Juliana Ruiz - The Cypher
For nearly a week, sixteen people made their way to Redhaven on a ship built for four. Their life support systems were overworked, and if not for the extra supplies they had brought with them, they may not have survived at all. They had sacrificed so much, but in doing so, they saved twelve children.
This was not the first time that Juliana Ruiz had been on that journey. Only five weeks earlier, she had made the harrowing exodus from her former home on Nyx, driven out by the relentless Institute. That journey had saved eight innocent lives; this one had saved twelve more.
There was no cost they would not have paid to do what had been done - and they had been asked to pay it dearly. They would all have been destroyed in the trying - if not for a man they would have killed without hesitation a week ago. An Institute scientist, of all people, had helped to save the only thing that meant anything to her anymore - her family. Florian had helped to save Ria, and he had nearly given his own life to save Ashton.
And Ashton would have laid down his life to save them all - and he nearly did, without a second thought. And that was a source of sorrow and anger to her, in equal proportions. It hadn't mattered what he'd leave behind. He had taken a bullet meant for her. He had made a fiery last stand on the deck of a doomed station, to ensure that people he'd never known, nor would ever know, would never have to suffer as he had. But it was the people he knew that suffered all the more for it.
Their escape was crushing - they had taxed the Acheron to its limits to escape the destruction of Solitude Station. Some of the children, already weakened from their hibernation, had suffered minor injuries. But Ashton and Florian had been in the airlock, with no time to get to safety or strapped in. They had been hurled against the bulkhead. Florian had broken an arm. Ashton, already wounded, had suffered far worse. He had barely been able to walk when they reached the Acheron - and then he faced the Doctor. Once more, Ashton had set the world on fire. He was spent when Florian hauled him into the airlock, and the impact of the escape was like being struck by a skimmer.
Ashton had fought for three days. If not for the fortune of having a biologist on board, he'd have died before that. Juliana's days were spent by his bedside in his cabin, and she was often joined by Ria. Both men had been harmed and traumatized by what the Institute had done to them - and she knew the scars that Ria bore were on the inside. She knew, because the other man she loved bore those scars as well.
Blake had come to check in on them from time to time, and to remind her to eat, but he mostly left them alone. Blake had always known when to step away - because Blake had always known. Even before she had been ready to admit it to herself. Even now, when this foolish, headstrong, wonderful man couldn't see it for himself. When Ashton finally awoke, hours before they reached Altair, she could have cried. She did cry.
When she met him, she'd wanted to kill him. She'd practically tried - and he nearly returned the favor. But when she asked him to help her - to save Nyx and her people when he had no stake in it - he had done so, readily and willingly. He had given her and her people his all. He fought to show her a new way to live. He was still so innocent, so vulnerable - and it felt safe to be vulnerable around him.
But when he learned what she had needed to sacrifice to keep her people alive - to try and save the innocent people who made their way to her door - there was that self-righteous, fiery Ashton again. And once more, they wanted to kill one another. But the infuriating thing was, he had been right. It was a bitter pill she'd had to swallow, and she still lived with the guilt. When he left Nyx, she felt as though a part of her was gone as well. She wondered if she'd ever see him again, if he really meant it when he said he'd kill her if he did. And she might have never known the answer... until the Institute returned to Nyx.
She saved what she could, and brought it to the only person she knew, the only one she trusted. She had to have faith in the man he was when he wasn't on fire. She had always worn her heart on her sleeve, his was in his head. And he took her in, without hesitation. He gave her a home, and she found a family. But no matter how carefully she tried to open her heart to him, he shied away or simply didn't notice. If not for her long talks with Blake, she might never have known that Ashton felt the same way, but simply didn't know how to show love. Maybe she could understand - he'd grown up in a cell, a laboratory animal that they tried time and again to set on fire... until one day, they finally succeeded. How does a man learn to love, in a world like that? How does he learn to find a home, a family? Yet he did - and he shared it with her.
This was her family. She would always be by his side - even if he never realized it, even if he never understood or acknowledged or said it, But how she wished he finally would.