Operation: Healing Shadows

The first break

Mason's POV
        I watched the road illuminate and fall to darkness with each mile we continued, each second further from the people and lives we lived, the past consumed by darkness. I looked at the center console and finding the time read 4:03 am, I returned my eyes to the road as we continued running from our past, I heard some movement next to me and heard the quiet yawn that Luna does everytime she wakes up I spoke "mornin'" she replied "Morning, what time is it?" I replied half distractedly "4:04" she stretched before asking "where are we?" I answered bored "Just outside of St. Petersburg, we're catching a train to Vladivostok where we'll take a ship to Alaska" she nodded before asking "how long have you been driving?" I glanced over and saw her eyes seemed to glow in the pre-dawn light "Since you went to sleep yesterday" she gasped lightly "You've been driving for that long? No breaks?" I replied with confusion "yeah I took some breaks, why is that so confusing?" She turned her eyes to the deep purple sky "you could've woken me up if you wanted to take a break" I replied easily "yeah but you looked so comfortable and the sleep talking was kinda cute so I let you be" her eyes snapped to me as I saw her eyes inspecting me for any deceit "What did you call me?" I nonchalantly spoke "Cute" the tough exterior evaporated as she quoted the stop motion Rudolph movie "I'm cute, I'm cuuuute" I laughed openly at the antics before breathing deeply trying to calm down.
She smiled happily, her brilliant smile seemed to illuminate the area around her as I glanced over repeatedly "What? What have I done to be blessed with such a smile?" She chirped the happiest I've seen her since we began our escape "You're laughing, you're smiling, you're not upset about your leg anymore" I nodded before replying "A well timed joke from the right person can change everything" she smiled again before leaning over and resting her head on my arm "I'm glad you're feeling better, but I don't want you telling anyone about this side of me. I need to keep my image after all" I raised an eyebrow "of a badass gorgeous ninja? I don't think you need to work to keep that image" she turned away and covered her face in her sleeves before she replied "Now you're just saying things" I waved her off as I replied "I say the truth, we're almost into St. Petersburg. You have your disguise ready?" She pulled her bag out of the backseat before pulling out a long piece of black fabric. She wrapped it over and around her head before placing on a pair of my old Aviator glasses to cover her striking golden eyes, she looked at me as I parked the car "How do I look?"
I sighed longingly "I miss your eyes but besides that you look good" she recoiled before asking "What do you mean you miss my eyes?" I replied as I pulled on my beanie "Your eyes, they're that gorgeous gold color. I like looking at them, it's like your eyes are small pools of amber" she rested her right hand on her left shoulder as her arm crossed her chest giving herself a sort of half hug as she replied "Thank you, I've always been kinda self conscious about them. I used to get picked on because of them" I pulled her into a close hug before pulling back and replying "Come on, let's catch our train before we have to walk" she nodded as I put my arm around her as whispered "Gotta keep our cover story" she nodded as she leaned into the embrace until I heard a familiar terrible Russian accent "...Aaron" I felt Luna tense as we continued on into the station. We listened to Aaron pretend to be Russian and one of the Russians themselves cursing in Russian as we moved through paying for our tickets and heading to our small private room, Luna asked quietly "Is he always like this?" I sighed quietly before replying "Yeah, he... he always pretends to be from the place we're visiting. We visited Egypt one time we were on leave and he spent the entire trip going "Hab dabbity, Dab dabbity. Allahu akbar, hab habbi" I swear to god he almost got me murdered"
She shook her head in disbelief as we turned into our assigned cabin and sat down next to each other we talked among ourselves until 20 minutes later, the door slid and Aaron and Timur(Glaz)walked in sitting across from us. I leaned back resting my left arm on the backrest as Aaron smiled "Hello kids, I see you're getting comfortable with each other" Luna replied while lazily checking her watch "took longer than we expected" Aaron smiled as he childishly replied "That's what my wife said the first time we-" I cut him off "Alright enough of that" timur asked as his eyes traced every curve of the board behind my head "What do you mean took long than we expected?" I replied looking at Aaron amused "we could hear Aaron's terrible Russian accent back at the terminal" timur looked at Aaron unimpressed "I fucking told you but no" Luna spoke saving Aaron "Nej(no), from what I've been told he always does a bad accent when he visits someplace" Aaron chuckled nervously as Timur spoke "lets get down to business" I sang with Aaron "to defeat the Huns!" Before quieting down "sorry force of habit" Luna laughed as she leaned into me.
Aaron looked at Timur and wiggles his eyebrows "You owe me 5 bucks" Timur sighed and was about to hand him the money when I asked "What's the bet?" Timur replied sadly "I said you two wouldn't be together by now, Aaron bet to the contrary and apparently he's won" Luna spoke tiresomely "We aren't together, not yet at least" Aaron's victorious smile dropped off to the dark side of the moon as he asked "what? Wait you haven't asked her out yet? You have stopped to take a small date yet?!" I sighed before leaning forward so my elbows rested on my thighs "you don't think I wanted to? We're on the run from a tier 1 special forces team and a global threat terrorist cell at the same time, I want to take the small moments and detour so we can have a small date. I can't however let those feelings overpower the necessity to get to the safe house where I know it's safe and we can take those moments" Luna sides with me "And even if he did try to take those moments I would've steered him back to the main objective which is get to the safe house" Aaron sighed while Timur smugly replied "my friend I believe you owe me 5 dollars"
