by Celeste Raye
To her surprise, they went up several flights of stairs and then into the front rooms of what must’ve been a grand residence at one time. Ben grabbed her arm then as they passed through the room. At least a hundred Rovers stood or sat about. All of them looked at her with speculation and greed in their faces. Jenny dropped her eyes, not willing to look at them or to have them see her face. She was too afraid that they would see that she was angry and hoping to use her makeshift weapon against Ben.
He hustled her through a series of doors. They stepped outside, and she had to squint. Her head went back, and she looked upward. The sky was there, and so was the sun. She stopped for a moment, her feet stumbling on the steps. Ben snarled, “What are you doing?”
She just stared upward. “The sun. When I arrived, there was so much dust you couldn’t see it. I’ve been in the hospital ever since I got here. I haven’t even had time to go outside. The sky, it’s right there, and I just want to see it.”
Ben actually laughed. “Yes. The sun and the sky they always denied us. Now we can look at it anytime we want while we starve to death.”
He dragged her onward. Her feet went through piles of dust and debris. More Rovers joined them, forming a sort of loose group around them. They marched onward with Ben dragging her every step of the way. She kept her eyes pinned up to that sky. This was the place she had come from, but this was not home. The sky here was not as blue and the sun not as bright and life-giving. These were not the people that she loved and wanted to spend her life with anymore.
What difference did it make where one lived? Above ground or Below? It had once mattered a great deal but those days were gone. The difference now was showing in the actions of those left.
The people who were carrying her forward and the ones who had been busy rebuilding and trying to dispose of the dead, the ones who had been searching through the rubble for lost relatives and who had sat silently alongside their injured and loved family members, those were the humans that she wanted to be with.
She wasn’t even sure Ben and his kind were human. Maybe they had been once, but they had lost something, something that gave them their very humanity, and she didn’t know that they would ever get it back.
Ben gave her a hard little shake. “Move faster!”
She did. She kept her eyes riveted forward now. The sight of the sun in the sky no longer fascinated her. She had seen more beautiful sights in her life after all.
They marched out of the residence and up the street. The Rovers looked decidedly nervous as they went. They had reason to be. At least she was fairly sure they did. They were up against skilled warriors. No matter how vicious they were, their weapons might not be enough to protect them against Marik and Talon. Not to mention Jessica.
They came to a halt. The street was dusty but empty. She looked around, seeing nothing but ruined buildings and a deserted street. Smoke hung thick in the air, further along, rising up into the heavens in a dark cloud. The scent of charred flesh came again, and she wrinkled her nose against it.
Sorrow hit. How could she be considering deserting these people? It was clear that they needed help. Not these; not the Rovers. But the ones who were not Rovers, the ones who were desperate to stay on their planet and to make it a better place.
A voice came from somewhere, and she stiffened as she recognized it. Marik’s familiar tone drifted along the currents of the breeze as he called out, “We are here!”
Where? Where was he? She was not the only one gazing about, trying to decide where it was that that voice had come from.
Talon, Marik, Jessica, and the others appeared as if by magic. A few of the Rovers drew back, muttering nervously, and she couldn’t blame them. It was as if they were ghosts and had just risen from some underground crypt or something. She had no idea how they could’ve gotten there that fast or where they had come from. She had a sneaking suspicion that it had something to do with the tunnels that she had run through on the day of her arrival.
Marik carried a chest, and he walked toward them.
He called out, “It was good of you to agree to meet with us and show us the sight of our healer.”
Ben went rigid. He called back, “Open the chest, creature!”
She stiffened at the offense. Marik might not be human, but he was not a creature. He was a sentient being, and one who was gifted with all of the things that Ben himself would never know. Love, compassion, and care.
But was that really true?
The memory of what he had done to her came back, and with it came hurt and rage.
Marik settled the chest onto the dusty street and said, “It’s here, midway. Send her over.”
Ben shook his head. “No. Open the chest, or she dies now.”
Marik looked at her. He asked, “Have you remembered everything?”
Then she knew.
That implant.
It had not burst of its own volition. He had somehow been able to reach into her mind, even from a distance, probably because the implant was hooked into some sort of technological device. He had deliberately spilled all of that knowledge into her brain, knowing that it could kill her.
But why?
She stared at him. Ben gave her a little shake and her head went rolling about on her neck until she stiffened it and yanked herself away from him slightly. Ben’s shouted, “I don’t have time for this! Open the goddamn chest, or she dies now!”
His weapon pointed right at her head. Marik looked at her from across the distance. His eyes bored into hers, and she felt as she always did: that sensation, that strange feeling that he knew every part of her and that he saw every part of her.
Then he said, “It’s the last thing that I gave you.”
What was he talking about? What was it?
It bloomed up in her mind’s eye again, that book. It flipped all the way to the back, each page flying by before she had a chance to scan them. Her rage grew with each page that went by. He could’ve killed her. Perhaps he intended to kill her. It made no sense; if he wanted her dead, he would not be there to rescue her. Was there something else happening here? If so, what was it?
