Aberrant: In the Beginning - Without Form

[SalmonMax]

When Hector poked cautiously into Juno's room, his heart was broken.

Juno was there, for a change, holding his baby son in her arms and feeding him from a bottle as she hummed a pleasant tune. She looked so much like her mother, especially since she'd erupted, that he could swear there was actual, physical pain just from looking at her. Not in any lewd sense...just the weight of happy memories finding strength again. Memories he'd tried hard to escape, because they led to much unhappier ones.

One careless moment. One submission to his own weakness. It seemed unfair that so much could be lost, for such a small thing.

Seeing Juno like that with Javier though...it almost made it all worth it.

"I see you there, papa," she said without looking up from Javier.

Hector felt a little chill that spoiled the moment. Some new super power? Could she read his mind? Smell him?

She laughed at his expression and said, "There's a light behind you. You're casting a shadow."

Feeling foolish, Hector stepped forward into the bedroom proper. Juno reminded him of her mother in less appealing ways too. She loved making sport of people, even people she oughtn't. And she had a temper.

"You're too proud these days," he told her. "You're hardly ever around. Off doing things, I don't know what. Meanwhile, Javier..."

"Has a very nice nanny, or whatever they call them here," Juno interrupted. "He adores her, I've watched them."

Hector shook his head. "She's nice, but she's not his..."

"His what?" Juno cut him off again. He hated it when she did that. "His mother? His sister? What exactly am I?" Her tone turned accusatory for some reason, and Javier shifted and mewled around the bottle's nipple. He was very sensitive to her moods. Juno murmured comfortingly in his ear and hugged him, and the baby quieted. But she kept her eyes on Hector, expecting an answer.

"That's a stupid question," Hector replied. "These people, this place...they're confusing you."

"I was always confused," said Juno. "I just didn't know quite how to put it." Hector had noticed her picking up some British speech patterns since they'd moved here. How long before she started with an accent? She went on to say, "Seriously though. Am I your daughter or your wife? I'm always having to nag you around, and make sure things are put away and clean up and take care of the baby. And you know, he thinks I'm his mom by now. Look how he looks at me."

Unwillingly, Hector dropped his eyes. Partly because he was curious, partly because he didn't want to look at Juno, but mostly because she told him to. And that made him angry at himself.

Javier was staring at his sister's face as he sucked the bottle. Staring with the blank adoration of infants everywhere. Juno had stared at her mother like that too. Hector remembered.

"So?" he heard himself say. "He needs a mother." Inwardly he cringed. Shit, he didn't mean that. He didn't want to say that. The ice suddenly radiating from Juno seemed like it would glaze the glass window she was sitting near...freeze poor Javier solid. To say nothing of himself.

"Okay, but what about me?" Juno demanded. "What about me? I need things too! I need...I need something to change!"

"Something HAS changed! Everything's changed!" Hector suddenly spat. No sooner said, than he realized how those words summed up all of his discomforts and fears. "You're gone half the time, no three quarters of the time. Strange people are taking care of Javier and making the beds in strange bedrooms and serving us strange food! I sit around all day watching...TV! We're rich but we haven't done anything..."

"YOU haven't done anything," Juno shot back. "When I go, it's to go let scientists mess around with me or to go take classes or to save the world. I -earn- that money!"

"Well that's great for you," Hector huffed. "So what's the problem? You've got everything you want."

Juno quieted at that, thinking. He was kind of right. So why didn't she feel like it?

"I don't have control," she said at last. "Even the stuff that's good that's happening is just...random. Things happen, and I react and that's how it's always been. I've never had time to plan or think ahead or worry about the future. And now I do, and I want to, and I have no idea how to do it."

She looked up at her father. "I don't know what I am. I don't know where I'm going."

Hector was still for a moment, his anger draining in the face of her seldom-expressed vulnerability. He then came forward, bent over, and picked Javier up out of Juno's arms. He carried the now-sleeping baby to the crib and laid him down, then returned to Juno and gestured. "Up."

Juno frowned, but got up out of the chair. Her father sat down in it, then patted his thigh. "Down."

A moment of hesitation, but Juno sat in his lap. A moment more, and she was leaning against his chest with his arms around her.

"You are my daughter," Hector said firmly. "You can be anything else you want, but that one thing will always be true."

"I don't know what I want," Juno whispered. She hadn't known until now how scared she'd been. She hadn't let herself feel any of those weaknesses...but they were there. Just waiting for a moment when she finally felt safe enough to experience them.

Hector laughed and squeezed her. "This isn't a test, mija. It's not like you have to decide now, and that's it forever. You have time."

Juno bit her bottom lip. "Do I?"

"Of course you do. Don't be crazy."

She shrugged. "They're starting to ask me to do dangerous things is all."

Hector was quiet at that, then said, "They are, huh?"

"Well, I mean, nothing that was over my head," Juno quickly qualified, hardly even thinking it was a lie. "I'm really hard to hurt."

"Hm. Because of these powers."

"Right."

A moment passed, where neither knew what to say. The fact of Juno's strange abilities was a wall between them, no matter how tightly they snuggled. It was far from the only wall too. Her mother was there, and his indiscretion. Their frequent squabbles. Financial troubles. Friends. Employment. Responsibility. Structure, or the lack therof.

Hector hated the walls. He hated that most of them were coming from him too, because that made him guilty. He hated being guilty. He'd asked so much from her, thinking only of his own needs. The same mistake he'd made time and time again. He'd done just now even, when he'd gotten mad at her. He was going to do it again.

"I can't help you," he whispered.

"What?" Juno asked, pulling back a bit to look at him.

Her father hugged her again, and did what came hardest. "The only thing keeping my life from being a complete mess was you," he admitted. "Whatever advice I could give, you don't need to hear."

Juno was quiet, staring at him. Then, "Dad..."

"No, just..." Hector shook his head. "You need to decide what you want, and not think about me, or even Javier. And me...I need to learn to get by on my own."

"What are you saying?" Juno asked. A stab of fear, of rejection, pierced her. "Are you kicking me out?"

"What? Jesus, no!" Hector kissed the top of her head fiercely. "No. Never. I'm just saying..." He hesitated, then confessed, "I don't know what I want either. But I know what I'm going to do."

Relieved, Juno asked, "What?"

"Find someone who's doing something I respect and admire, and ask them how they got to do it."

She chewed on that. "But how do you know you'll like doing it once you're actually in it? Maybe it just looks good from outside."

"Maybe," Hector agreed. "But you won't find out by just sitting around and watching. You have to try things."

"You know, you don't HAVE to work now," Juno offered.

"Yeah, I do," Hector replied with a smile. "It's not about money. It's about belonging. It's about contributing. I haven't been too good at that, but I want that to change."

Juno buried her face in his neck and hugged him. "I love you," she whispered.

"Me too," he said. "So...did I help?"

She laughed and pulled away. "Yeah."

Hector grinned and let her go. "Beginner's luck. I'll try to make a habit of it though. So go on. We'll be here when you get back. And we'll be fine."

Juno popped up off her father's lap and waved goodbye as she jogged to the door. Already the confused haze was lifting away; she felt free for the first time to really take control of her future. No longer at the mercy of random happenstance or an endless series of crises that demanded all her time to manage.

Even her power worked like that, she realized. It waited for something to catastrophically wrong, then fixed things so she could soldier on through it. It put her at the mercy of outside forces. She'd always been at the mercy of forces, struggling to get by, to cope, to get her family through.

That was changing, she decided as she ran down the steps to the door out to the grounds. That was changing as of now. She was taking charge. Of her power, of herself, of her life.