handed cupboard above the sink, nearly dropping out a couple of glasses. They crashed in the sink. Million of pieces shattered. She took a deep breath with a closed mouth as she bit down on her bottom lip hard. She walked out of the kitchen with a full glass of red wine in her hand, passing the unfamiliar box on the table Jacks brought with him. She wanted to ask him about it, but decided not to and continue what she was doing before he showed his presence on her doorstep. She turned and kneeled in front of one of the many brown, packing boxes on the floor.

"What's the hospital been like without me? Boring?"

"No. Far from boring." Jacks said, walking around the boxes after he spotted the basinet where the baby slept. "I haven't had a chance to see her yet." He looked down into the basinet and smiled in awe, "She's so small."

Callie was already tired of unpacking. "Are you sure I can't get you anything to drink or eat? I wouldn't mind at all. It would be no hassle." She felt she would rather help people than unpack the memories of her dead friends.

"Maybe a beer. Do you have beer?" he asked but didn't look away from the sleeping newborn.

"Yeah. I think so." Callie stood up from kneeling and ran the short distance to the kitchen. "You know, it's funny that you came over."

"Why?"

"I don't really know why. Here for the past few weeks I've been pushing people away because all I wanna be is alone." Callie laughed to herself, but her laugh sounded morbid. "And at the same time all I want to do is just go back to work." But she knew she couldn't go back without a fight first with the board, and what made her laugh even more was she was chief of the board.

She shrugged her shoulders, playing off the thoughts with a teary smile. She tried to snap the cap off the beer bottle, but the bottle opener took an unexpected turn and sliced the side of her finger.

"Shit." She cursed under her breath, trying to keep tamed. Jacks finally looked up from the basinet and watched Callie through the opening as she sucked on her finger.

"You all right?"

"Yeah."

Jacks returned his focus on the baby, and slowly but quietly she started to stir. She stretched out her tiny arms as if she was trying to grab something above her. She started to fuss as if she was about to cry. She whimpered quietly but loud enough that Callie noticed.

"What's wrong?" she asked as she washed her finger under cold water.

"Nothing," Jacks answered. "Maybe a bad dream."

There was a long pause.

"Well, as long as she's sleeping, I won't have to mess with her."

Callie walked around the corner of the kitchen and handed Jacks the cold beer as he again watched the baby quickly drift back to sleep. He gently touched her little hands. His finger glided across one silky cheek to her tiny ears, and then into the silky wisps of light brown hair as he stared into the angelic, sleeping face. Her skin was softer than feathers. He never felt skin so soft before. At times like this her daughter looked so much like her father, and Jacks felt a prickle of tears burning in his eyes as he remembered his friend, and then wondering how long it would take for Callie to realize she's not completely alone.

Barely could he recall the journey from Houston control theatre to the hospital when he found out the news of Hicks's death on that day. It had seemed as if the whole of the earth had let up a cry and shook with mourning the moment Jacks let out the news to Callie. Like someone shot him in the shoulder, passing through him to strike her in the heart. She had let out such a terrible cry as she turned her body, losing all sense of the word sane.

He gestured. "What color are her eyes?"

"Gray. Newborns have gray eyes until they're three months. She's barely a month old."

Jacks smiled to himself, admiring the sleeping baby. "It's amazing."

"What's that?" Callie asked, stepping away from the lieutenant and back on her knees to open a taped box.

"How two people in love can create a little person like this. With toes, fingers, eyes and ears, and a nose. It's just amazing." Jacks turned away from the baby and slipped his hat back on his head. He took a swig of the beer and set it down on an untouched box. "It's not going to be easy, Callie. Nobody says raising a child is." Callie glanced up from the open box and watched his motions. "But if you need any help, you know where I am all the time."

"Yeah..." she let her voice travel through a deep exhale. "You know, ever since I talked to Hicks last and I found out I was pregnant, I kept myself so busy I didn't have time for anything else. Didn't have time to think about it anymore. But now that he's dead, I feel I really alone."