Then she saw it.
She saw an illustration of a woman, her body still and quiet, her eyes closed, and an enormous light radiating out from her body. What did that mean?
Marik said, “You must use it.” Use what? She had no idea what it was that he wanted her to use. But that image stayed in her mind. The woman, quiet and still, and the bright light emanating from all around her. Coming from within her. What was it?
Her eyes went to the other page of the book, and only one word flashed in front of her eyes.
Weapon.
Weapon? What weapon? All she had was the little metal jug tucked into the back of her trousers. Ben’s weapon rested against her temple now, the steel of it cold and somehow warm at the same time. He spoke in a whisper. “I think I will kill you anyway.”
Of course he would. She had a sudden premonition. She would start walking across the distance, toward them and he and his Rovers would open fire but not before they got the chest. Ben would already be gone, running hard and fast when his Rovers opened fired on the group and her. Even if they killed all the other Rovers, he would escape. Perhaps he planned it that way. Fewer people to share it with.
Weapon.
Heat blossomed in her stomach. Her entire body vibrated. Her eyes closed tightly and a bright golden light filled her mind, filled her consciousness.
A weapon. She was the weapon. Marik had done something with that implant, done something that would see to it that she was a weapon.
And she was.
A scream, so horrible and so shrill that it tore at her senses, echoed right into her ear. The gun pressed closer to her temple and then it began to jitter up and down, on its edges, raking against the flesh of her face. Her eyes flew open, and her arms came up.
And then all hell broke loose.
Chapter 10
Jenny had done it. She had rea
ched down within herself, and she had found that last bit of gift a natural healer had. That gift was a double-edged sword, however. If used upon a healthy person, it became a weapon. Ben, her former lover, fell and kicked on the ground, his body arching and flexing as every illness ever known suddenly attacked him, coming in from all sides of his immune system and central nervous system.
The other Rovers broke into a run. Marik and his crew surged forward. There was nothing in the chest, of course; it had all been a ruse, and he had bet everything he had on Jenny.
He knew he had to get to her. He had to save her now. They had only needed her gift long enough to make a difference, to send as many Rovers as possible to the ground while their bodies battled illnesses and lost.
The Rovers were falling by the dozens. All of her energy was directed at the Rovers and not them, but Marik knew that she did not get control of it and soon it would spread and radiate outward. Nobody would be safe.
He took a deep breath. Talon said, “Let me. It shouldn’t be you.”
Marik said, “It has to be me.”
He advanced even further and called her name. Jenny’s eyes flew open. The golden light emanating from within her body made her long blonde hair stand up on end and crackle with energy and light. Her eyes shone, lambent and huge, and her mouth was open. Even her teeth were rammed in that light.
She looked right at him, and he saw tears, golden and beautiful, go running down her face.
He drew his weapon.
The weapon fired, and she went down.
The light that covered her winked out, and they ran forward. The Rovers were beyond help. There was nothing they could do, and they might possibly even be contagious. The only thing they wanted to do at that moment was save Jenny, and Marik was the first person there. He scooped her up in his arms, seeing the neat blast hole in her chest. She would die if she were not assisted; she was already now slipping into unconsciousness.
They turned and began to run. The Rovers, so frightened and horrified by the terrible deaths that their fellows were undergoing, also ran but in the opposite direction. It was the most anticlimactic fight that Marik had ever been in, but it was still one the most awful outcomes he had ever seen. It sickened him at the same time that it relieved him.
The Rovers would fall back now. That would give them a chance to load those who were willing to go, as many as possible, onto the ships. Talon’s ship was already at the dock, and two more were coming down. The other two were owned by space pirates who had agreed to carry the passengers for a fee.
Jenny flopped in his arms, and he stared down at her face for a moment, disregarding the dangers and obstacles in the path ahead of him. She had to live. She just had to. He would die without her. He was sure of that. Oh, his body would go on, but his heart would be crumpled and broken to the point where it would not matter if it beat again at all.
They had been busy in the time between the ransom demand and the meeting. They had been rounding up the injured, asking who wanted to go with them to a new planet into a new home. They had sent a crew out onto the street to see if they could find any who were willing. The numbers of those who were was astronomical.
And already among the ranks, fighting was breaking out. Many of those who once lived above began to demand first passage, saying that their station required that they go first. Even now crew members were beating those angry people back, demanding that they wait in line, that they wait their turn, that they understand that all turns were equal.
Those who protested the most, who held their station up the most, who demanded first passage and would not listen to reason or be swayed by the fact that Talon had ordered children to be given first passage were immediately stunned into unconsciousness and then hauled away so as to leave the docks clear for others.
It was horrible. It was beyond comprehension.
They raced onto the docks. Marik laid Jenny down on the ground gently, looking up to see that the ship had not yet opened its bay doors. People, held back by the crew but anxious and frightened, crowded close. He knelt over Jenny and put his hand to the neat little hole in her chest. He put one hand on her pulse. It was weak and thready.
