Work Text
Chapter 1: Just Another Day
San Diego, California
October 13, 2001
“
And here, a month after the declaration of the War on Terror, the men and women of the 37th Marines embark on the USS Custer, destined for Afghanistan
,” the CNN reporter on the television behind the bar announced. The screen showed rerun footage of the previous day, First Lieutenant Isabelle Gutierrez giving a slight nod as they and the rest of the Marines from Fort Pershing proudly walked by the camera.
Aurora Sharon dropped her eyes down at the glass in her hand. She should have been there with her people, her Marines, leading them into the fires of Hell and back, not sitting at the bar with her third glass of Whiskey.
Isabelle was a good officer, but she had a Hell of a lot to learn about combat; Aurora had been there, had seen the carnage and wreckage that formed in combat. Her side still ached from the shrapnel she’d needed to have removed. She resisted the urge to rub the area.
“Well, hello, there, good looking!” a man slid into the stool beside her, hungrily eyeing her without a thought in his small, testosterone flooded brain.
Aurora glanced at the Whiskey in her glass, staring at the liquid for a moment, hoping that if she ignored the guy long enough, he’d get the hint and leave. No such luck. Apparently, his Neanderthal brain stopped working at ‘Me man, you woman; we must fuck’. She rolled her eyes and looked at him as she ran a hand through the stubble of blonde hair on her right side. She could feel the longer hair on her left side brush against her fingers.
“I’m going to be blunt, not interested, in any way, shape, or form, now go over there and spend quality time with Palmela Handerson.” She returned to her Whiskey. She raised the glass to her lips.
“Fucking dyke,” the man scoffed and walked off, back to his friends on the other side of the bar.
His words brought up memories she preferred to have remained lost. She stared into the mirror behind the bar, seeing herself still in uniform, still wearing the two silver bars of a Captain in the United States Marine Corps, only to have that melt away. Standing in front of General George C. Rembrant, commander of Fort Pershing, being subjected to scrutiny before having the nuke fall on her.
Her discharge had been six months ago and she’d done nothing but drown in alcohol since, washing away the pain that had accompanied that. She glanced up at the mirror across from her and stared at herself. Her reflection seemed to judge her, eyes filled with shame as she thought about what she had done to herself, but she wasn’t about to change.
She motioned for the bartender to bring her some more whiskey.
He stepped over and looked her square in the eye. “I think you had enough, Rora,” he said.
“Just pour some more, Paul,” she said, narrowing her eyes at him.
He relented with a sigh as he did every night for the last three months and poured her another glass. “You know, you have to get over this.” He put the bottle down. “What’s it been, three months of this? Far be it for me to tell you
how
to do that, but you’re just going to kill yourself with the amount you’re drinking. And all for a government that didn’t see your potential?” He shook his head. “They weren’t worth it, nor you.”
She sighed. Another lecture, though she accepted that he was just concerned for her safety. After all, he was one of her only friends now. It wasn’t like anyone from her old unit wanted anything to do with her now, or so it seemed. She knew it was possible they had tried to reach other, but days had stretched into weeks, and weeks into months, and she barely remembered what happened the night before.
And she sure as Hell wasn’t trying to make friends. Paul had been an accident, in all manners of speaking. He’d been friendly enough as the bartender and had struck up the conversation, every night she had come in, and she’d found herself opening up to him little by little until he knew more about her than most of the people she’d grown up with.
She drank back the Whiskey without a second thought. She placed it back on the bar and ran her hand through her hair again. Short stubble tickled her fingertips. She sighed again.
Two men slid into the stools on both sides of her and she saw a third step up beside her. She glanced across each of them, noticing that the one on her right was the same man she’d told off only minutes before. She pursed her lips and pinched the bridge of her nose. She knew where this was going.
“So, I hear my good buddy there’s not worth your time,” the one on her left said. “That really hurt his feelings, didn’t it, Rob?”
“I’m just so hurt,” Rob mocked.
“Well, if you weren’t such an asshole, maybe you’d have more than your hand tonight,” she shot back.
“Feisty, aren’t you? I could use some of that spunk,” Rob put on an attempt at Hannibal Lector from SIlence of the Lambs.
Aurora rolled her eyes with an exhausted sigh leaving her lips. She was in no mood to deal with idiots and losers tonight. She looked at Paul.
“Gentlemen, I’d recommend you think about this,” he said, glancing between the four people. He stopped on Aurora; she could take care of herself. He disappeared around the back of the bar and she knew he was ready to call the cops at the first sign of a fight.
“Come on, sweetheart, you’d love to come with us,” the guy behind her muttered. “We’d show you the best time you’d ever have.”
“I doubt that,” Aurora muttered. “Like I told your friend, go have fun with Palmela Handerson or whatever else you’ve named your hand. I’m not interested.”
“Three sexy guys and you’re not interested?”
“Sounds more like you guys are interested in yourselves more than me,” Aurora shot back. She felt a hand clamp on her shoulder.
