Monthly Bonus Content #2—'A New Start!' (Adam/Nate/Farah/Morgan version) (Patreon)

Pink and yellow streamers scatter through the air, twirling in front of Adam’s stone-faced expression. Ringlets of colourful paper land across his tensed shoulders.

“It’s a new year!” Farah shouts, bouncing on the spot as she lets loose yet another unnecessarily bright explosive. This time it releases a spout of glitter Adam just knows he’ll not be able to wash from his clothing for weeks.

Nate laughs, poking his cardboard hat further onto his head as it begins to slide down to a jaunty angle. The tinsel spurting from the top of it twinkles in the hastily thrown up fairy lights of the facility’s common room.

Morgan sits with a grimace far in the deepest shadows of the room…somewhere Adam would quite like to join her right about now.

“So what are these resolutions you lot do in this world then?” Farah asks, slumping down onto an armchair and offering a dazzling smile at an agent who makes a very slow, very inspecting walk past the open doorway.

Adam slowly shuts the door. If anyone ever saw him dusted in glitter and drowned in coloured swirls of paper…even another thousand years couldn’t save that hit to his reputation.

Nate seems to sense his unease, as the tall vampire walks over towards him with an appeasing smile. “This is her first New Year’s Eve in this world. With us. Let her have it as she wants.”

Adam lifts a brow. “Are you stating that I will not need to do this every year?”

“Well, we should at least give her a decade of them to let the novelty wear off,” Nate adds with a chuckle.

“So? What are they?” Farah insists after no one responds to her original question.

Nate turns back to the newest member of Unit Bravo. “They are kind of like promises you make to yourself. About things you will do during the upcoming year.”

“Oh! That sounds cool! Do you keep them?” she asks with bright eyes.

Morgan snorts out a breath that is somewhere between a laugh and a scoff. “No. No one ever keeps them.”

Farah deflates a little. “Oh. That’s…kind of sad. You’d think of all the promises a person would make, the ones they make to themselves are the ones they’d never want to break.”

“Oh wonderful.” Morgan throws her hands into the air. “This world is gonna tear her optimism into tiny littles pieces.”

More of Farah’s enthusiasm seeps out of her.

Adam’s jaw tightens at the prospect. With all the darkness Unit Bravo has been plunged into these past few years, Farah cut through it with his sunny cheer and refreshing view on, well, everything.

There is no way Adam would let it be broken. No matter who he’ll have to fight to protect it.

“My new year’s resolution is that I will protect this team. Whatever it takes,” he vows.

Farah looks up at him wide-eyed from where her gaze had dropped. “Does that include me?”

“You are a part of this team, are you not?” Adam asks with a smile hinting at the corner of his lips.

“Yeah, but only for a little while. I wasn’t sure if that was enough time to count,” she confesses, tugging at her hat.

Adam glances over his gathered team. His family. The people who have given him purpose. Given him a reason to keep going for all these numbed years.

And Farah feels like she was one missing piece of it.

After inhaling a deep, resolving breath, Adam reaches out and grabs a holographic cardboard hat and slips it onto his head.

Nate almost falls from his chair in shock. Morgan rolls her eyes and glances away from the spectacle. But Farah smiles with such renewed happiness that this moment of spectacular embarrassment is completely worthwhile.

“What are your resolutions?” Adam asks.

Farah instantly erupts into a long list of ideas, bouncing in her seat, eagerly doling out who should choose what.

As the young vampire tries to get Morgan involved with little success, Nate moves to Adam’s side once again.

“Thanks,” Nate says with a smile.

“I’d have done the same for any of our team.”

“I know,” Nate replies. “It’s why we respect you so much.” Then his gaze flickers up to the hat standing proud on top of Adam’s head.

He sighs. “Does it at least suit me?”

Nate breaks into a laugh. “No. It looks utterly ridiculous!”

Adam groans and sinks a little. But he knows this will be one of the rare beginnings of a new year that he’ll actually remember.