every day they grow stronger.
she’s gripping maggie’s hand as hard as she can, harder than she should, harder than can be comfortable.
but maggie doesn’t complain, doesn’t ask, doesn’t say anything.
they know that these are their final moments, that there is no denying it. no hope that someone will swoop in and save them. it’s clear and it’s sad, but it’s expected.
alex wants to cry, the more she thinks about it. about everything they’ve done, and everything she wishes they could have done. she wants to cry, thinking about her mother and her father, and everyone else. even kelex, that stupid, stupid droid. and alex hates crying, she almost never cries, but her eyes are burning and her chest is tight and she just can’t help the few tears that find an escape.
and when she looks back up and looks over at maggie, she starts to have a harder time holding back the tears.
and maggie smiles, that goddamn smile that makes alex flustered, kept her grounded and reminded her of everything they were fighting for. it’s a smile full of hope, and alex feels a little odd, seeing it in such a hopeless moment.
but it’s comforting, and that’s better than nothing. so in their last few moments, when alex starts thinking about everything that’s happened, there’s that last bit of comfort in maggie’s smile and the feeling of her hand being squeezed back.
alex is just a kid. she’s six, nearly seven, and she’s watching as her father’s being shot, her mother being grabbed, being taken, and hears the order yelled out to “find the kid”.
it takes a minute for her to really realise it, but it’s her . she’s the kid. and as soon as it registers to her, she’s up and running. she’s running to where her mom always told her to go, if something like this happened. but alex was a kid, she was little, she never thought that something like this would ever happened. never even thought that this hiding spot would be necessary. she thought her mom was just being dramatic, being a mom .
but now she’s running to that special hiding place, running when all she wants to do is scream and cry and be held by her dad. but that’s never going to happen again, because she just watched her father be killed.
so she runs and she runs and she runs and by the time she’s crawling into the tiny hiding spot, she’s out of breath and heaving for air, while trying to stay as quiet as possible. there are tears streaming down her face and she can’t stop it from happening. she’s a kid and she’s rarely this emotional, but her dad is dead and her mother is gone and she’s alone and scared and doesn’t know what she’s going to do, after all of this is over. once they give up on “finding the kid”, where is she going to go? her family is gone , and she has no one. and then there’s the thought of them never giving up. always looking for her.
but the worst thought is the one of them finding her. because she doesn’t know what they’ll do, because even though she’s little, she’s not naive, and after what just happened, she’s horrified of the thought.
when she hears footsteps, her heart freezes and she covers her mouth, hoping that she won’t make any noise. there’s talking, and alex squeezes her eyes shut, not wanting to see them open up the rock, not wanting to watch as they find her.
but after nearly a minute, they’re turning around and leaving and alex can finally breathe again.
alex had sat in that tiny hole for two days. she was heading into the third, when the rock opens up and she sees the face of a man she doesn’t know. he tells he to come out, to come with him, and it takes alex a couple minutes before she concedes. because she doesn’t know who this man is, she’s never met him before, but she’s also lost everything she knows, and he looks nice enough for her to find some hope within him.
so she crawls up the ladder, gripping tightly onto her tiny plush, her little backpack still holding onto her shoulders. once she’s out of the hole, the man smiles to her, another reassuring smile that lets her know that she’s making the right choice.
he reaches a hand, to let her hold onto, and she takes it quickly. because while this man is nothing like her mom, nothing like her dad, he’s comforting and kind and alex is just glad that she was found by him, and not anyone else.
when he starts walking, still holding alex’s hand, she doesn’t move. so instead, he picks her up and carries her, just like her dad would.
he begins the walk again, and alex holds onto him tightly. she buries her face into his shoulder, not wanting to look up at the world around her, just wanting to feel the warmth that this man is providing for her.
they’ve been walking for a couple minutes, total silence surrounding them, besides the sounds of feet on the ground and the wind. and then the silence between them is interrupted, as the strange man begins to talk.
“you can call me j’onn, alex.”
the ship they’re on is big. bigger than anything alex had ever seen before, bigger than her little home, and to alex’s six year old mind, bigger than the planet she lived on.
her legs swing back and forth, her eyes dart around the interior. being on the ship itself has been enough of a distraction for her to nearly forget all the bad things that have happened in the past few days, and she’s happy to have that distraction.
every sound is new and the structure of the ship is different from her home, understandably so. alex had always heard stories about ships, about different things that have happened on them, places they’ve gone, but it’s her first real experience with one, and she’s excited.
excited, but nervous, because while the trip is neat, she has no idea where she’s going. j’onn had said something, told her the name of the planet they were going to, but she couldn’t remember it. she was too overwhelmed, too distracted, too emotional.
and then they’re landing. not that alex would have been able to realise it, but j’onn comes in and tells her such.
