FIC: A Man in Chaos, Epilogue
January 2288
Jim stood at the door, water bottles in hand, waiting as Leonard finished tying his shoes.
"Ready?" he asked, and Jim nodded.
They set out into the streets of Paris, the early morning fog still lifting off the Seine as they ran across the bridge, trading barbs and laughing as they go.
Things had become more normal, Jim thought, whatever that is, as they turned left and followed the route Leonard liked, the one that led to the Champs Elysees. He'd been back at work for a month and people had stopped treating him like a security risk, had started treating him like Jim most of the time. The road had been long and mostly uphill, but he thought that it was a good journey, all things considered.
Things weren't what they had been, but they never really would be again. He'd never have the full use of his arm back, and the pain in his joints some mornings was almost debilitating, but he was strong, and medicine was good, and if there was no cure, well, he could still live his days with Bones at his side.
There were nights, sometimes, the long nights, when he woke up and mistook the sounds of the city for the sounds of the hospital, heard people on the sidewalk and thought that it was Nurse Latt, with her measured steps and her kind eyes. He knew that, in the next few years, Kythar would reach warp technology and break into the galaxy, and maybe they'd meet again, Jim and Latt, maybe the Kytharn would see what they did and he would help them come to terms with it.
It wasn't all the way better, but it was close. And if Jamith still lived in a little part of his head, if sometimes he thought that this was all a fever dream, well, those times are getting to be further and further apart, now, and Jim was getting to be the constant in his own head again.
He thought, idly, that this was how it should be, morning runs and afternoon comm chats and midnight sex, that while he loved the adventure, while there was glory and honor and fun in it, his real home was here, in the comfortable rut of a life well lived.
Masterpost| Part One| Part Two| Part Three|Epilogue
Jim stood at the door, water bottles in hand, waiting as Leonard finished tying his shoes.
"Ready?" he asked, and Jim nodded.
They set out into the streets of Paris, the early morning fog still lifting off the Seine as they ran across the bridge, trading barbs and laughing as they go.
Things had become more normal, Jim thought, whatever that is, as they turned left and followed the route Leonard liked, the one that led to the Champs Elysees. He'd been back at work for a month and people had stopped treating him like a security risk, had started treating him like Jim most of the time. The road had been long and mostly uphill, but he thought that it was a good journey, all things considered.
Things weren't what they had been, but they never really would be again. He'd never have the full use of his arm back, and the pain in his joints some mornings was almost debilitating, but he was strong, and medicine was good, and if there was no cure, well, he could still live his days with Bones at his side.
There were nights, sometimes, the long nights, when he woke up and mistook the sounds of the city for the sounds of the hospital, heard people on the sidewalk and thought that it was Nurse Latt, with her measured steps and her kind eyes. He knew that, in the next few years, Kythar would reach warp technology and break into the galaxy, and maybe they'd meet again, Jim and Latt, maybe the Kytharn would see what they did and he would help them come to terms with it.
It wasn't all the way better, but it was close. And if Jamith still lived in a little part of his head, if sometimes he thought that this was all a fever dream, well, those times are getting to be further and further apart, now, and Jim was getting to be the constant in his own head again.
He thought, idly, that this was how it should be, morning runs and afternoon comm chats and midnight sex, that while he loved the adventure, while there was glory and honor and fun in it, his real home was here, in the comfortable rut of a life well lived.
Masterpost| Part One| Part Two| Part Three|Epilogue