I Can Feel You Out There

The eldest Virgo daughter had just come from the senate house in New Rome where she submitted her forms to retire from the legion. She had initially planned to retire after she returned from her quest with Sophia and so that was what she had done during the late morning after maybe one hour of rest. She had a fast pace of walking as she was trying to make it out towards the tunnels to leave. Aspen Virgo didn't intend to leave for good, she had every intention on coming back, but she needed to try and find him. Maybe even if he wasn't alive, didn't his body deserve to come home?

Aspen was a little shaken from the experience that had occurred the night before. She had seen him there sitting on her bed, and he didn't say anything, but he was there in her room. She was so close to where the entrance to the tunnel was on their side when she halted seeing him. She didn't say anything to him, but he spoke to her.

"Do you think this is a good idea?" He asked her and she looked at him not knowing what to really say or do, she tried to keep walking, but only got a few steps before she heard him again. "You know you haven't slept. You're good with a blade Aspen, but not that good." Aspen knew he spoke some truth, but she didn't want to believe it.

"I'll be fine." She mumbled quietly as she started to take a few more steps forward.

"If you're going to go Aspen, I would do it now before they catch up to you." and with that he disappeared and he was gone. What did he mean by that? No one was after her. Aspen was very confused, but either way she took his warning seriously and she started to run again, but it wasn't long before she felt someone run into her as she got knocked to the ground.

"What the hell, Lennie." Aspen hissed at the girl and tried to shove her off of her.

Lennie had only been Centurion for a day now, and she already felt entirely overwhelmed. Christian always said his Sundays were dedicated to unnecessary paperwork. Now Lennie was stuck with it, and she could feel herself clutch each stack tight, like she never wanted to let it go. Needless to say, Lennie was having a tough time. The only people that had been with her to retrieve the Moon Chariot were gone, thousands of miles away. And the ones that spent Christian's last minutes with her angered her the most, that even one of them could chalk up a joke afterwards.

Lennie felt a breathe escape, and found her fingers were whitening with the death-grip she'd had on the paper. She remembered what Lia said about her grip and handshake, and wondered what she might say now, before she sighed and began to sort. That was when she found it.

-----

Lennie didn't have to feel Aspen struggle in order to get off of her. The tackle was to make sure this wasn't a long-winded effort. "Stay down or I will cuff you to a fucking tree." Lennie barked at the older Centurion. It wasn't an authority move or a sign that she was a Centurion. The reality is that she would have done this even if she wasn't considered a Legionnaire at all. This was for Christian still.

"Did you even say 'goodbye' to anyone?" Lennie scolded. Her dark hair was scathed and messy, but nonetheless still maintained in a bun, different from her usual style to let it flow. "Your mom? Your partner? Your people? Your sister?" She put emphasis on it, considering she knew Sophia was behind her. There was dead silence between the two, until Lennie had found the resignation of Aspen Virgo in the Senate House.

"As if this wasn't the biggest reminder we could get about what can happen to you out there. What's the plan, Aspen," Lennie scolded, "March up there sleep deprived to fight an unknown enemy and then wish him back?"

Sophia gave Lennie a small smile as the older girl. Both of them were at the Senate building for paperwork. Sophia knew that the other girl had been close to Christian, just like Aspen had been. Sophia hadn’t known him to well though. But she felt bad anyway.

They had been sorting their papers in silence for a couple minutes when Lennie got up and dashed out of the building. Sophia, confused pulled the other girls papers closer to her so she could see what had clearly set the other girl off. Her eyes widened after reading it, she gripped it tightly in her hand as she too ran out of the building, heading to the only exit of camp.

~~

Sophia was only about 30 seconds behind Lennie. She stopped a couple feet away from Lennie who had her sister pinned to the ground. “You were really going to leave again?!” The younger girl asked, some sort of mixture of anger and hurt mixed in her voice, making it crack. Making her sound way younger than she actually was.

Aspen could only feel the anger that was consuming her right now, obviously this is what Christian was trying to warn her about. She wanted to get up and tackle Lennie to the ground, but she knew she should at least be a little careful with her leg since her quest. Although the anger had slowly subsided when she heard her sister.

"You all act like I was leaving for good. I'm not. I was going to come back." Aspen stated with a slightly irritated tone. She sat up so she wasn't laying on the ground. She would offer to fight Lennie, but even in her state of mind, she knew it was best to stay put.

"I would have slept before I got there. Maybe then I would look in the surrounding area for him. I don't want to go fight or anything, but maybe he's just hiding somewhere and he's not able to get home. I have to at least look, Lennie. I have to." She said and tears began to come to her mind again, she could see him again behind Lennie, but all she could do was mutter a sorry before he disappeared again.

Lennie sighed at Aspen's desire to find Christian. She still didn't know he was an addict. "He-" She hadn't known what was in the letters that everyone else received. She wanted so badly to read them, so that she could know more about what his last moments were like. So that she could find out if he told anyone about the painkillers. The days it had taken to get back to camp made her struggle. Because if he had mentioned them to somebody, what could Lennie do? She wanted to protect his legacy, so people would remember him as someone worth fighting for. Not as a junkie who couldn't stop using to literally save his life.

"There's things that I could tell you. Something that would ruin the way you feel about him." Lennie answered. "Part of who he was came into play there, and that's how he died." She explained. "The people there, they took him by his skin, led him up a mountain to a shrine, and they slit his heels and then his neck. They bled him out and dropped him down a pit. So I cut off their leader's head with a pugio before she could bleed out." Lennie slowly repeated the events. They still didn't feel real. "His pugio."