Jacks paused, unsure of how to continue, "I've been alone the better part of my life. I know how hard it could be, but you're not alone. Forget about what you thought you were and just accept who you are."

Jacks gave her that easy smile that was so familiar despite the fact that they had known each other such a short time. His blue eyes sparkled and he pushed a lock of brown hair back from where it fell across her eyes.

He turned away and walked to the box he brought. "Here," he set it down in front of her. "The rescue mission was able to retrieve the Sulaco. Inside this box is everything that was in Hicks's locker. The pulse rifle will be delivered here in the next few days. You're the only living relative Hicks had, even though you were never married. You're still his family." Jacks finished and walked toward the front door.

Callie thought she was still sitting on the floor, but in veracity she was walking behind Jacks. But before they reached the door, Jacks couldn't help but spot the quilt lying across the rocking chair.

"Wow," he spoke softly. "This is beautiful."

"It's Hicks's baby blanket his grandmother quilted for him before he was born. His mom wanted to keep it for safekeeping when he got older, but he wouldn't let her. He wanted to keep it himself so when the time came he could give it to his son or daughter." Callie paused and gently touched the fabric, and tears began to corrupt her eyes again. The memories again flowed rapidly like white water. "I- I have- sorry the place is a mess. I wasn't prepared to have anyone come over today and with me looking like this. I would have straightened up."

Jacks shook his head. "You don't need to impress me." He opened the front door. "Just be yourself, Callie. If you can't do that then you're screwed." He began to step outside, but she stopped him.

"It's Jody." She ran a hand through her hair, the silken strands running through her fingers as she pushed the errant locks from where they had fallen across her eyes earlier. "I think by now you can call me Jody. Don't you think?"

Jacks felt his heart make a small jump. Then a small, silly smile spread across his face and her name sinked into his mind. "Jody." He said aloud, pondering over the beauty of it. "That's a nice name." He leaned off the door after giving her another smile and stepped onto the walkway, admiring the rich, deep purples of late August.

Callie closed the door and leaned her back against it. She gripped the doorknob in her hand, feeling the coldness to her sweaty palm. She closed her eyes, and all she could think about was being alone again and how much she hated it. Her daughter was sleeping no further than ten feet away from her, and she couldn't even hear her breath which made being alone even creepier. She opened her eyes again, and landed them on the box Jacks dropped off. For having so many boxes in the living room, that was the box that stood out the most. No reason for it to do that. It looked like the others. Just brown and square.

---

The day past slowly, filled with tiny moments that would be forever engraved upon her heart. Dearly wishing Hicks could have stayed with them to see his beautiful daughter. Callie could still hear the words called anxiously across the room when Jacks told her he was dead and then Hicks's soft pleading words as he reached out to the screen telling her he loved her the last time she heard his voice.

After the big hand struck nine o'clock, Callie tucked her daughter in bed for the night. And now desperately alone, she sat on the couch in the dark, deep in her thoughts with barely a glow coming from a lamp. She stared sadly at Hicks's box on the floor, barely holding onto the wine glass in her hand. Tears formed in her eyes.

"Oh God, Hicks..." she didn't blink. "I packed up your quarter the other day. I don't know why. I saw Mr. Connor at the dry cleaners when I picked up your bed sheets. He told me to tell you hello and wondered why you never stop by to see him anymore. I broke into tears. It's so hard..." she rocked herself back and forth, "I think about you every minute. It's like you're still here, like I can still feel you, Hicks."

She hated thinking, and she was glad she began to tire. As midnight approached, Callie sat in her darkened bedroom lit only by the delicate colored candles, still sipping her glass of red wine. The soft glow warmed the room with only the occasional rustle and sound of soft breathing of her daughter coming from within the crib near her bed.

