trans_9 | In another life

Jaime had been poring over the notes left to him by his other self and his investigations had led him here.

The Vatican. He stared up at the scarred edifice of the building, bullet holes and scorch marks. Places near the doors and windows where claws had gouged into the stone. He traced a finger along one of these marks as he tried to imagine what it must have been like. A tide of, well, zombies, surging against the makeshift fortifications. Gunfire and explosions. The stench of death. And this had been something his other self had been convinced was his own fault. Jaime couldn't seem to grasp the magnitude of it. Thousands of people, dead. Because of a mistake? The malevolence of others. He opened and closed a fist.

This wasn't his mistake though. It wasn't his burden to carry. It shouldn't be. He wasn't here. And yet he couldn't help feeling slightly culpable. It had been him, a version of him, that had made the decisions that led here. Finally, he spoke aloud.

"No. This wasn't me. I don't have to live burdened by what someone else did." A pause.

"Even if it was me." Khaji snickered mentally, a faint buzz against the back of his mind.

"Oh, yeah, laugh it up, bug."

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Mary Jane had been meaning to explore the City more. Peter appeared to have his own schedule, one that was quite content with and wished him well with, and so, when he went to go start his day, so did she. She had already visited a couple shops and even some quiet, crumbling buildings.

But the Vatican. That just stood out above them all and the rest.

She pushed open the double doors to the church, peering in.

"Hello?" Did she just hear someone?

Jaime half-turned as heard another voice, surprised that someone else was bothering to visit the place.

"Uh. Hey." He raised a hand to wave at the red-head.

Mary Jane now saw the person. So there was someone else in here. "Do you mind if you have company, or are you...praying?" While she was not so much religious, she could respected those who were, and understood that in a church, prayers were usually silent and lone.

"Oh! No. I'm not praying. Just. . .thinking, really. Trying to get some stuff figured out." He smiled at Mary Jane, giving a small shrug.

"Some important stuff happened here, apparently."

"I guess that's why you're 'just thinking', huh?" She stepped into the church, quietly shutting the doors behind her (it was a church, after all) and then walked down to where Jaime sat. She sat down next to it.

"Nice place to think, though, right?" She looked up at the altar. It felt quite safe in the church. Safe enough to just relax and let thoughts wander and ponder and gather.

"Yeah, I suppose so." He looks back towards the doors.

"A lot of people died here." His voice is quiet, morose. He doesn't want to think about it, but that's all that's on his mind right now.

"Mr. Reyes." Hey, look, its an old friend. Of the other Jaime. But he does look (relatively) happy to see you as he approached.

"I heard you were finally back with us, kid. How're you feeling?"

Jaime manages not to grimace. It's so weird having people who are familiar to him that he doesn't know. Instead, he gives a polite smile and offers a hand.

"I don't think we've met yet. Well, you and me me, anyway."

That... was a very weird response, even considering the context of this ship. So he doesn't shake Jaime's hand, instead pausing to give him a concerned look.

"Jaime?" You might want to explain yourself.

"Yeah. That's me." He eyed Leon up and down.

"I know I was here before. Because I--the other me--left notes for myself, if an alternate self--like me--ever showed up. It's complicated."

"...I'd imagine so." he looked at Jaime a little skeptically. This kid looked just like how he remembered Jaime looking.

"Is this some kind of joke?" He questioned. "You used to joke about alternate selves and stuff like that before, and frankly, I wouldn't put it past you and Paco to try to pull off a prank like that."

"It's not a prank. If it were, I'd be having a much better time." He's grim faced for a moment.

"I'm here because I'm trying to understand what the other me did that made him feel responsible for all. . .this." He waves a hand at the battle damaged Vatican.

"And I still don't know your name."

Most of what had drawn Rachel there was curiosity-- it was kind of a hard building to miss, and of course she recognised it. And then there were the damages to the building that caught her attention.

Approaching, she heard a voice, and said, "Probably shouldn't make a habit of talking to yourself."

"Huh? Oh. I wasn't talking to myself. Just to Khaji Da." He smiles at the other teenager--quite the attractive blonde, actually--and gives a wave.

"Not crazy, I promise."

Okay then.

"Leon S. Kennedy, Captain of the ship." Previous Jaime had friends in high places, apparently. "And what happened here," he motioned vaguely around the Vatican, "is kind of a long story."

"Good to meet you, sir. And I got the cliffs-notes version. Wasn't too pretty." He shrugs and half-turns to look at the building again.

"He also said you know about the Scarab and the Ohm and that I could trust you."

Rachel gave him a sceptical look, but she approached anyway. "Sure then," she said, a bit dubiously, but she shrugged. "It's not like you'd be the first one on the ship, anyway."

"He's my symbiote. Scarab. Whatever you want to call it. He's embedded in my spine. Long story." Jaime grins.

"I'm Jaime, by the way."

"He blamed himself for a lot of this. For all of this. It wasn't his fault, though." He shook his head a little. Poor, stupid kid.

"And, yeah, I know about Khaji. And that he's some kind of very distant relative of the Ohm. Though no one is entirely sure of what that means at this juncture."

Jaime shook his head as well.

"Hopefully it won't happen this way again." He looks at Leon critically for a moment.

"Yeah. That kind of scares me, to be honest. All I know is that if I'd rather end up dead than a tool of the Ohm." A pause.

"Khaji says it's the same for him."

Rachel didn't really make an effort to hide the glare that came naturally at that word. "A symbiote in your spine?" she repeated slowly, watching him.

After a moment, she offered her name a bit begrudgingly. "Rachel."

"Yeah. Like I said, it's a long story. I'm a teenager from El Paso, he's an alien bug-robot from outer space. Together, we fight crime." He grins.

"I'm serious about the fighting crime part. Nice to meet you, Rachel."

"Let's try not to take it that far."

Rachel rose an eyebrow, breaking her nasty stare somewhat. Alien bug-robot was slightly different. He was being open about it, too, but that didn't mean he was trustworthy.

Even if he seemed pretty serious about the crime fighting part.

"Seriously?" she asked, a bit incredulous. That did not seem like alien symbiote activity, from her experience.

"Seriously. I go by the name Blue Beetle, punch bad guys, fight aliens, save the world. The whole nine yards." Jaime gave a shrug.

"Not exactly what I was expecting Junior year to be like, but there you go."

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