She grabbed the hand, pulling the man forward and slamming him against the bar. Letting him slide away from her, she twisted in the stool as Rob moved to restrain her. She pulled him over her stool, throwing him to the ground as the third one grabbed the back of her collar and yanked her backwards before she slid out of it. He stared at it stupidly before she grabbed the back of his head and brought it down to impact her knee.
He dropped to the ground with blood trailing down the front of his face from the broken nose. The one who had been behind her rose from where he’d fallen against the bar, sneering at her as her blue eyes glared at him. Movement came at her from the side and she pulled him in front of her as the third man struck out. Rob’s face stopped the other man’s fist and he dropped like a sack of potatoes as the other man lashed out again.
Aurora grabbed his arm and twisted, yanking him forward as she brought it up against his back. She turned him around and rammed him against the bar. He tried to slam the back of his head into her face. She dodged it with a quick movement to the left, then brutally smashed his face against the wood. He let out a moan before slinking back down against it.
She caught sight of an attack from behind in the mirror.
The second guy lashed out at her as she twisted to avoid the fist. Her hands shot up. She turned sharply and dragged his arm over her shoulder before brutally cracking it over her shoulder to a wet, resounding
snap
and a sharp, pained scream from the man. She let go as he dropped to the ground.
She leaned over the counter, pulling a bottle of whiskey from under the bar, opening it and sitting back in the stool. She pursed her lips and rubbed her eyes. It was going to be another long night, she knew, especially with the cops likely involved. She glanced at Paul, who nodded, knowing her query without a word uttered.
He shook his head. “Scared my customers off, left a mess, and now you’re drinking from the bottle. What am I to do with you?” She offered a sheepish grin and shrugged. He scoffed. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
The sounds of cars pulling up and doors slamming closed came in front outside. “Here’s to another fun filled night in a San Diego drunk tank,” Aurora muttered, bringing the bottle to her lips as alternating blue and red lights flooded the bar through the windows.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Chapter 2: Pride Before The Fall
The first thing Aurora noticed when consciousness summoned her back was the splitting headache that rumbled through her head. She wished someone would split it open and let the damned drummer out already. Next was the brightness of the lights that seemed as though they wanted to melt her eyes and she raised her hand to block them out, gingerly rising from the bench in her cell.“You'd think after all the drinking, I wouldn't have hangovers,” she muttered.“So would I,” a voice stated from the other side of the bars and Aurora glanced over. A heavyset man in a white dress shirt and black slacks stood there, staring at her. She sighed as he continued, “According to the officers here, they had to take an alcohol-blood level.”“Well, at least there was still some blood in there,” she muttered. She shook her head before letting it drop to stare at the floor. “Though this isn’t a zoo, you can’t just stare at the wild animals in here.”He was silent for a moment, eyeing her over. He leaned against the bars smugly. “According to the officers here, you can’t be tamed. They know you by name, Aurora Sharon. Rookies are warned about you and your classic behaviour.” He snickered. “But I have an offer, a very lucrative offer, from my employers that will change that.”“Tell them to fuck off,” she said.“I was in the bar, when you defended yourself against those three, you impressed me and that’s not an easy thing to do,” the man stated. He stopped. “Forgive me, where are my manners? Allow me to introduce myself, I am Victor Hoskins, but you may call me Vic. I work for InGen Security and I believe you may be just what my employers want.”“And I’d work for the company of death why?” Aurora asked. Her comment seemed to catch Hoskins off guard, but only for a flash of second, then he returned to a more stoic look. “Oh, yes, Mister Hoskins, I know. I don’t think there’s a person on this planet not aware of the San Diego Incident, even if I wasn’t here when it happened. Nearly bankrupted the company over the lawsuits that followed, sold to Masrani Global in an effort to stave off that inevitable end, and you want me to work for you?” She scoffed. “To what end? I’m not a scientist.”Hoskins shrugged. “Neither am I.” He motioned to an officer, who opened the cell. Hoskins stepped in and sat next to Aurora. “Hell, I failed chemistry in senior high. But I’m not looking for scientists. InGen has enough of those. What I need is people who can get stuff done.”Aurora rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Stuff, huh?”“I’ve read your file,” Hoskins stated. “Everything that could be gathered on Aurora Snow. Date of birth: June 16th, 1977; graduated valedictorian from senior high; traveled to Tel Aviv and served the mandatory one year in the Israeli Military in 1996, wounded in action by a suicide bomber and discharged in 1997. When you returned stateside, you immediately sought out the nearest Marine Recruitment Office and signed up, given the rank of First Lieutenant upon graduation because of your prior experience. Promoted in 2000 to Captain, then discharged in 2001.” Hoskins stopped. “Sorry, not just discharged, marked ‘undesirable’, then dishonourably discharged under article 125 of the USMJ.”His words brought the memory to the surface again.
“
Witnesses have reported seeing you engaged in deviant behaviour, Captain
,” General Rembrant had stated after a few minutes of trying to pry the information from her. She had scoffed at the use of ‘deviant behaviour’ when referring to any non-heterosexual relations. “
That destroys unit cohesion. No one wants to worry about whether you’re staring at their ass or the enemy.