She was nestled in a silk tank top and checkered pajama bottoms in the center of her bed with Hicks's box in front of her. She didn't want to open it, but slowly found herself unfolding the flaps. It was too painful, but she knew what pain was and this was it. Soon it became hard to even breath. Callie bit her bottom lip hard in order not to scream in the deep heated pain she was in.

She opened the box entirely and pulled away a gray cloth that protected the items within. What she found in the box, and could only describe as she gently removed each item, made the pain unbearable. She pulled out his red boxing gloves he would usually enjoy having a good time punching Hudson or Wierzbowski and winning every time. She found his brown, dusty wallet where he kept his driver's license and identification card along with his social security card and a few pictures of his parents, brother and sister, and a picture of her.

She found a smaller box stuffed in the corner and she carefully opened it to find his silver dog chains. She raised them out of the box and tightly squeezed them in her hands. They weren't cold anymore and as she squeezed harder the only thought that came to her was the last time she squeezed them that hard. The night they reconciled their love and created their daughter without knowing.

She finally released the dog chains and set them aside on the nightstand. She looked back in the box and next pulled out a gray ratty shirt that looked as if it had been beaten and worn too death with stains so fresh and smelling like Hicks.

There wasn't much in the box and Callie was glad it was almost empty. There was only one more thing left in it and it took her a while to realize what it was exactly. She pulled the tiny, blue velvet box out and stared at it in the palm of her hand. She opened it slowly, not wanting to break the antique cringes. It squeaked open and what she saw nearly stole the breath right out of her lungs.

Her engagement ring sparkled in the candle's blaze. The ring she clearly remembered throwing at Hicks after their break up. He must have put it back in the box when he came to pack after she'd left. The diamond ring had sat still and untouched for over two years in that tiny box.

"Goddamnitt Hicks." She whispered and slowly put the ring back on the proper finger. "Jody Hicks," she said to herself, loving the way it sounded. "Hicks." She placed her hand over her mouth in order not to cry out. "I'm still yours." Her eyes filled with tears. "Jerk." She reached for the ratty shirt, pulled it to her nose and mouth, smelling the only piece of clothing that really smelled like him.

She inhaled deeply, missing Hicks so badly, with tears tracking down her face as she closed her eyes and fell into a light sleep....

---

She felt like she was walking on feathers, unaware of her surroundings. The place was dark and creepy. The only lights were the highlighted control panels in front of four frozen cryotubes as she cautiously approached them. A quick check revealed all four occupants untouched, undisturbed. Bishop, quiescent in fragments. The little girl ethereal in her perfect childish beauty, so foreign to the place and time in which she unwillingly found herself. Ripley sleeping with her head leaned to the side, looking as if she was dreaming happy. And Hicks peaceful and alive, unmarred. Callie felt herself hesitating as she drew near Hicks's cylinder but his dome remained shut, his eyes closed.

A sound and she whirled, knocking her back against Hicks's cryotube. Panicky, she searched for a window in the unknown place, dark and demented, and found one. She quickly ran over to it to only find herself somewhere in space. She never saw stars so close to her before, and somehow she knew something wasn't right.

Something nearly, close. She dreamt herself retreating, backing up cautiously, seeking the protection of a solid wall as she tried to see where she was going in the darkness. A minute more, that was all she needed to regain her thoughts and come to realize she was the only one awake on that dark, cold ship.

She searched with her hands and eventually found Hicks's cryotube again when she felt cold and looked down to see Hicks's pale face and bandaged chest rise to show he was breathing. Then no later than a half a minute, she happened to glance downward.

An alien's tail was between her legs.

She spun screaming, right into its awaiting arms. It spun her around and she opened her eyes to only see smoke. Then suddenly agonizing pain strikes her back as the alien squeezed her tightly, nearly breaking every bone in her back.

"No! No! No!" she screamed over and over. "Stop it!"

