WHO: Lila Pitts & Diego Hargreeves (with appearances by Graciela) WHAT: A flashback to the last time Diego and Graciela saw Lila, and the first time they're seeing her again. WHEN: After the arrival battle, 2033 WARNINGS: Language, sad, lots of attempted murder on both sides STATUS: Complete
“But!” Graciela huffed and had she not been clutching a dagger (other people may have frowned at the child holding a knife, but Diego would rather she learn how to use it and be able to defend herself if she had to, that was responsible, fuck off) she would have crossed her arms over her chest. “I promised Auntie Evie I’d practice my tracking!”
“And Auntie Evie will have my ass if we don’t get back,” Diego countered. Typically, he might not have taken Graciela out with him, but with no one around to watch her that Diego approved of, and the fact that Graciela was inclined to sneak away from anyone who she didn’t approve of, sometimes taking her with him on shorter errands was easier. Or, if not easier, than at least more reassuring for Diego. The people he trusted with his daughter were few and far between. “Come on, we’ve been out for too long anyway.” Graciela grumbled, because she couldn’t let her dad think he’d won anything over on her, but she went along anyway..
It hadn’t been long into their journey back to the Outpost when Diego felt the hairs on the back of his neck–-intuition, a sixth sense, or something else entirely, but he stopped short and threw out an arm to prevent Graciela from going any further. “Go hide, Graciela.”
“Dad, no, I want to stay–”
“You go and hide, and if I tell you to run, you run like you’ve never run before, okay? That’s all you have to do, you hide and you run.” He kissed her on her forehead before she ran off into a scattering of bushes, and Diego had to hope that the assassin training she’d been given since she could ask for it would be enough. Diego’s own training told him he should have pulled out a knife–should have pulled out five knives and had them ready to go, as it was, his fingers tapped a nonsense beat against his leg holster.
But he didn’t.
“Come on out babe, I know you’re there.”
The woman that prowled the woods was no longer Lila. She had no thoughts beyond the goal she was compelled to pursue: the death and destruction of all rebels. Even the so-called thoughts to that purpose weren't really thoughts so much as instincts. Her powers had been used against a number of rebels already and they would continue to be useful very soon.
When Diego spoke, Lila leapt out and tackled him to the ground. They rolled in a tangle of limbs and dirt, over sharp rocks and sticks. She sounded like an animal, all growls and no words. She was an animal. A fierce one, blind to anything but tearing Diego apart. She pinned him to the ground beneath her.
She was not oblivious to the small child skittering through the bushes, still too close to the danger. Her monstrously blank eyes turned sharply towards the sound. She stole one of Diego's thigh daggers, and his power while she was at it, and she launched the dagger off into the trees.
Diego’s hand stretched out as if he could grab the knife–he couldn’t, of course, but he needed the visual in order to tap into whatever it was called that made him and his siblings unique. For a second, the knife hovered in the air, pulled between two forces. But as Lila had always said, there was no one more stubborn than Diego Hargreeves, especially not when his daughter’s life was on the line, and the knife flew in the opposite direction and ‘thunked’ into a tree trunk.
He wasn’t aiming to hurt Lila, and that was the difference, even now when he knew that logically, he should have, the what if haunted him. If, just if there was a chance that someday the thralls could be reversed and Lila could be herself and they could be a family again, Diego would take it. “I know you’re still in there,” he muttered, because again, no one was more stubborn than Diego, and he jerked to the side, hard, to start rolling and scuffling in a different direction, away from the bushes.
Lila made an inhuman noise as the knife careened off target and she was bodily rolled away. He might have been more stubborn, but she was more agile, and before long she had him twisted into a painful position, his chest to the ground and her arm around his neck, squeezing tight. A rock hit her in the back and she whirled towards the trees, spotting Graciela’s dark hair disappearing back behind cover. Diego was too physically strong to keep him pinned for long and, although there were very few lights on in her mind, there was enough instinct and viciousness to know she needed to end this fast.
She stole another one of his daggers, this one from his boot. A childish scream echoed along the cliffside as Lila replaced her arm around Diego’s neck with the biting slice of his blade and blood gushed from the wound. Little footsteps pounded across dry leaves and grass. Diego was still alive – the thrall could tell because she could still feel the power of her mimicry calling on his ability.
Somewhere inside her, in the dark cramped cage where the thrall spell had her trapped, true Lila was screaming her anguish. But the thrall still lifted her blood-soaked blade to aim for the child one last time.
Diego knew the trouble he was in the second he felt his boot knife slip out, almost immediately after he felt the sharp sting of it on his neck he wrapped a hand around the wound and pressed down, hard. Time moved differently then, slowly, images flashed before him in time with the sound of his heartbeat in his ears.
Thud
He threw his head back in a hard jerk to throw Lila’s aim off.
Thud
Gracie screamed and wasn’t running away, she was running towards them.
Thud
Lila was gone.
Thud
In the Outpost, in a hallway, Diego blinked at Lila.
“Hey.”
