The Order of The Six Sages-We have Cake^^

Jack didn't look like it, but Courtney's words DID get to him. He knew what it was like to lose a loved one, and it was in the most cruelest of ways possible. It was a part of his past that he'd rather not speak of.

"Oath's pretty important to you, huh?"

Jack continues.

"Then, if you really love someone, you have to be able to protect them..."

"I love him...I just love him", she said sadly."And I am going to protect him...", her eyes flashed again as she thought of a boy from back home."Yu-Shin, please...", she whispered.

Not responding back, Jack silently threw off his janitor disguise.

Then, let's do it. Let's look for Oath....together. That way we could survive out there longer. Who knows what we'd be up against once we get out there?"

Jack would turn to everyone else.

"Who else is coming with us?

Courtney grabbed her tapout shirt and put it on, waiting for Yu-Shin's orders and croutching down with one knee to the floor, looking at it and deep in thought.

Jack briskly paced back and forth. He wasn't fond of waiting to take orders when something so important was at stake. Suddenly, Courtney caught his eye. What was she looking at?

"Something important to you?"

"No, nothing, dont worry tabout me", she whispered, barely acknoledging him as she thought.

Whatever it was, Courtney seemed to be taking a deep consideration for it. It must be something of importance.

"A momento, is it?..In it's Indo-European roots, it means to remember the living, or dead in the history of the masses. I never thought much of it growing up, but years ago, during our trips into Vietnam, we had a war buddy in our unit. Alex....
He was known for never leaving camp without his hankerchief....He said he needed it since he was allergic to all the sand.
One night, we got a distress call from an unknown district not too far from home base. Everyone in my unit was tired, and nobody wanted to check it out. Alex convinved me to go with him..just the two of us...."


Jack wouldd stop, take a deep breath and continue...

"It was night back then....dark and cold. Just as Alex and I made it the eastern route, bullets swarmed over us before we even hid for cover. We should've known that it was an ambush....right behind enemy lines....Just as the gunfire ended and I thought that we were in the clear...next thing I knew...I saw Alex's body laying next to me, still holding onto his hankerchief.....Funny....eversince that cold night....I've been holding onto this hankerchief eversince...."

Courtney listened to the story, heartbreaking to have your best friend die next to you."If that ever happened to Brent", I whispered, a tear driopping form her eye, then two."Or Oathkeeper", she added, then broke down crying.

Jack would sympathise with her, he really would, but he had no more tears to shed.

Pull yourself together, kid! Never let your past get the worst of you! Let it make you stronger!"

Jack looks down at Courtney, expecting her to show him that she was tougher than she looked.

Death is not pretty, I know....but it gets less ugly the more you look at it...

Courtney continued to cry, not yet able to talk."If only you knew", she managed out in a whisper, after a minute she regained herself enough to stop crying, wiping away the tears."You dont understand what Ive gone through, how rough it was to become what I am now", she said, staring blanky at the ground.