by J. N. Chaney
“I’ll tell Stacy and meet you there,” Ricky said with a quick nod.
I could see the hope in my friend’s eyes again and I sincerely wanted it to be well-founded. Ricky was doing his best to put on a strong front for Arun, but I knew how much my friend was hurting inside. The Eternal had come to mean a lot to him, just as Stacy had to me.
Outside the tent Stacy was finishing up speaking to the gathered group of survivors. She had a contingent of Civil Authority Officers with her and I felt a moment’s pride at the view.
“And that’s all we know at the moment,” Stacy was saying. “I understand that we’ve had to hold information back in the past for the betterment of our people, but not anymore. As soon as we find out more, we’ll address you again and update you with what’s going on. We’re in this together. We’ll all survive together.”
The crowd seemed oddly satisfied with Stacy’s blunt truth. There hadn’t been a lot of honest communication between those leading the expedition and the colonists until now. They had been kept in the dark about the reason for the crash and even our alien friends until recently. That really wasn’t fair, or, as had been found out, effective as a safety measure. In the attacks that occurred, the colonists were blindsided and unable to properly defend themselves. They needed to be prepared in all instances, which they couldn’t be if we spoon fed them bits of information.
Stacy ran the show differently now. She tackled the hard topics head on, and for that, I was grateful. The community had come together and seemed to have more faith in us now.
As soon as she was finished, Stacy opened up the conversation for questions, much like an official press conference. Neither of us had been ready for our current positions, but she’d settled into hers just fine. I was still floundering; at least it felt that way.
“I’ll wait until she’s finished to tell her,” Ricky said, bobbing his head up and down enthusiastically. “You go and tell Elon and Arun. The sooner we get everyone on the same page, the sooner we can gather our forces and link up with the Rung to take out Legion.”
“Rick,” I said, taking in a long breath. The way I said his name made my friend stop in his tracks. He gave me his full attention.
“What’s wrong?” Ricky asked. “Are you hurt or something?”
“No, nothing like that,” I said, clearing my throat. Bringing the words to my mouth was nearly painful. It was harder than taking a blow or lifting a physical weight. “I—you know I’m here for you, right? I mean, if you need to talk about everything going on.”
Ricky gave me a sideways look and nodded. “Dean, are you feeling okay?”
“Yep.” I cleared my throat. “I just know you’ve been through a lot. I’m hoping for the best just like you, but if Arun doesn’t get healed from the virus, I don’t want you... Look, just know I’m here for you buddy.”
Ricky nodded, gratitude causing the corner of his mouth to tug up into a smile. “Thanks, Dean. You’ve always been a good friend.”
We looked at each other for another moment, then it turned awkward.
“So, do we hug now or something?” Ricky joked.
“No, no. I can pass on that,” I laughed, putting my hands up in front of me to stop him, just in case.
“Okay, yeah, yeah, good.” Ricky shrugged unconvincingly. “Sure, I didn’t want a hug anyway.”
We both grinned at each other before I left to go find Elon and Arun. For a long time, Ricky had been my only friend. I knew I’d do anything I could to cure Arun, not only for her sake but for his too.
Thoughts about what an open war with Legion would mean raced through my mind. I headed for Arun’s tent, pressed up against the giant half of the Orion.
The seed ship was cracked in half like an egg. On top of that, it had landed on its side when it crashed onto Genesis. The tent I made my way toward now was more of a lean-to. Elon had repurposed an exposed room on the ground floor to accommodate his sister. The front portion was a tent and the back half of the room led into the Orion itself.
I stopped at the tent entrance, clearing my throat to make myself known.
“Elon, Arun? It’s Dean,” I said. “Can I come in?”
Nothing.
“Hey, I’m coming in. It’s Dean,” I shouted.
Still no response.
A cold prickle raced over my skin, raising goosebumps. I had been to visit Arun as much as I could over the last month. Someone was always there, and someone always answered.
