Welcome to Our Life -- Chapter 27: Ben (X5-493)

Disclaimer:  The TV show Dark Angel, all of the characters that appeared on it (Max, Zack, Jondy, etc.), and everything else that has to do with the show belong to their respective owners, not to me.  No money is being made off of this fic.  I only own the original characters (Elle/X5-164, etc.).

I finally reached the old High Place and sat down and looked out across the grounds. It’s only been a day since Alec and his unit left to go back to their own facility in Seattle, but it felt like a million years. I know, usually when somebody refers to something along these lines it’s the other way around, but when have I liked the typical? Not since I was very little, if then.

I shifted a little bit. It’s just odd, you know? I almost felt the way I did when I was younger, when I was so curious about everything. Religion, how things worked, you name it. As I grew up I figured things out on my own, found at least some answers out there while on missions or learned about others in the classroom, like about religion and how the Blue Lady was actually the Virgin Mary or how it turned out that our seizures were caused by a serotonin deficiency that was cured by that procedure that we all had done years ago or even something little like why people acted a certain way sometimes. Things fell into place, at least mostly. I still don’t like Manticore any more than I ever did and I still think that there’s something about this place that definitely falls into the ‘so wrong you don’t want to touch it with a ten-foot pole’ category, but as corny as it sounds at least I felt sure of myself as a person.

When Alec and his crew arrived, it was definitely very weird at first. Trust me, the sight of your own face looking back at you and not from a mirror would creep you out in a nanosecond. Afterwards, once the shock had faded, we got to know each other a little bit and he was a cool guy. We are a lot alike. We have a similar sense of humor, we like or dislike a lot of the same things, we specialize in the same areas, and we just get along with each other very well. There are some differences. I’m a little quieter than Alec and he’s an even bigger smartass than I am. I’m an early riser and he told me that he likes to lie in bed for as long as possible if he could. I guess even identical twins can’t be completely identical.

I always knew, logically at least, that his being in Wyoming was only temporary and once we had gotten back here from Poland and had been debriefed and everything that he would go back and it was more likely than not that we would never see each other again. I guess Lydecker and Renfro and everybody else in charge figured that we wouldn’t get close like brothers are supposed to and that we would be good soldiers that would complete the mission as ordered and move on with no questions asked. Fucking morons. That’s probably the thing that pisses me off the most about Manticore. Why don’t they remember that soldiers are human too and that even though we’re about twenty percent animal that we think and feel like regular human beings do? When I woke up this morning at 0630 as usual and I realized that Alec and his unit had left even earlier that morning, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I had this weird hollow feeling inside, the same one that I’d suddenly gotten when we’d said good-bye the night before. I might not have been a hair away from crying like Rena and Sasha had been, but I was definitely feeling it. I’ve just always been better at holding back on the waterworks than any of the girls and I guess Alec is the same.

I stretched and turned my head so that I could see in the somewhat distance the windows of my family’s barracks. I smiled. They’ve been great about this whole situations, they really have. They knew how hard it had hit me. I mean, sure some of my brothers and sisters have cracked some jokes about how much of a relief it was to only have one of me around again because that was all they could stand. If they didn’t make that type of a joke, then I would have worried. That kind of thing goes with the territory. But they know that I’m going through and they haven’t been mean or nasty about it at all. I heard a noise behind me and I turned and grinned when I saw the person who knew best of all what I was feeling. “Hey, Rena.”

“Hey, Ben,” Rena said. She walked over to and sat down next to me. “I woke up and I saw that you weren’t in your bunk. Max and Jondy told me that you were going to go up here.” She tried to give me a smirk, though I could see how down she felt in her eyes. “Do I even have to guess why you’re here at the High Place?”

“Nope. Guessing is not necessary,” I said. I sighed. “I miss Alec.”

“I miss Sasha,” Rena agreed. “This is just so fucked up, Ben. A week or so ago, I didn’t have a single clue that I had a twin or a clone. No, a twin. I just know deep down that Sasha and I are actual twins and not clones.”

I nodded. “Same here. I’ve got that same feeling.”

“Now that I know that I have a twin, spent time with her, and have gotten to know her and she’s gone back to her home, I feel like part of me is missing. I would have laughed if a couple of weeks ago somebody said that something like this would happen,” Rena said. “I feel almost incomplete.”

“So do I,” I sympathized. “It was great to have a brother like Alec. I don’t love any of the others any less, but this was different to have a twin.” I looked over at Rena and saw that she was about to cry and I felt my heart wrench. I put an arm around her shoulders and a smile on my face. “I think that we’re lucky, though. Who knows how many of us, whether it’s us in our extended family or transgenics here in Gillette in general, have a twin or a clone that’s in Seattle or Syracuse that they’ve never met or even know exist? We not only got to find out about Alec and Sasha, but we got to meet them and get to know them, even if it was only for such a short time. That’s something that I’ll always be grateful for my whole life. Besides, you never know. We might get to see them again. Hell, maybe they’ll need some people to infiltrate a twins convention or something.”

Rena laughed a little. “Maybe.”

“We’ll get through this, Rena,” I said quietly. “I promise. No matter what.”

“I know,” Rena said just as quietly. “Thank you, Ben.” She shifted a little so that she could lay her head on my shoulder and I kissed the top of her head and we sat there at the High Place for hours.