Was he already too late?
Had he shot too close to her heart after all? Had his aim not been as true as he had thought?
Marik summoned up every ounce of energy that he could for the woman that he loved, the woman that he could not live without, and the woman that he may very well have killed.
Marik awoke in a med bay. He lay there looking up at the ceiling, his entire body aching and sick. His head turned, and he stared at Jenny, who stood by his side. Her face was drawn and pale, and her hair was tangled around her face. Her eyes were red-rimmed and her cheeks were sunken and wan.
She said, “You saved my life.”
He managed a smile. “I might’ve shot you.”
She looked away. When she looked back, there was something in her face, something that did not bode well. “Why did you do that to me? Why did you implant me with all of that? Why did you break the implant? You were able to with technology, Jessica told me. She only told me because I pressed and then, when she still wouldn’t tell, I threatened to… Well, I threatened to become a weapon and use myself upon her. I think I scared her.”
Despite the gravity of her words, Marik felt amusement pushing into his being. He said, “She had good reason to be frightened.”
Her voice held anger. “You turned me into a monster. I hate you for that. How could you do that to me? Why did you do that to me?”
He said, “I had to. All natural healers have the gift within them. You’re strong and true, but you have to know that it works both ways. You hold the balance of both life and death; all natural healers do.”
Her eyes burned into his. “Do you?”
He said, “Yes. It’s why I can heal when someone is very close to death, but I do not have the power that you have. I don’t know why you are so strong. I don’t know where it comes from. It’s impossible for you to have that gift. It rarely appears in humans. The last time it did was many, many centuries ago, back in a time of your history and race already forgotten.”
She looked down at the floor and then back at his face. She shook her head. “I didn’t want this. I never wanted this. How could you give me something that would kill?”
He tried to sit up, but the pain from healing her flattened him again. “I didn’t give it to you. I only gave you the knowledge of everything in the universe as far as healing goes. The gift was already yours. I gave you nothing but knowledge.”
Her voice broke. “And you gave it to me in a way that you knew could kill me. Why?”
Marik said, “Because I’ve seen war before. Because I knew that there would be a great many people down here who would need your help and that you were not prepared to help them. That you had no idea of how to do more than just simple healing and you needed to be able to do so much more. That if I gave that to you that you would be able to do so much more. That you can heal hundreds, maybe even thousands if you only accepted your gift.”
Her lip curled upward to show her teeth. “Accepted it? I didn’t even know I possessed it! Why didn’t you just tell me I possessed it and then I could’ve worked on it like a… Like normal people?”
He studied her face. “There is no such thing as normal anymore. Maybe there never was.”
Her head lowered. Tears filled her eyes. She said, “I don’t know why it feels as if nothing ever happened at all. I mean, in my body. I feel every weight of every death that I caused in my heart though. I feel it all. But in my body, I feel fine. I don’t understand.”
He said, “I touch healed you.”
She said, “I understand that. And I hate you for it. I don’t want to hate you for this. I’m so angry at you right now, and I don’t want to be. I’m angry at you for what you did to me on that ship. I’m angry at you for giving me the knowledge of how to kill. I’m angry at you for summoning that forth from me
somehow. And I hate you for those things, but I don’t want to. More than anything else I do not want to hate you.”
He knew that she would hate him for a while. He only hoped that, eventually, she would forgive him. He said, “I am so sorry. I promise you that I would not have done it if there had been any other way. I…”
His mouth closed. How could he say to her now that he loved her? She would not hear him even if he did. He sat up; wincing slightly as one last bolt of pain went through his body then subsided. He said, “Have we left the surface?”
She shook her head. “It’s chaos down there. They are trying to load people onto the ship now, but they need help.”
He managed to get off the table and stand. “Then we should go.”
As soon as he said the words, he fell back into a dead faint.
Chapter 11
It was chaos. Jenny rushed down to help as people crowded close, desperate to get on the ship and off the surface of the planet that was no longer home for them. Those who had lived above were still fighting, still demanding first passage for the most part. That sickened her but did not surprise her. She called out, “We are taking the elderly and the youngest first!”
Talon called out, “Those of you with small children, come forward! Those of you who are family to the elderly and have your elderly with you, come forward.”
As Jenny watched a sharp-faced woman who wore the stained and torn robes that marked her station as having been from above snatched a small child from an obviously injured young woman wearing the faded and filthy tunic and trousers worn by those who came from Below. The sharp-faced woman rushed forward, the child held high in the air. She called out, “I have a child! I have a child!”
The young woman wearing the tunic and trousers tried to cry out, but she was lost in the crowd. Jenny darted forward and snatched the child from the woman, passing the child back to one of the crew members. Her hand came up, and she shoved the woman to the ground. That rage boiled up again, and she felt that light within her trying to come forth.