It stopped abruptly, and no longer did she feel pain or a rough, prickly body against her. She opened her eyes after she stopped hearing the ghastly breathing of the thing that almost took her life. But there was still something holding onto her. She opened her eyes further and the room that was once dark was now full of light. She pulled away from the thing holding her, keeping her distance, and looked up to only find Hicks staring back at her.

"Hicks?" she questioned, not believing her eyes. "You're dead."

He just looked at her for a long time and then Callie cried out and ran into his strong arms.

"Oh God," she cried on his shoulder. "I need you."

Hicks didn't say a word. For a long time they stayed like that, just holding each other and crying. Callie could not believe she was holding him again. They pulled away slowly from each other and she looked up at his pale looking face. She could not stop crying. He smiled and softly kissed her lips. She deepened the kiss further, holding his face in her hands. Their kiss was passionate, but short. He pulled away, she not wanting him to, and he slowly began to step back.

A female voice, calm and serenely artificial, echoed unheard in the dark chambers. "Attention. Explosive gases are accumulating within the cryogenic compartment."

She watched his face grow paler and his eyes lighter. She watched him and he was scared. His eyes were glazed, and on the verge of shock. He stared at her intently, and she looked down to see she was drenched in thick, dark blood. His blood?

Unexpectedly he lets out a blood-curdling scream. She watched as his face went completely shell-shocked, and just like that, his entire body was wrapped in cloth like a mummy. She tried to scream, and as she reached out to grab him, something triggered off through her eyes and she was sweating and surrounded by many bald men looking like monks in long, brown robes. Callie's eyes were awash in horror and confusion.

Flames began to flicker around the beveled edges of the holding pit before her and the men. They heightened the stark figures of the two prisoners who stood on the crane suspended over the abyss. A pair of nylon sacks hung between them. Their limp contents caused them to sag noticeably in the middle. The bodies of Hicks and the little girl.

"You goin'?"

"Haven't decided. It's nothin' to do with us."

"Dillon gonna be there?"

"It's been decided. We're all goin'. Maybe we didn't know these people, but we show our respect. They wanna burn bodies, that's fine by us, long as it isn't one of us."

Below the catwalk white-hot flame filled the smelting pit. It roared efficiently, impressively in the semi-darkness. No mountain of ore waited to greet the fire, no crowd of technicians stood ready to fine-tune the process of reducing tons of rubble to slag. The flames seared the sides of the pit and nothing more. A deep whine sounded behind the men in dark, long coats and shadowy faces, rose to complaining pitch, and died. Other lights flashed ready.

"The child and the man have gone beyond our world," a deep groaned droned on. "Their bodies may lie broken, but their souls are forever eternal and everlasting."

Up on the crane the rising heat from the furnace finally became too much for the men in coats stationed there. They rocked several times and heaved their burden into the pit. The body sacks fell, tumbling a few times, before being swallowed by the inferno...

"NO!" Callie screamed, sitting up in bed faster than her head could take, covered in her own pool of sweat. She looked around her dark, empty bedroom starting to come back to realism that it was a bad dream. She held her forehead, feeling her temples pulse quickly. And then she heard her daughter cry.

"Hicks?" Callie cried out into the darkness. She breathed heavily, not trusting her own senses. She kicked off the sheets that were covered in thick sweat and quickly moved to be at her crying daughter's side, passing the window where it sprinkled outside.

She sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed her daughter's tiny chest.

"Sorry," she apologized through sniffs. "Mommy had a bad dream." She looked and saw her daughter's eyes were red and raw; much like her own, and suddenly she felt sick to her stomach. Her daughter cried harder, and like her own daughter the tears were beginning to surface. To keep the tears from coming, Callie gently picked her daughter up and layed her in her lap so they were facing each other. The baby suddenly stopped crying and looked directly into Callie's swollen eyes.