Diego didn’t know all that had to be done to save his life, but whatever it was plus his sheer stubbornness to stay alive for Graciela had left him with a jagged scar across his throat and vocal cords that never fully healed. He sounded as if he’d swallowed a glass full of gravel and glass, made worse by the sudden wave of emotion that threatened to pull him under. He loved Lila with everything in him, and that hadn’t changed just because she had become a thrall. But Diego had made a conscious choice to stay at the Outpost because his daughter needed him, but also because he just didn’t know if he could face the blank stare of nothingness from Lila. And now that she was here, he had spent so much time focusing on Graciela and making sure she felt supported and heard that Diego hadn’t let himself feel or think about himself.
It was a lot. Almost too much.
Lila had been stubborn enough to agree to this bloody time travel only a month after giving birth, but she hadn't expected to show up and immediately have to fight. It had worked out some of the jitters, at least. Not all of them - she was out of practice with all of this, after all - but enough that hearing Diego say hey in that rough voice didn't make her jump out of her skin. It did make her spin towards him a little too fast though.
"Damn it, Diego. Don't sneak up on me like that." She was wrapping a bandage around a shallow cut on her bicep, but she paused to stare at his scarred neck for a long moment. It took entirely too long to realize she wasn't breathing. The bandage dangled half-done from her arm as she moved forward, fingertips reaching for that terrible mark. She had no way of knowing she'd done this, of course. But she was still horrified. "Good God, what happened to you?"
Instead of answering Diego stepped in and finished wrapping Lila’s arm. It gave him something to do, something to focus on so he could find solid ground again instead of straight up freefalling. He wanted to look at Lila because he hadn’t seen her looking like herself in two years, but also looking at her was so hard, like pouring salt into a wound that hadn’t even started to heal.
“You okay?” he asked, quickly glancing around for a dark haired ten year old who was just as likely to be hiding in the shadows as she was to make a loud, don’t give a fuck entrance. Either way, Diego was going to have to do some quick explaining before she showed up. “Did they tell you anything–also, fuck me, wait.” He took Lila by the shoulders. “Graciela’s here, and she’s okay. I know you just had her. I’m sorry. I promise you, she’s literally everything we wanted her to be.” That was the most important thing, after all, their daughter came above and before everything else, and Lila having to leave her as an infant was incredibly shitty. With any luck her being here would change everything for them, but. But. That didn’t make it any easier.
The fact that he didn't answer made her insides twist up uncomfortably. The discomfort of the cut being bandaged was miniscule in comparison.
"I'm fine, I'm just--I didn't expect you to look like this. And to sound like someone left a chunk of knife behind in your bloody throat." The imagery was an immediate mistake. Hearing Graciela's name was a good distraction, though. Lila's gaze tracked around them until she spotted half of an eye and some dark hair peeking from around a corner.
"I'm here because they made it sound like we were all fucked if we didn't all get on board and fast. That and those of us on the list were already done for in some way or another." She wouldn't have really blinked at that once upon a time. But she had a family now. One she wanted to grow old with. The only reason she'd left them behind was to save them. She leaned forward to whisper. "Why is she lurking if she's okay?”
Diego flinched. Minutely, he would have denied it if caught, but it was there. A reflex from something hitting too close to the truth that he wanted to protect Lila from. He attempted to cover it up with all the bravado and confidence he could muster and said, “Excuse you, I’m fucking hot.”
He caught the flash of movement of Graciela disappearing out of the corner of his eye and hoped that her vanishing was more because she had been caught sneaking around and not because of her hesitation in seeing her mom. They had had a lot of talks, and Gracie seemed to vacillate from what she wanted to do. Most of the time she was on the side of wanting to see Lila, and Diego hadn’t wanted to keep pushing her to talk about it, let alone get her to commit to something. She was the child and his job was to protect her, but he also knew she was her own person who could make her own decisions.
“She’s been through a lot, Lila. And she thinks she’s sneaky,” he said by way of explanation, the latter part louder for a child who was definitely eavesdropping, and chuckled when he felt something strike the back of his head in protest. But officially caught, Graciela came out from her hiding place and came up to Diego, who put his arm across her shoulder for a hug. She blinked up at Lila, then at Diego, then back at Lila.
“Mum?”
"Well of course you're hot, I just--" Lila shut up as Graciela came over, her eyes going wide as she took in the girl. Having seen her as an adult hadn't prepared her for seeing Graciela as a baby, let alone as a ten year old. It was just the screwiest way of doing this parenting gig, all out of order. And her emotions still hadn't quite leveled out after the whole giving birth thing. So seeing her baby as not a baby but a near pre-teen with big wounded eyes and a straight back made her want to burst in tears.
She didn't because she had some control over that now, thank you very much.
"Hello, kitten," she said gently, reaching out to brush a hand over Graciela's hair. "Bear with me, alright? I was just wiping spit up off your face yesterday." Her daughter froze for a second and then pushed forward to wrap her arms around Lila's waist. "Oh. Okay, this is good too." Lila looked up at Diego for help as she hugged Graciela back.
