weldedtomyspine | El Paso, Texas [Monday evening]

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El Paso, Texas [Monday evening]

The mission had been a success. It had been long, and busy, and incredibly demanding. He'd barely had time to sleep, worked himself into exhaustion every day, and managed not to think about anything but fighting alien invaders for a whole week.

Oh, and they'd actually beat off said alien invaders. That had been good too.

But mostly the distraction had been what Jaime had been going for. And while he felt a little bit guilty for his priorities, he was still grateful. And as his feet touched the ground in his back yard, he knew that tomorrow that distraction was gone, but that all that exhaustion from fighting would thankfully keep that from happening for at least another night.

And he'd be glad to see his family again.

Even Milagro.

So Jaime de-armored, sighed in relief at the breeze blowing across his skin, and headed for the back door.

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Jaime reached out and grabbed the bag of trash before it could hit the ground. "I just got back," he half-heartedly whined. "Couldn't Milagro take out the trash?"

Because, obviously, his mom had used her special mom-powers to detect his arrival and decided that Jaime should do some chores.

"Ah! How do you know Milagro, Thief?!" Luckily it only took a moment more for Momoko to recognize the voice and she didn't actually complete the punch. "Jaime?"

...

Momoko?

Jaime didn't actually manage to say the name. He was too busy staring and trying to get his brain to start working again.

...

No luck so far.

Which was when Dinah came stumbling in, bearing a baseball bat, looking half-asleep and demanding, "Whozit? Whasshappening?"

"It's Jaime! He's back!" Momoko grabbed the bat from the sleepy Dinah with a chuckle. Funny how just seeing him had Momoko feeling so much lighter inside. "Milagro's finishing a report for school, and anyway it was my turn to take it out. Here, let me take it! Welcome home!"

"Jaimeeeee!" Dinah perked up, nearly stumbling as Momoko grabbed the bat and tried to grab the garbage, and Dinah went for the Jaime-hug. Of the guy just standing there. Kinda looking shocked. "You're baaack! Finally. Jeez."

Dinah?

Wha--?

And now there was an ex-girlfriend-current-awesome-friend was hugging him. At least Jaime's arms seemed to know how to respond to that. As he hugged back, some part of him was kind of surprised that she didn't disappear like a ghost or something.

His brain still hadn't caught up, of course.

Momoko laughed. "You've only been waiting two days!" It didn't take that long to dump the bag into the can and soon Momoko was back and taking one of his hands (Sorry Dinah) to drag him back to the house. "I told her you said two weeks. At least that's what your parents said."

Okay, she couldn't hold it any longer: she bounced up and kissed his cheek.

Dinah let go of him so Momoko could have her squishing chance, and grabbed his hand to squeeze it. "So, save the world? Nobody got hurt? You didn't get hurt, right? Your mom made us empanadas, we should get you some, did you eat?"

...

"You're..." Alive? Here? Thingy.

"Both of you?"

"Noooo. I'm me and she's Dinah!" Momoko totally knew what he was asking. "Come in! We'll totally explain! You have to eat first, though! I got to help with dinner!"

Okay, tonight she'd made the salad, but it totally counted.

Oh, totally.

Dinah snickered at Jaime, and tugged on his hand. "C'mon, c'mon. Did you not even check your messages, goofy boy? You need food to be thinking with."

Jaime still looked like he'd just been hit in the face with a sledge-hammer, but at least that made him easy to lead into the house?

So... it wasn't all bad?

"And how d'you spell 'Mesopotamian'?" Milagro hollered as she stuck her head into the living room.

Momoko waved at her. "Look! Mila-chan! Jaime's back!"

"Sound it out!" Dinah called back. "It isn't a tricky one." She opened the fridge, and floated a drink out for Jaime, then the plate of leftover empanadas and absently put them into the microwave. "So who were you fighting, hunh? Your mom didn't say." She peered into Jaime's face, then waved her hand in front of his eyes. "Jaime? How tired are you?"

Some part of Jaime's brain finally caught up enough with things for his eyes to widen. "You're both back!"

This time it wasn't a question. Progress!

"It's not easy either!" Milagro stomped back into the hallway. "I'm going into your room to get your dictionary, Jaime!"

Momoko shoved Jaime towards a kitchen chair, laughing. "That's totally sister-speak for 'welcome back'. And yes, we're back, too. Or were back. Already. We're not ghosts or zombies or evil clones or robot us-es! Promise!"

"Is not. M-E-S-O--" Dinah interrupted herself to grin at Jaime, then lean over to poke at him. "And you're real too. Oh good. We're all on the same page." The microwave pinged and she pulled the empanadas out, floating them over to Jaime as she got up to rummage for a fork. "Jeez, what do you have a phone for, guy?"

Momoko frowned at that. "You know, I think I didn't call him."

"Oh. Well, I did, I texted everyone," Dinah said, shaking her head, one leg swinging as she reached into the fridge for a drink of her own. "But it's not the same as us being here, hunh? Jak's back. Priestly's back. Sam's back-- oh, hey, Sam and Peter are engaged! Cool, hunh?"

"Ah! I did send emails!" Momoko sank into the chair across from Jaime, keeping hold of his hand. At least until he complained. "Oh! And Leda is fine, too. We missed her party, did I tell you that? It was Sunday. I still haven't heard from my-Warren yet. I'm totally calling him if I don't by Friday."

"Wait, wait," Jaime said, shaking his head. "Slow down."

"Can we start at the beginning?"

Last he'd known, both of them had been... well...

Jaime didn't want to think about that.

"Um." Dinah blinked at him, then took a sip of her drink. "Hang on. The beginning was... uhhh. Right! We've been back since last Sunday! And people at Fandom fought the people behind the Nothing. And won."

That's pretty succinct, right?

Momoko sighed fondly at Dinah and tapped Jaime's plate with her fingernail. "Eat!"

"We were both Gone. No one who was gone remembers anything about it. I remember talking with you and then losing the fight and falling from the sky." A short pause for catching her breath. "Next thing I know I wake up on some weird American island and it's a almost two weeks later." She shrugged. "What Dinah said."

Edited 2011-12-20 04:36 (UTC)

Jaime managed to eat mostly automatically because his brain wasn't really working properly yet.

"Don't... remember anything?" Remember... disappearing? Just... being gone?

He wasn't sure if that was a blessing or a curse.

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