she’s climbing out of her seat, her legs a little wobbly because of the nerves and the not entirely steady ground. just as they’re hitting the ground, the shake knocks alex off balance and she’s just about to hit the ground when j’onn grabs her by the back of her shirt. he gets her back up and onto her feet and gives her a smile, causing a rush of comfort to flood alex’s body.
because maybe, even though everything has been really bad, and even though she misses her parents and her home, things are looking up. in some sort of a way.
she’s being led off the ship, and struggles between staring at the building they’re about to enter, and turning around to look at the ship they just left.
she’s holding onto j’onn’s hand, and just as he’s about to lead her into the building, she stops. she turns around, and stares at the ship. alex is glad she’s finally getting a look at it, as she hadn’t seen it when she entered. she figures that she’ll be able to see the base any time, but she’s not going to miss her chance to look at this ship.
j’onn smiles, tells her that she’ll be able to see the ship later, which has alex excited. she thinks she already loves the ship, and she really, really , wants to see it some more.
now that she’s been turned around, and that they’re walking towards the “building” alex is realising how odd it looks. it’s tiny, even smaller than her home on vallt. she’s skeptical, when they’re walking towards the building.
she can’t totally comprehend why the building is as small as it is, but she’s still too afraid to talk. so she just follows along, and it isn’t until she’s in the building that she completely understands it.
once they’re inside, j’onn is leading alex down a flight of stairs, and before she knows it, they’re underground and in the largest room that alex has ever seen. people are moving about and there’s some sort of a buzz throughout the room. there are hallways after hallways and so many different paths that alex is already worried about getting lost.
alex’s eyes are wide and her mouth is slightly agape and she is stuck between the feeling of wanting to explore and wanting to turn around and go back to the ship. because at least with the ship, she can’t get that lost. there isn’t nearly the amount of space on the ship as there is in the base, and alex has to take back all of her previous thoughts of the ship being the largest thing she’s ever seen.
she’s still trying to grasp how big this place is, when someone comes running up to j’onn, babbling about something that alex can’t quite understand.
the girl is probably alex’s age, maybe a bit younger, but there definitely isn’t much of an age gap. alex is sort of dumbfounded when she sees her. alex has known all of two people her entire life, and just a few hours prior she met j’onn, and now she’s barely even meeting this girl and alex is overwhelmed by her.
she’s only six, but she feels it in her bones that this girl is important, will be important, to her, and alex doesn’t know how to deal with that.
her hair is long and dark and alex has to stop herself from reaching out to touch it. her eyes are light and soft, and she’s short enough to be smaller than alex, but isn’t noticeably short for her age.
and alex looks away. focuses on everything else in the room. watches the people go by and tries to remember details about each one. how fast one person was walking, what someone was holding onto. it works well, and if it weren’t for the fact that she could still hear the girl talking, alex thinks she could forget about her. but part of alex keeps nagging at her to look back, because she doesn’t want to forget about this girl.
and before she knows it, j’onn is giving her a little nudge and she’s looking back to j’onn and this girl. the girl has the biggest smile on her face, and j’onn tells her that this girl, lucy, is going to show her around.
lucy.
she repeats the name a couple times in her head, and before she can even realise what is happening, lucy is holding her hand and dragging her off, and j’onn’s laughter can be heard in the background.
alex doesn’t know what to do, so she lets herself be dragged down the different hallways that twist and turn way too often for alex’s preference. really, she has no idea how she’s ever going to find her way back to j’onn, and the more she thinks about it, the more scared she gets.
but at the same time, there’s something comforting about lucy’s hand in hers, something that tells her she’s going to be okay. it’s the kind of feeling that she hasn’t felt since she hugged her parents, since they told her they loved her.
lucy is talking and talking and talking, explaining each room to alex, telling her all the rooms they aren’t allowed to go into. really, though, alex is mostly focused on holding onto lucy’s hand.
they’ve gone through four different hallways and lucy has barely stopped talking, when alex squeezes her hand. alex doesn’t know what she completely means by it, but as soon as she does it, lucy freezes.
she turns around and faces alex, and looks her over for a few seconds. a smile crosses her lips, softer than alex has seen so far. she looks at alex for a couple more moments, before turning around and continuing their journey, this time much slower than earlier.
within a couple of minutes, alex is led into a small room with just a bed and a dresser. there are pictures and drawings all over the walls and there’s something comforting about it.
lucy tells her to sit on the bed, and alex does what she’s told. she regrets it almost instantly, because then lucy is letting go of her hand, and she misses the warmth, the comfort.
she takes her bag, and puts it over onto her dresser, and if alex wasn’t so comfortable with this girl already, she’d probably argue. but there was something about lucy and something about j’onn that told alex that everything would be okay. there has yet to be another person to be able to do that, and alex has a feeling that that person doesn’t exist.
lucy comes back, sits down next to alex on the little bed, and takes her hand again. they sit like that for a while, and alex finds the silence to be settling.
lucy breaks the silence, after maybe ten minutes, and alex feels her little heart flutter.
“we’re going to be best friends, alex.”