Gracie promptly dissolved into tears, her face pressed against Lila’s shirt, and for a moment, that was all the little girl could do. She tried to be strong–she was strong, for that matter, but she was still a young child without her mother. “I just really missed you, Mum, I missed you so much.”
Fuck. Fuck. Diego wasn’t ready, he thought he had been prepared, he had braced himself for seeing Lila, had reinforced all of his walls and shields in order to get through this, but at the end of the day, the sight of her with their daughter took him out at the knees. Always had. Always would. He practically bit through his tongue trying to resist the urge to reach out to both of them, but ultimately failed, holding both Lila and Graciela on the shoulders. “She hasn’t seen you in two years,” Diego said, and then amended, “We haven’t seen you in two years. The last time we saw you was–really fucking shitty.”
Graciela pulled away just enough to wipe her eyes and demand, “But, who’s watching baby me?” which drew a snort from Diego, who then pointed at himself. Graciela looked skeptical. “By yourself? Who’s watching you?”
“Your uncles and Auntie Evie are there too,” he responded, and if his voice caught on the word ‘uncles’, well, hopefully no one would notice. God, how stupid was it to be jealous of his past self, who got to do mundane things like sit around at night on the train with Lila and their friends, with Graciela being passed around. Lucky bastard.
Her kid was crying so naturally Lila was crying. She didn't know what exactly had happened to her, but she was starting to get the picture. They'd been there, for whatever it was. Her family was traumatized and here she was feeling very out of her element. Still, she hugged Graciela tighter before the girl pulled away, and she kept one hand on Diego's shirtfront as a balance for herself.
"I know your dad will take good care of you. What I don't know is if he'll also take good care of himself." She eyed Diego pointedly. There was a good chance his friends would have to bully him into sleeping, but she trusted them to watch out for him. Hopefully, the wizards would have a way to message the past, but if not, she'd just have to power through. Lila tucked some of Graciela's hair behind her ear and exhaled, trying to steady herself again. "I can't imagine how hard all of this is for you both. But I'm here to do what I can to help fix it. Just...say something if I make things harder, yeah? And tell me where I can crash while I'm here."
“What? No, Mum,” Graciela’s hold on Lila tightened, instinctively. “Mum, you’re staying with us. Right, Dad? We have space. Dad, tell her we have space.” Her tears changed to anger almost immediately, already gearing up for a fight, already prepared to throw down even as Diego lifted his hands. She felt everything so intensely, and woe be to the person who got in her way.
“We have space,” he agreed, but was carefully watching Lila’s face as if to anticipate her feelings and reaction. “You should stay with us. It’s your space too.” Literally. Lila’s things were still there, as Diego couldn’t bring himself to put them away. On the off chance Lila would come back to herself, somehow, he wanted her to not only have her things, but know that they never gave up and wanted her back.
Hopefully it wasn’t going to be too fucking weird for her to see them. Fucking fuck fuck.
“And we want you to,” he added, clearing his throat yet again, although it did nothing to improve the quality of his voice. “I mean, fucking, Gracie’s going to break into wherever you are anyway–”
“--You bet your ass I am–”
“Language, Jesus Christ,” Diego sighed exasperated, and yes, he realized the irony of him commenting on anyone’s language but when it was his ten year old daughter, he had to at least put up a valiant fight. “And there’s no fucking way I’d be okay with you somewhere else. I would kick my own ass, and I would deserve it.”
Lila met Diego's watchful stare with an uncertain one of her own. Once upon a time, she'd have taken the offer and not really considered the consequences. Her own wants and needs had always come first. But Diego had come along and "ruined" all that. Now she took a moment to think before making a decision.
"Kind of tempted to make it a challenge for her and to watch you kick your own ass when you put it like that, love," she teased. Growing quiet for a second, she finally nodded, more seriously. "If you're sure it's not too much. I'd rather be close to you both. I'm bloody here for you both. And I suppose a few more of these ridiculous people," she joked cavalierly. She wouldn't admit it, but she'd grown fond of Diego's family. She liked to think of them as her family too.
"Speaking of…" She stepped back to take a glance around. She hadn't seen Jacob or Serefin yet, which was probably a bad sign. At the risk of causing Diego pain, Lila ripped the bandaid off. "Do you want to tell me how bad it is?"
“I know.” Swallowing down the bowling ball that had lodged in his throat, Diego wrapped Lila up in a hug because she damn sure looked like she needed one and hell, he probably did too. “And I’ll make sure that when this is over, you go home to a lot less cooler and hotter than me but still cooler and hotter than everyone else me and our kid.”
His jaw tightened once again as Diego thought about where even to begin the conversation of all they had lost. None of it was fair. None of it would be easy. But Lila deserved the full picture. So he nodded, kept one arm around her shoulder, and inclined his head towards the direction Graciela was walking–backwards, as if she wanted to make sure her parents were following and didn’t get lost or mysteriously disappear. “No. Not really. I fucking will anyway.”