Not-yet-titled sequel

Part 4

Rebecca. She'd upgraded to a couch downstairs when she could walk with assistance, away from reminders of the carnage on the upper floor. Her eye dilation had normalized and she seemed to be thinking straight again, but Sam couldn't bear to look at the ugly bruise changing colors on her chin. Her eyes... they didn't look at her with fear anymore which was a blessed reprieve. She was acting like she thought everything was, everything should be fine between them, but she was also acting like it wasn't.

**

Rebecca watched Sam bat at Epstein's extended hand of greeting and then pull the screen door open. She couldn't fully ignore the swirling doubts of her decisions that led to them all being in the shape they were in. Sure, they'd freed almost all of the imprisoned workers, but maybe if she'd planned a little more. Maybe if she hadn't panicked right at the end and rushed across that last room. She could have used her radio. Sam, friendly on your left. That's all she had to say and things would have gone completely differently.

Now, instead. Sam had probably set a new record for the worst day of her life. Everyone except Patrick and Chris was injured and those two were working themselves to exhaustion trying to attend to the rest. And here she was, suspecting a hairline fracture in her left arm, recovering from a concussion, trying to convince herself everything wasn't her own fault and Sam that these injuries weren't her fault. Probably doing about an equally successful job of each, dammit.

She tried to shove all those thoughts aside and smile encouragingly as Sam sat, but the movement pulled uncomfortably on her sore jaw and she struggled to keep her expression from turning into a wince. That wouldn't help Sam at all.

"Hi, Rosie. Thanks for coming."

"Of course. I missed you last night, not just because my toes were cold."

"Heh." Rebecca tried to smile as much as she could manage comfortably. It was good to see a little of Sam's humor still glimmering in there. "How's your head?"

Whoops. Not the best thing to say — Sam's expression turned downcast again. "Okay. Just a lingering ache, Chrissie wants to change the bandage later. I should really be asking you that, though."

Rebecca's half smile turned sad, she didn't want Sam beating herself up over... okay. Poor choice of words. Over beating her up. Maybe she could try to lift her spirits with a little humor too. "Codeine is my friend. It's not as strong as Vicodin, but it also doesn't give me the hangover I remember after my wisdom teeth, either." She pulled herself up with the back of the couch and pivoted to sit facing Sam, her feet on the ground like a functional person. "Sam... please. Don't be so hard on yourself. There's any number of things that could have gone differently night-before-last, including a lot of my own decisions. The important thing is we got as many of these people out as we could and Mags won't be causing them any more misery. That's what was most important — we both said it ourselves."

She was starting to get an understanding for what Sam went through trying to get her to ease up on herself — at a time when she kinda needed that again, no less. This was an uncomfortable lesson in being too reliant on each other.

Sam hesitantly reached for her hand now that it was closer, but didn't say anything yet, so Rebecca spoke again. "You know... I'm going to start demanding get-out-of-apologizing-too-much-free cards at this rate. You're turning into me." Sam still didn't reply, just looking down at the floor between them, or maybe their hands. Rebecca held on as long as she comfortably could, then squeezed her hand apologetically and leaned back into the couch. She didn't seem to be getting anywhere, so she figured she should change subjects.

"I was hoping we could think about what to do next. Like... do we call this off, patch everyone up and head home to rest, or do we keep going? Landry probably shouldn't move much for at least another few days anyway."