I removed the tent flap and went through the front of the tent portion, where a wash basin and cleaning supplies were held. Another flap led into the portion of the living quarters housed in the Orion itself.
“Arun? Elon?” I asked as I drew back the next tent flap.
Elon’s body slumped in a chair.
Arun stood over him. Her eyes weren’t her own. The bright blue irises I was so used to seeing were gone. The black orbs of Legion had replaced them.
4
I didn’t have time to call out for help. Arun sprang at me the second she saw me enter. She bullied me backward, clenching her jaw as if she were going to break her own teeth.
Her hands reached for my throat.
“Arun, stop!” I shouted at her, grabbing her wrists tightly in my hands. “This isn’t you! You have to stop!”
She was too far gone at the moment to let any kind of words sink in. The Eternal struggled forward, trying to drive me back the way I came. She opened her mouth now as if she were going to say something. No words came out. She stood with her mouth gaping open, black eyes open wide in surprise.
Elon jumped to his feet and secured an arm around his sister’s neck, trying to pull her off me.
I was shocked and relieved that he was still alive. When I saw Arun standing over him, I’d feared the worst.
“Arun, stop. You need to fight this,” Elon said just below a shout. “Listen to my voice. This isn’t you. Remember who you are.”
The fight went out of Arun a moment later and her arms went limp. She stopped trying to grab at my neck. As if by some kind of magic, the black orbs that had become her eyes transitioned back to bright blue.
Arun fell to her knees.
“Dean, Dean, I’m so sorry.” Arun shook her head as if she were trying to dismiss a bad dream. “I don’t—I can’t…” her voice trailed off. I thought she might be crying, but I couldn’t be sure.
Elon glanced at me apologetically. I took a good look at him, still keeping an eye on Arun, who could possibly regress any second. His eyes were bloodshot with bags hanging under them. His normally tidy hair and clothes were wrinkled and mussed.
He knelt beside his sister, putting a hand on her shoulder.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Elon said. “It’s not you. We know that’s not you.”
I looked on, still recovering from the shock of what had just transpired. I knew Arun was doing badly but not this badly. I had been to visit her a few days before. She had been herself. Certainly weak but nothing had suggested this might happen. Neither Ricky nor Elon had told me about changes like this happening to her, where she completely lost control.
“Come on,” Elon said coaxingly. “Let’s get you back into the bed.”
I moved in to help. Together, we lifted Arun to her feet. She was shaky and seemed drained in contrast to how strong she had been when grabbing my throat. She felt small and fragile in my hands, like I could break her if I wasn’t careful. I could nearly wrap my hand around her upper arm.
“I’m so sorry, Dean,” Arun said again, her eyes finding mine. “I could have hurt you.”
“No offense, Arun,” I said to her, gently laying her down, “but there isn’t an alternate universe that exists where you hurt me in a hand-to-hand fight. Go easy on yourself.”
Her lips twisted up into a ghost of a smile.
“I had no idea it was this bad,” I said out loud. “I’m sorry, no one told me. I should have been checking on you every day.”
“It’s not your job t
o check on me,” Arun said, shaking her head.
“These full transitions just started,” Elon said, rubbing at his tired eyes. “This is only the second time.”
“I should be tied down,” Arun said dully. “The Legion virus is growing in me, getting stronger and stronger every day. I don’t—I don’t know how much longer I can fight it. It’s a miracle I’ve been able to keep it at bay this long. It’s only because of my Eternal DNA that I’ve stood a chance at all.”
“We’re not tying you down,” Elon said firmly. “It was my fault. I fell asleep. If I had been awake to see you change, I could have brought you back like I did just now.”
“We can’t risk it,” Arun said, shaking her head. “I won’t be the cause for Legion taking another life.”
“Listen,” I said, interrupting the brother-sister feud. “You two need to figure that out on your own. I have news.”