"Funny thing about nightmares." Callie took a deep breath, "Just when you think you've got them licked they hit you all over again, sneaking up on you when you're unprepared, when you're completely relaxed and least expect them. And the only cure is good sound sleep, and that just feeds the infection." She stopped talking and listened to the pouring rain outside the window, but never taking her eyes off her daughter. She was beautiful. Just beautiful. On her head there was a fine growth of silky, dark-gold hair. On her plump rosy cheeks, there were two fans of extraordinarily long, satiny black lashes. And little by little Callie sees a familiar person through her daughter's eyes.

"Hey, you kinda look like your Dad, but like a female, squishier, bald version of your dad." She paused, catching her smile. "Oh, I just wish you could have gotten to meet your Dad. I know he wanted to meet you." She didn't blink, just kept a controlled stare on her daughter in her lap, but after watching her for a long while, the tears were begging to be released and so did the truth about how she really felt. "Sometimes Mommy wishes she had died instead of Daddy. He would have stopped everything to just hold you instead of pushing away to avoid being happy. It's just that-" her tears stood no justice and came out anyway. "Mommy wasn't prepared for Daddy to leave the way he did. It's just really, really hard on Mommy sometimes, who's been trying to fill up her days with work, so she wouldn't have to think about Daddy never being around again." She took another long and deep breath. "I just loved your Daddy so much, you know? And when that happens, you kinda think that it'll go on forever like that until one of you dies. You just don't expect-" she paused when a wave of fresh tears came over her. "I miss him so much. So, so much." She opened her eyes again and looked down at her daughter and smiled. "And you're a little piece of Daddy, and that makes you really special to Mommy." She picked up her daughter so they were eye level. "Just don't go anywhere. 'Cause you're the next best thing to Mommy, and I love you so much. And I'll always be here for you. And I'm sorry about the way I've been acting." She kissed her daughter's head and held her tight. "I promise I'll be better now. I'm gonna love you, and I know Daddy loves you too."

Callie layed her back down, stroking her soft cheek as her sleepily green eyes tried to stay awake to stare at her. She turned the dial and watched for a while as the baby mobile of angels circled over the spellbound child's head to the sound of 'Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star'.

"Everything's going to be all right because you're mine. And that's all I am now. I'm just your Mom." Callie sat back down on the bed, watching her baby girl fall in and out of sleep. "Sometimes I like to run the mouth for a while. Your Dad wasn't a big fan either." She took another relaxing breath, feeling more at ease than she ever did. "You want to see a picture of your Dad? I have one." She reached for the nightstand drawer and pulled out several Polaroids. New and old pictures she found in a box earlier that day. She flipped through the stack and found a good lone picture of Hicks. She lowered the picture to her daughter's eyes, allowing her to see her father for the first time, but not knowing if she would actually remember. "This is your Daddy. He was really handsome." She pulled the picture away and hooked it on the mobile. "You can keep it. Mommy's got a bunch."

Callie watched the picture of Hicks dangling above the crib with the angels. She wondered if he was with the angels or off somewhere on his own, seeking new adventures on the other side. She wondered a lot about him and what he was up to and if he was happy.

She glanced down at her daughter again, and she was staring up at her. "You're the only thing I was ever good at, Abby." She watched her breathe lightly. "Abby Hicks."

Callie looked behind her at her dented pillows and wrinkled sheets. She didn't want to go to bed just yet. She didn't want to dream again. Only if it were a good dream. She looked at her daughter once more, having an idea that may just work.

"Abby? We can make up dreams. Dreams about Daddy. Here, I'll help out." She Indian styled her legs, thinking about a time she and Hicks were together in a happy memory. What was she thinking? All her memories were happy. "Bright green eyes, like yours, and the warmest hugs I remember. One day, it was pouring outside. The sun had just gone in for the day, and there your Daddy was, holding his jacket over my head protecting me from the rain. And our friend Hudson was chasing a tow truck that had his car. And as cars passed us by on the sidewalk, they splashed dirty water all over your Daddy and me. We never laughed so hard..."

THE END