"I'm sorry, Aspen." Lennie's voice faltered as she watched the other Centurion begin to cry. "He's not hiding. He's dead, and if you go out there they'll find you and find out you're one of us, and you'll be dead too." It was Lennie's quest, and that's how it happened. "I'm sorry." She repeated. "And I'll always be sorry."

Sophia kneeled down next to her sister. “Aspen leaving wouldn’t help. It really wouldn’t. I’m not just saying that either. I know what it feels like, ok. I’m sorry he died. I really am. But going after him, it won’t help bring him back. It’s just going to hurt worse.”

She didn’t know how to handle her older sister like this, it was a side she wasn’t used to seeing. What she wanted to say, didn’t sound right. So she did the same thing Eli did when Aspen had been missing, and Sophia didn’t sleep for a week straight trying to figure out a way to get her back.

Sophia wrapped her arms around her sister, “I really am sorry. But you can’t leave, even if you promise you’d come back.”

Listening to Lennie speak had hit her somewhere down in her core. Aspen had no words to speak for the moment as it wasn't long until she heard her sister speak too. She could feel the tears stream down her face even more, she wanted to sob knowing what would have happened to Christian. It wasn't fair. How could the world be so unfair?

"Lennie.." Aspen managed to speak out as she could feel Sophia's arms wrap around her. She wanted to just break into heavy sobs, but she couldn't not yet. "It's not your fault. You don't need to be sorry. He wouldn't want you to feel sorry." Aspen said as she held the urge to cry harder in. Aspen had noticed the papers that Sophia had been holding, but decided to wait to comment on it. Aspen opened up one of her arms free to invite and gesture Lennie in for a huge, she had a feeling that Lennie could use one too.

"My plan was to retire the whole time, even before I found out." Aspen plainly stated. "I even told Sophia on our quest that it was probably my last one. I have served for over ten years, and I was thinking of focusing on other aspects of my life, I'm sorry it upset both of you."

Seeing Sophia and her sister react the way they did made Lennie's heart shatter. Being behind the safety New Rome provided was painful. Having no risk was hard. When she was outside, fighting for her life, and she had to focus to live, she felt alive still. Being here, where all she could do was suffer and watch what others still had, Lennie felt more hopeless than she had that first night where she was alone. Christian was like her brother, and what Aspen and Sophia would do for each other, they would also do for each other.

"Don't you get it? Sinclair is still out there." Lennie managed to get out. "He put this all in motion, and he's still out there." Lennie saw the hug Aspen offered, and everything it meant. It meant healing, it meant accepting what had happened. Lennie rejected it, before pacing a short distance around the two. Her index finger and thumb grasped at her sinus, forcing herself to hold her tears back. She didn't want to heal. She wanted to hurt so bad that she'd never make a mistake like this again.

Lennie let the two sisters have their moment. Aspen deserved to be able to heal. "If you want out, I get it." She managed, pulling herself together. "This world is crazy, and every-time we beat something, something worse just takes it's place. But I'm going to kill Sinclair. I'll do it if it's the last thing I do." She swore.

“I’m not upset that you want to retire... I would want to also, if I were you. I’m upset that you want to leave without telling me, or anyone else...” Sophia said, pulling back from the hug enough so that she could see her sisters face.

Sophia finally put two and two together. Well not really, but it was the final piece needed. She and the other Centurions had suspicions that Sinclair had something to do with the moon chariot disappareing, and now they would have all the proof they need at the next meeting. Even if it was too late. Sophia wanted to kick herself, there were things they could have done to stop this.

Aspen had a mixture of emotions as Lennie began to tell her about Samuel. She was angry but part of her was also upset. She had offered out a hug to Lennie, but she had decided not to take it, and it made her question whether Lennie was okay or if she would even be willing to ever talk about it at all. Aspen had no idea what was going through her mind, perhaps she had managed to put it all aside, and honestly? Aspen couldn't even imagine being in Lennie's shoes.

"I'm going to still retire, but if you need help at all, you have my help Lennie." Aspen said and she slowly got up helping her sister up with her. Aspen felt some much anger and rage in the moment that she was considering just walking up to that little village and slaughtering as many as she could, but she knew it would be pointless. It wouldn't bring him back.

"Just give me a time and place and I'll be there."

"No." Lennie replied. "If my brother was here, I'd do anything to keep him here. Your family already lost you once. The rest of us don't have the same things to lose that you do. And I need this." Lennie assured the pair. "I hope you can understand that." Lennie breathed out.

"There's another one." Lennie breathed out. "A letter to his mom and dad. I know they didn't get along, he hasn't talked to them in 10 years." Lennie reached into her pocket, digging out the small parchment and Christian's pugio, which still hadn't been cleaned with it's time with Xena. Lennie could feel her arms become more heavy when she was holding both of the items, as if they weighed a hundred pounds each.

"Do you want it?" Lennie slowly asked, before flashing Christian's pugio to Aspen. "I'm supposed to give it to the senate, but, they don't know that I still have it, and... I think he'd want you to have it with you." She offered the blade out to the girl, blade in and handle out.

The word no was a hard pill to swallow. Aspen didn't want to just sit in the sidelines while Lennie did the work. She didn't want to just let someone else get back at this guy for Christian, but all of her features softened a bit as the pugio was being offered to her. The offer of his pugio meant so much to Aspen that she couldn't even explain why it did. Maybe it was just the fact that it would be another thing of his that she could hold onto.

"I want it." Aspen said as she reached out to take the pugio from Lennie. "As far as the senate knows, it got lost."