Chapter 26
26
The rain stops. The wind dies so suddenly I nearly stumble and fall. Within seconds, the black clouds dwindle and clear, and the sky is once again a bright cerulean. A few soft white clouds remain. It’s as if the storm never was, a violent argument diffused with a single sentence.
I push drenched hair out of my face, shaking. My hands are swollen and seeping, red with blood. I’ve bled through my bandage and my shirt. I turn to face the tree. It’s unchanged, unblemished. Fear blooms in my belly, but I try to quell it with quiet words.
“My mother is the reason I’m here,” I sob, half-choking on tears and phlegm. “She kept her word, didn’t she? And so will I.”
She’s listening now. I feel Her contemplating. This is all I have.
“Let him go.”
And then, just there in the wood — a crack begins to form.
Breathless, I watch as it grows longer, wider. My heart threatens to burst in anticipation. The fissure opens, but there’s only blackness within. I claw at the edges of the opening until the blood on my fingers stains the tree.
“Ben,” I plead. “Ben, come back.”
The fissure widens.
A shoulder appears. I recognize Ben’s jacket emerging from the darkness, illuminated in the pale morning light. I grab him and pull, screaming as my shoulder flares in pain at the exertion. The crevice expands. Ben’s head finally comes into view, brown hair matted and wet, like he’s been digested and made whole again, slick with the insides of this godawful tree.
I pull and pull, tugging with every last vestige of strength left within me. I’m starting to think I’ll never do it, that She freed him just enough to taunt me, to show me how weak I am. How human I am. That I was right all along: I’m nothing.
But I won’t give up.
I’m sure I’m about to pass out from the agony and effort when I finally wrench him free. I fall back, dragging him bodily from the maw. As soon as his booted feet fall from the dark fissure, it closes behind him. The bark knits itself together until there’s no hint that an opening was there at all.
I lie there, breathless among the tree roots, for I don’t know how long. I realize, finally, that Ben isn’t moving. Dread tightens in my throat. He’s just unconscious. After all this, She wouldn’t give me a corpse. Would She? I drag myself up to my knees, heart thudding. If She killed him…
I clamber awkwardly to Ben’s side, heart in my throat. I check his pulse with blood-encrusted fingers. And when I feel the telltale throb at his neck, I sob brokenly. He’s alive. Barely, but he’s alive. He’s here. He’s still mine.
“Ben,” I whisper, kissing his temple, gently touching his hair, pressing my forehead to his. “You’re okay. I saved you. Wake up.”
His eyelids flutter.
I hold my breath. My entire world hangs in the balance.
Then he opens one eye and immediately scowls, blinking. “Where am I?”
Tears stream down my face. I throw myself over him, kissing his face and neck. He smells like earthworms and ancient soil. I’ve never smelled anything better.
“With me,” I sob. “You’re safe. I made sure you’re safe. She won’t take you again.”
After a few minutes, when we’re both able, I help him sit up. He’s strong and recovering quickly. He’s safe . And I hate that I’m grateful to Her for giving him back to me like this, returning him whole. I guess she knows I won’t keep my end of the bargain otherwise.
Ben rubs an unsteady hand over his face, then looks at me.
Really looks at me.
Dappled sunshine softens his expression, leaf-made shadows dancing across his eyes. And somehow, something in his gaze makes me feel like he’s seeing me for the very first time.
Maybe he is.
Maybe he sees my mother’s daughter, grown from the seed of a planet.
I can’t help but wonder if he also sees, in the stricken darkness of my gaze, what will happen next.
We won’t stay here. The mission is complete. We’ll go back to the shuttle, back to our ship, which orbits the Planet. We’ll chart a course for Earth, and on the way, I’ll put together a statement for the Earth Colonization Effort: Julian and Darcie are dead. I’ll say it was a slow-acting post-hypersleep ailment or a simple fever. I’ll say we honored their last wishes and buried them here, on the Planet. No one will question it; no one will look into it too deeply. And if their families protest, the ECE will pay them off. The ECE will be too focused on the fact that the Planet passed all our tests. They’ll see in my report that we ran every possible experiment, each one a success. The ECE won’t need much data to convince them. They’ll acknowledge there are no remaining options for humanity, and that will be that.
I won’t go back on my word. She’ll know if I do; She’s part of me. She always has been. I refuse to lose myself to her. I refuse to put Ben at risk.
So, I’ll support the ECE when they officially declare the Planet viable and ready for human colonization.
Within a year, colonization efforts will commence. By that time, maybe Ben will have questioned me. Or maybe he’ll still be glad to have made it, to be one of only two left standing.
I imagine all the years that will pass, the money and manpower spent to ready humanity for the journey across the stars, right back here, to the Planet. It will take trillions of dollars and several years. And by the time we set out on the long adventure, millions will have died on Earth — from weather events, illness, starvation, or worse.
But that won’t happen to us. Ben and I will be treated as heroes, kept safe from whatever ails the rest of the world. We’ll be asked to join in the colonization effort. We’ll be paid a ridiculous salary. And if I know the ECE, we’ll be offered a spot on the first ship.
We’ll refuse.
And one day, I can’t guess exactly when — but one day, Ben will outright ask me why I did this. He’ll ask me why I wrote that report. He’ll ask me why I lied about Julian and Darcie’s deaths, why I signed off on the Planet, why I lied and sent millions out there without any warning.
Maybe I’ll tell him. Maybe I won’t. Maybe, by then, he’ll have figured it out.
I do know one thing: As long as he stays far away from Her, he’ll be safe. Even if he grows to hate me, even if he sees a monster where a woman used to be, it won’t matter. It will be a weeping wound in my heart for the rest of my pathetic life, but it will have been worth it.
It will have been worth it because he’ll be safe.
And when colonists begin to die, when they’re taken away, one by one… at least it won’t be him. At least it won’t be him . Even if he hates me, it won’t be him. Even if he wants me dead, it won’t be him.
Ben lifts a hand, pressing a thumb against my chin. I realize I’m crying. He brushes my tears away, sweet and gentle. Almost reverent. Almost worshipful.
“Jones,” he breathes: a benediction. As if he sees me for everything I am. As if he understands me. As if I’m everything .
Maybe, I dare to hope, turning my face into his touch… maybe, when that day comes, he’ll forgive me.