I told them everything about the images on Jezra’s data pad, finding the Rung in our walls, the way we captured him, and the white flag he had come to offer. When I was done, Arun and Elon stared at me, digesting the information. Then they looked at each other, almost as though they were silently coming to consensus before speaking.
“The Rung could be lying,” Arun pointed out. “The only real proof we have at all are the images Jezra captured. This could all be an elaborate ruse to get us out of our walls and into the open.”
“I don’t think so,” Elon said, shaking his head in disagreement. “Apart from the images Jezra captured is the fact that this Rung risked his own life to bring us the news. He has to know we wouldn’t have accepted him willingly. He put himself in great danger to come here. At any point, we might have killed him.”
“He could have killed me,” I pointed out. “Almost did when he took off the way he did. The bottom line is that we won’t know for sure unless someone goes with him and reports back.”
Elon and Arun both looked at me as if I’d lost my mind.
“You’ve been through so much already,” Elon said with a grimace. “I can’t ask you to go with him.”
“We’ve all been through a lot,” I said, nodding to Arun. “And you don’t have to ask because I’m volunteering. Maybe I’ve been hanging around Jezra and Lou too much, but I’m starting to believe that maybe I am here for a reason. I have a very unique set of skills that seem to get me through most situations. Let me go with this Rung. If he’s telling the truth, I’ll report back, and we’ll have the way to kill Legion.”
“And if not?” Arun asked. “If he’s lying and this is a trap?”
“Then he gets one of us instead of all of us,” I said, shrugging and spreading my hands palms up in a “whatever” gesture. “We can’t afford not to explore the few options we have at this point.”
Arun gave a long sigh, too tired to argue.
Elon, on the other hand, still had some fire left in him. “You’re not going alone,” he said so definitively that I understood at that moment he would fight me the whole way on this one. “We’ll ask for volunteers from those we know we can trust. A few are better than one. Even if it’s just a handful to cover your back.”
I opened my mouth to argue but didn’t get any words out before Arun interrupted me again. “Save your breath,” she said, exhausted. “You know well enough he’s not going to give in.”
Elon nodded along with his sister as if to punctuate her statement. I looked from sister to brother and back to the sister again, then I raised one side of my mouth in a half-smile.
“Elon, if I could have a moment alone with Dean, while I’m still in my right mind?” Arun asked, looking over to her brother with questioning eyes. “It won’t take more than a few moments.”
Elon looked unsure at first then regarded his sister with a wistful smile. “Okay, I’ll be right outside if you need me.”
“Thank you,” Arun said, smiling weakly but reassuringly at him.
Elon passed me with a tilt of his chin and left the interior of the Orion.
I looked around at the metal walls and ceiling of this section of Arun’s new home. Memories of the magnificent seed ship now brought to ruin poked at my mind. Thinking too hard about this situation we were in and how it occurred could bring on madness akin to Legion’s possession of hapless individuals, so I avoided those too-dark thoughts.
“I need you to do something for me if I don’t make it,” Arun said, pulling me from my thoughts. “Before you go on a rant about how I shouldn’t think like that and be positive, you can save it.”
“I wasn’t going to say that at all,” I said, going over to the side of her bed and giving her a sad smile. “I know you don’t want that.” It was only a partial lie. It was on the tip of my tongue to do as she’d said, but I stopped myself. She didn’t need it.
“Thank you,” Arun said, running her right hand under her sheet. She came back with two folded pieces of paper. “I have a note for my brother and another for Ricky. If I’m not able to fight off the Legend virus, I want you to kill me and give them these notes.”
My stomach clenched in my gut at the same time my mouth went dry. I had done my fair share of killing people infected by the Legion virus, but I hadn’t known any of them. Maybe I was a bad person for thinking that taking someone’s life I did know was worse than a stranger’s, but that was how I felt.
Could you really kill her? I asked myself. Could you really put Arun down for the count if she couldn’t fight the virus’ infection?