” He had turned away from her. “
You’re a good soldier, Aurora, so I doubt these
rumours
have any basis in fact. All you have to do is say so.
”
How she had wanted to simply deny everything, be completely untrue to herself, just to continue serving. It was all she had known, all she had done. Hell, she had gone to Israel specifically to serve out her mandatory year of service, despite her parents having immigrated before her birth. It was all she wanted. It was the feeling that she was doing something better than everything that she had done before.But she couldn’t have done that. It wasn’t her. It could never be her to deny any part of herself; keeping it hidden beneath a crafted facade was no problem, but to adamantly lie was something entirely different.
“
I can’t do that, General
,” she had said. She’d taken off the metal insignia from her lapel and placed in on his desk. “
Lies are unbecoming of an officer, sir
.”
“Sodomy charges,” Hoskins finished, “which means that you’re essentially blacklisted from many jobs, you’ve forfeited any benefits and pay that are rightfully due to you, and your only option to serve would be to return to Israel. Instead, you’ve become a drunk, living off your inheritance from your grandparents, all the while at home with your parents. That has to be embarrassing, for both of you.”She glared at him. There was no way he could understand what she was going through; Hell, he was there wearing a fancy shirt and slacks, talking about a cushy job with a company that had, somehow, managed to all but escape responsibility for their actions, and he was talking about her? How could he know? What did this prick know?“I’m not judging, though,” Hoskins continued. “Quite the opposite. Imagine if you could feel like you were actually doing something and not just being drunk all the time?” He waved a hand dismissively in the air. “What does the military know? They threw away a perfectly good asset because they don’t agree with her? Fuck ‘em!” He looked back at Aurora. “You could still do something, still feel like a valid member of society. And you could make double, perhaps triple what the Marines would have paid you. And no one will judge your choices in romantic partners.” He pushed himself from the bench and reached into his pocket. Pulling out a business card, he handed it to her, “Here. Think about things, then give me a call.”He stepped out of the cell and Aurora caught sight of her newest romantic entanglement coming towards her. Valery stood there as Vic walked out, giving him an inquisitive glare, then turning her eyes to Aurora in disappointment. Aurora just rose to her feet and stepped out, feeling the burning of Valery’s eyes on the back of her head as she moved down the hall and out the main doors of the precinct, towards Valery’s beat up Olds 88.Outside, it was a cloudy grey, storm clouds forming over the city, ready to let loose. For the first time in her life, she didn’t want it to, she was having a bad enough day as it was. For it to rain now would only be icing on a shit cake no one wanted to eat.They were barely in the car with the doors closed before Valery snapped, “Really, again?” Aurora sighed. It was going to be one of these times, she realized. It wasn’t as though she had wanted to call Valery when she’d been arrested, but Hoskins was right about one thing; she was an embarrassment to her parents, even her own sister, who, at twenty, had managed to almost complete a degree in biochemical engineering. No, Valery had been of the last people she’d wanted to call, specifically because she didn’t want to hear about how she had been in the wrong, again.“Obviously,” Aurora stated bluntly.Valery shook her head. “When we started dating, I got that you had some emotional baggage you needed to deal with. But it’s been a month, it’s been six months since the Marines threw you out. It’s time that you shape up!” She glanced over at Aurora, “I had to leave work an hour early just to get you out of jail, for God’s sake.” Her eyes returned to the road. “Next time I should just leave you there. Maybe your parents’ll get your ass out of there.”Aurora scoffed and turned away, looking out the window as buildings passed.“What?”Aurora looked back at Valery. “Work?”“Yeah, I was at work. I know it’s strange, isn’t it? People have to work to survive.”“Oh, cry me a fucking river, Val. You’re a fucking stripper, for Christ’s sake, you take your clothes off for money,” Aurora shook her head. “That’s not work, not for you. You love showing yourself off, flirting with everyone out there like there’s no tomorrow.” She was nearly thrown into the windshield as Valery hit the brakes.“I’m sorry I’m not drinking myself into a drunken stupor every night! Or that I’m not beating the Hell out of three guys! Or ending up in jail!” Valery growled, angrily facing the other woman. “I’m sorry that I have to have a job so I can support myself and, in more ways than one, you!”“Oh, yeah, such a hardship for you,” Aurora snapped. “If I’m such a burden to you, then why stay?” Aurora fired at Valery. “If I’m so much trouble to you, why haven’t you just up and walked out?”Valery leaned over and Aurora thought she was going to kiss her, despite her angered state. Then the black haired woman grabbed the door handle and opened it. “You’re right. I don’t know why I do. Let's fix that right now.” She glared at Aurora as she pulled back. “Not get the fuck out of my car!”“Fine,” she scoffed, sliding from her seat. “Want to know something, Val? You meant nothing this entire time. You were nothing more than a distraction.” She slammed the door and watched as the car sped off. Rain drops sprinkled her cheeks and nose as she cursed. “Great, just fucking great! Hell of a time to do that, moron!”Thunder crashed above her and she pulled the collar of her jacket up, slowly starting towards her parents house.
“Forgot to mention self-destructive behaviour, Mister Hoskins.”