I Like It Heavy

Posted on Sun Jul 23rd, 2023 @ 8:29am by Alden Loxley

Mission: Oh, Give Me a Home on The Range
Location: Ezra - Blue Cloud Ranch (Attic)
Timeline: 18 November, 2517 - Alongside 'Broken Heartland'

Bloodied and bruised. Battered and broken. Kindra. She’d looked at him like he was a conquering hero, and that was when it had truly sunk in. Heroes protected people, saved the day and… then what? Settled down, married and raised kids? Alden wasn’t sure, but this diversion from the everyday chaos of roaming the Verse in an old Firefly had brought him back home and forced him to look at past and future in perfect synchrony. Quite literally.

Physical vulnerability was something Alden Loxley was more than used to. Pain, either self-inflicted by virtue of his career choice or the ramifications of such connectivity to others, remained a close, personal friend. But verbal vulnerability? That was so much more difficult to face. Speaking one’s deepest fears and traumas, speaking one’s darkest and more honest truths… this was pain far beyond a broken body and tortured conscience.

Being sent up into the attic to recover old albums took his mind briefly away from Kindra’s current situation, her wounds and injuries, her pain and emotional decisions. Older, persistent memories brought back his first real - could you call it love? - Alden wasn’t sure. Either way, Anouk had found her way back front and centre and as a result, time temporarily and subsequently ceased to matter.

Coming out of a dark mental street or two, wandering down shadowy paths he had no need or reason to revisit, he couldn’t help but wonder if, in this case, he was the ‘Anouk’. Had he led Kindra on, brought her into a world she didn’t need to inhabit? Had he led those men to her, pulled her into places that allowed her stepbrother to capture her? If he had done something differently, played dumb or unavailable or just been a better person, would things still have played out the way they had done? Would she still….

He stood up, banged his head on the low attic beams at the edge of the roof and cursed. In his hands the albums his mother has requested weighed heavy, but the person who was about to look through those carefree moments of his childhood before he left home, before he understood what bad things were out there, she was a bright light. One that had been broken and crushed right before his eyes, and yet one who still wished to be with him.

Alden wiped the tears from his cheeks and brushed his fingers in his shirt, but his emotions weren’t done yet. The tears kept coming, fresh and keen and coloured with all those things he perceived he’d done wrong. Or could have done differently. Or walked right into fully aware and caring less. Each mistake, each misstep, each kind word or gentle action that had brought him to that moment. A stupid, dangerous and unwanted moment.

He leant against the lower side of the attic wall and lifted his chin, eyes closed, sorrow everywhere inside and out. Anouk was dead. And if he kept moving onward down this path, Kindra would surely follow. Perhaps this time it wasn’t his doing - her family were hardly his responsibility - but what ‘next time’ lay ahead of them? What pathway was he taking Kinmont’s daughter down if she relinquished her career and chose to stay with him?

No. Better to hurt now than be party to far deeper wounds later. A kinder choice than a letter left on a pillow, a braver decision than simply letting Kindra make mistakes with her life that were based on her love for him. Considered, sensible and mature. Unselfish. Right? Alden considered the matter for the hundredth time since the lectures, the leaving and the mutually brutal honesty had battered him from Kindra to Alison and back around again.

Would it last? Would she live to regret giving up her everything - a wealthy ranch, an heirloom of a homestead, a beautiful life with folks who loved her and wished her well, who wanted to see her marry, maybe have children, be happy and healthy and alive?

Would he change for her? Be what she expected, wanted… needed? Unlikely. Alden was too much his father’s son for that. A wanderer who lived in the moment and made mistakes every damn day that he’d never seen coming. Somehow Jericho had played both sides, at least for a while, been a fun father, a present husband and an enthusiastic rancher in between those cargo runs out into the wider Verse. He’d come home with gifts for his kids, credits for treats and stories, so many stories….

Then there was Alden’s dead wife. The instrument of selfish disruption, extreme possessiveness and confusing rules. Anouk had done whatever the hell she wanted, earnt her keep for the Alliance and survived via strength of character, teamwork and action. She got results the hard way, and by any means necessary. Yet, in the end, she had paid a high price for her love.

He couldn’t do that again. Give everything to see it die for stupid, pointless reasons. So he had to be the grown-up now, the one who made the tough call, the hard, adulting decision. The one who drew the line and the one who held it. He had to ensure no more pain came to people because of him and his actions, at least whenever said option presented itself boldly before him. His path, Alden knew, was clear.

It took him a mite longer to stand up. To slow the torrent of misery and exodus of trapped emotions. To dehydrate himself via his tear ducts. To exhale, face those demons and understand what he had to do. He had to say no. He had to be defiant. He had to make the choice that he believed Kindra wouldn’t. And he had to find a way to live with that judgement call.

Love wasn’t roses and romance, love wasn’t perfection and paradise. Love was hard choices, responsibility and freedom of expression. Love lasted beyond those initial warm moments of messy but certain affection and changed folks - or didn’t - for the better and worse.

Right now love was something Kindra desired enough to make changes she shouldn’t have to make.

And love was something Alden believed he understood enough to make the decision to walk away from, albeit with a heavy heart, a sorrowful ache and a clear mind.

Time had moved enough now for him to be certain of his next decision. Alden just needed a few more moments to hide emotions that reddened his eyes and weighed on his heart before facing those two women with a smile and photographs of old times. He knew what he had to do, but he’d rather dance naked on a field facing every one of his weaponised enemies than talk it out in actual real words.