“It shouldn’t be Ricky or Elon.” Arun cleared her throat, blinking back tears. “They’re not strong in the same way you are, Dean. I hate to ask anyone for this favor, but you’re one of the few options I have. I’ll ask Stacy if you say no.”
I stood quietly, thinking over her request. Four little words that were anything but simple ran themselves over and over through my mind. Will you kill me? There was a huge amount of trust that went with that request. In a perverse way, it was an honor to be asked.
“I need you to promise me, Dean.” Arun looked at me through pleading eyes. “I need you to swear to me. If I’m gone for good, you have to kill me. I don’t want to live my life as a puppet controlled by Legion. I won’t give him that satisfaction. Please promise me.”
I couldn’t bring myself to voice the words, but I nodded.
“Swear to me.” Arun reached out and grabbed my wrist with more strength than I would have thought she was capable. A brief flash of blackness raced over her eyes and I was afraid she was reverting into madness again. “Swear to me, Dean!”
“If you turn and there is no way to bring you back”—I paused, swallowing hard—“I’ll be the one to end you.”
“Thank you, thank you,” Arun said gratefully, releasing my arm. “I hate to put this burden on you, but you’re different, whether you see that or not.”
I ignored that comment. I had enough to deal with at the moment. I had just agreed to kill one of the few people I considered a friend.
“The letters?” I said instead.
“The one I wrote to Elon gives him my last instructions on how to save the colony,” Arun said, biting her lower lip in concentration. “The one I have for Ricky explains what he’s come to mean to me.”
“Why don’t you just tell him?” I asked. “I mean, you still can now. Why wait to let him read it from a letter?”
“He’s been nothing but wonderful to me since I’ve known him,” Arun said, shaking her head sadly as she stared at the ceiling of the Orion. “He doesn’t deserve to hear how I feel about him now only to lose me if I should die.”
“No way,” I said.
Arun looked over at me, confused. “What?”
“No way,” I repeated myself. “You don’t get off easy. If I’m supposed to kill you, you don’t get to die without having these hard conversations. You tell Ricky what he means to you while you have the time. I wish I would have told my wife what she meant to me more often before she was gone. If you have the chance now, you take it.”
&n
bsp; “He’ll be devastated if I don’t make it,” Arun said.
“He’ll be devastated anyway reading it from a note,” I said, tossing the letter with Ricky’s name back to her. “At least this way he gets to hear it from you rather than a piece of paper.”
“Dean—” Arun said, about to try and convince me again.
“Not doing it,” I said. “You tell him. If you care about him, give him that at least.”
We regarded each other a moment longer in the quiet of my words before we were interrupted by a familiar voice.
“Arun!” Ricky dashed through the tent flaps into the room. He looked at me with a happy smile that worried me. “Oh, sorry, I came as fast as I could. Stacy is on board with the plan to help the Rung as long as Elon and Arun are. I mean, did you tell them already?”
“Oh, I told them,” I said, placing a hand on Ricky’s shoulder and giving Arun a meaningful look. I headed out of the tent. “I think Arun has something to say to you.” I left them both staring after me.
5
I ducked out of the tent a moment later to let Arun and Ricky have their much-needed conversation. Elon stood outside, his arms folded across his chest, his head bent forward in desolation. He had a mountain of problems weighing on his shoulders. I didn’t envy him the slightest.
“Need another drink?” I asked, remembering how I had found him in the downed Orion before as he tried to drink his problems away. “Or maybe you just need to break something?”
“Both,” Elon said with a sigh. “I know I should tie her down, but how do I bring myself to do that? Am I really going to restrain my sister?”
“We have got to believe that the Rung are telling the truth,” I said, trying to navigate the conversation away from his personal problems to the more global ones at hand. I wasn’t really one for making people feel better, preferring to change the subject when things became too emotional. “I’ll head out tonight. If the Rung are telling the truth, we’ll know soon enough.”
