Sam's Reality: Cape Canaveral, Florida - Kennedy Space Center

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Leeroy wasn't too sure how the night guard at the Kennedy Space Center had acquired Sam's name. He assumed it was the Internet - everything's the Internet's fault these days - but he couldn't be too sure, as the guy looked to be about sixty and the type who wouldn't touch a computer to save his life.

"They're freakin' out the dogs," he said in a Southern accent. "And we ain't been able to photograph 'em, either." He pointed to the large behemoth of metal that could be seen a few miles in the distance. "They're always there."

It was, Leeroy recognized, launch pad 39-B. Jeimu had launched from there not even a year ago.

Why freaks were hanging out around launchpads, Leeroy wasn't certain. He turned to Sam and asked quietly, "What d'you make of all this, eh?"

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And he looked back, uncertain.

[i_salted_dean]

-You need to name him, cyare,- she said softly, swallowing.

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He sighed and closed his eyes. He couldn't remember what went into the custom, so he figured he'd just wing it.

A name. A name for this person he'd helped to create; this person who would never really live. There was a few moments' silence and then something - God perhaps, his belief was dubious at best, but he was working on it - impressed upon him a name he felt to be rather apt.

He knelt down, facing the pyre.

"Matthias," he whispered, barely audible, and the numbness lifted. The faceless person now had a name. Had an identity.

And suddenly it was all the more painful.

Leeroy started to cry in earnest.

[i_salted_dean]

"Gift of the Lord," whispered Sam past the lump in her throat. "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, blessed be the name of the Lord."

She tossed the match and watched the fire flare up, feeling her senses reel and swim as tears slid down her cheeks. -Blessed be the name of the Lord....-

[teh-rest.livejournal.com]

His forehead touched the ground as the tears continued to fall.

He couldn't watch.

[i_salted_dean]

Sam wobbled, then knelt next to him and put her arms around him as though protecting him.

And Rob watched blankly, feeling like his world were raveling at the edges.

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Leeroy stubbornly refused to move until the fire was out, and he stayed curled up into himself for a good long while.

[i_salted_dean]

Sam clung to him, her face buried in the back of his shirt, feeling as though he were the only thing holding her in the world. Part of her wondered if she should talk to him, but she couldn't find the right words.

[teh-rest.livejournal.com]

"I was stupid," he whispered to the ground. "So stupid."

[i_salted_dean]

"No more than me." Her voice was as soft.

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"I didn't even figure it out," he continued.

[i_salted_dean]

She remembered her own uncertainty as to her condition and swallowed, feeling his shirt grow wet under her face.

[teh-rest.livejournal.com]

Leeroy's litany of self-loathing continued:

"And I ask myself why because I know everything else about you..."