Re: Eames/Holly: dreaming
The boy, the captain, was standing there in a puddle of sweat, but there wasn't one bruise on him. There wasn't even the memory of a bruise, not visible, and the boy had always been good at pretending. If he believed a thing hard enough, it became true. He was unmarred, and he just looked at the quartermaster's borrowed bruises. It never occurred to him that E might own his bruises, because he wasn't that kind of selfless. This was his dream, and everything here was about him. Life was better lived that way, and the boy had learned that long ago. Standing there, in the puddle of sweat, he didn't even think about the lost captain, the prior one. He didn't think about it at all, even as the yearning ate a hole in a gut and filled it burning and with bile.
Here, the boy was bigger. The camo was still big on him, but he was older. Teen, still holding onto the lankiness of a growth spurt, but solid. Stocky. Tall. He was over 6 feet now, and he was still staring at the portal and pushing floppy brown hair from his dark eyes.
"It's a portal," said the now-bigger captain, the statement accompanied by a very teenage roll of eyes. "We have to go in there," he said, but the boy, the captain, the teen, was even more machinating at this age than before, and he turned and looked at E, eyes narrowing with a thought... an idea. "I order you to go in first," he said bossily, hands coming to rest on his hips. Because if E's skin bubbled off, then the captain would come up with a new plan. If E was fine? Then the captain would know it was safe to go in. Simple.