I looked at the duo before turning to Luna "my dear Rudolph, would you kindly get the children back on task" she chuckled quietly behind her hand before taking a breath and saying firmly "Children, children, on task please. Let's go we can talk about Mason and I's love life another time" Timur nodded as he took Aaron's money "Ah yes, you wish to know about the progress the Agents have made" Luna nodded while her eyes widened "Well of course we fucking do" Luna leaned back into me while Aaron spoke "Well your detour south, it worked. The agents think you're heading south through Africa before getting on a ship and sailing to America so you've got a majority of the team off your ass for a couple weeks." I asked as Luna shifted "So what's the bad news?" Timur replied resentfully "with their hard on for killing you two, we aren't getting to many missions to actually combat the masks so they've been running rampant" I sighed as Luna sadly spoke "we never wanted that..." Aaron replied seriously "We know but we need to do something fast" I asked inquisitively "so tell me what you have in mind?" Timur replied as he looked out at the countryside "were building a case slowly for abuse of power, but I don't believe it will stop the manhunt for you two. Your father is working to get more information in Washington as well, we may need you to show up for the mutiny" I leaned back before speaking "We won't be able to make it from Alaska to Britain fast enough"
      Aaron spoke with finality "Well it's a great thing we'll be doing it in DC" Luna spoke with a suggestion "Why don't you guys keep getting information we can use while Mason and I raid some Mask compounds and look for any useable information" Timur nodded clearly pleased at the suggestion before passing a map to me "Here's some of the places you can check, we haven't hit them and I don't think we will any time soon" I folded the map and slid it into my breast pocket "Wonderful, we'll get busy after we reach our final destination" Aaron and Timur stood before Timur spoke "just be careful, FSB is around" I nodded before sliding on a set of brass knuckles "We'll be fine, have a good night boys" I leaned back and sighed in relief as Luna spoke "So it worked, i wasn't really expecting it to" I nodded happily "I'm glad it did, we can relax for a bit now" she chuckled as we heard the footsteps of a heavy thick soled boot move past the door. I sat up and watched the door and the shadow dancing through the opaque glass, the Russian voices were hushed and hurried but I could sense the topic, Luna confirmed when she shifted so she was next to me before whispering "they're making a breaching plan, we've got 2 minutes"
I looked around before noticing the window opened the full half way, "Think we can make it to the roof?" She smiled before challenging "do you think you can keep up?" I rolled my eyes but pulled the window down, before motioning Luna past me. She climbed out and up the side using small grip rail on the side to pull herself up, I carefully closed the window behind me as I followed her lead up onto the roof of the train, I sat down and watched the green fields pass as a blur, Luna sat infront of me and leaned back into me using me as a windbreak as we just sat still watching everything pass. I used my arms to bracket Luna so the many small bumps didn't knock her in any direction until a minute later I felt the sensation as the tip of a feather being dragged against your skin, I looked down as saw Luna using the tip of her fingernail tracing the black lines of my tattoos, many of them old and a lighter black then they were the years ago when I got them.
10 minutes later we climbed down and back into our cabin only to see a single FSB agent staring at us bewildered at the sudden appearance of two wanted criminals infront of him I motioned him to remain quiet but when he went to lift his radio I threw a right hook and connected with his temple, hearing him hit the ground causing me to sigh and Luna to ask "What do we do with him now?" I shrugged before pulling out a piece of paper and writing to Glaz "Make it look like he got fucked up" before sending a text to Aaron "Hey come get a guy for me, will you?" He appeared a minute later and saw the man "We're gonna have to kill him, aren't we?" I sighed but shrugged "that's up to Timur, I just need him quiet for the next week" he nodded but picked up the unconscious man before I dropped into my seat "Holy shit this is so stressful" Luna nodded but asked "What does your tattoo represent?" I crunches my eyebrows while asking "which one? I have a lot" she pointed to the one she was tracing "the only one you show to the world" I nodded as I looked at my tattoo the SPQR symbol with a single snake wrapped around a rod. "The Eagle, lightning bolts and wreath with SPQR below it is from Ancient Rome, translates to Senatus Populus Que Romanus: the Senate and People of Rome. It was like the White House's seal, it represented Rome as a whole. The Single snake around the rod is the symbol of Aesculapius: the Roman god of Medicine. My team in the PJs before I got transferred to the one with Aaron all got this tattooed on our right forearm since we said "The SPQR represents Rome as a whole, the Pjs represent the brotherhood between all branches of the military and the half caduceus represents our commitment to use medicine to save any of our brothers"
She mused to herself "A lot deeper than I expected, I'm glad you shared that with me" I waved her off with a small laugh "I share a lot with you that others don't get to see, I guess it just makes you special" she laughed before replying "well I'm glad I get to see it, it makes you more interesting" I shook my head as we started looking at the menu to get some breakfast.

Short A/N
      I want to apologize for not having this chapter out sooner or for the lack in quality, I spent the last couple days doing things for graduation and with friends. I hope you enjoyed it
                                             much love, Crimson