Taking Back The World! (A Pacific Rim and Raleigh Becket Fanfic)

Prolonged Stays, Becoming Friends and Nervous Breakdowns

    “No.” Pentecost answered simply, letting that one word hang in the air.

    After several seconds, realization sank in. If Herc hadn’t been the one to stand up for me, there was only one other Hansen in all of Sydney with the kind of authority to tell the UN not to kick me out of the program all together.

    “Chuck did? There‘s no way!” I screeched loudly, my chin nearly brushing against the ground in shock. I don’t think I’ve ever been so shocked in my life.

    “You are dismissed, Lila.” Pentecost ended the conversation with that.

    I gave him a wobbly salute, to which he nodded and ended the vid-call. I stood, staring at the wall the call had just been on. There was no way it had been Chuck to stand up for me. I’d just got done beating him up, for Christ’s sake!

    After a few more minutes of collecting myself, I left the room and took a deep breath once I was in the hallway.

    “Looks like your sticking around.” My heart nearly gave out when the voice rang through the empty hall.

    Chuck stood, leaning against the wall right beside the door, giving me a smile. Not a cocky grin but, a real smile. His nose was bandaged up and two blood soaked tissues were stuffed up each nostril. I quickly cleared my throat and threw together some words to shot out.

    “You either knew before I went in there or like to eavesdrop.”

    “Look, Chuck-” I tried to start and the said Ranger took a step towards me, cupping his ear and leaning close.

    “Yes, I‘m listening.” He said in a sing song voice.

    It grated at my already shot nerves and I quickly turned my back to him. Crossing my arms again, I made a move to walk away but stopped myself. I really did have to apologize for hurting him, even if he did deserve it.

    “Hey.” I called out, still facing away from him.

    “Thanks for sticking up for me. And sorry about your nose, it looks pretty messed up.” I shot out quickly, not moving as I heard him take a few steps to walk around me.

    Our eyes met first, and the smile that was on his face was in his eyes. It looked like he was happy I’d almost broke his nose.

    “It‘ll heal.” Chuck shrugged his shoulders.

    “We good then?” His voice was hopeful, like he actually wanted to get along with me.

    When he held his hand out to me, I looked at it for a moment before back up at him. His smile grew and his whole face pulled into it. I gave him a small one back and took his larger hand in mine, shaking it a few times.

    “For now.”

~ ~ ~ (5 months later) ~ ~ ~

    Chuck was trying to teach me how to get around a bigger opponent in basketball. Which he made extremely hard by not going  easy on me at all.

    “Come on, Lils, you can do better than that!” Chuck taunted, crouching to my height with a smile on his face.

    He’d taken to calling me Lils after we started being friends. I protested at first but it stuck and I actually started liking it. Or maybe because he was the one of the only person to give me a nickname. Or maybe because I liked that he thought about be enough to give me one.

    “Your taller than me, dammit!” I laughed, dribbling the ball.

    My sweater was way to hot to playing basketball in but I couldn’t part with it. Not even in this highly physical sport. My basketball shorts fell past my knees and were tightened so tight, you could tell under the bulky sweater. Chuck took one look at me, laughed and told me I needed a new wardrobe. And that he was expecting me to be wearing less layers, which flamed a blush on my cheeks.