Beyond Our Stars (19 page)

I was starting to think we were fighting some Locals who didn't want us here. But not all of them. Different messages in different sessions. I kept thinking as the rest of the group started talking about what the Chief might do next.

Finally, enough time had passed and I left them and made my way up to Chief's quarters. The door slid open before I knocked. I stepped inside.

“We have to surrender our weapons, all of them,” I said immediately.

Chief groaned softly. “And here I had just finished convincing myself that you weren't crazy.” He spread the drawings out on his desk and patted a chair next to him. “Explain this.”

“Those
are
a message. I want to make the Locals understand that they don't have be afraid of a wave of billions of humans following us to invade their planet. I wanted them to know that we came here because we had no choice.”

Chief's eyes were piercing, making me wish to high heaven that I'd shared this with him first instead of surprising him with it like a traitor. “I thought as much once I'd looked at them. They're very good. Weeks did them?” I nodded.

“And you decided not to tell anyone about them. I can see why, if people realized you were revealing a weakness of ours they'd do everything in their power to stop you. But you know who you
should have
told?” he said, struggling to control his anger.

Now I hung my head. I couldn't say anything. The truth was that I had thought I knew best.

“Hope, I just don't know anymore. These creatures… they don't want us here.”

“There has to be a way,” I said. “Maybe they're not sure what to do with us. We are the invaders after all. This is their home.”

Chief looked at the drawings again.

“I'm not sure about this,” he said softly. “I don't know if I can take it to the people.”

“I'm not sure, either,” I whispered.

Chief sat back in his chair. I let him think and stare at the wall. I couldn't give an order like this. I couldn't make a hundred thousand people do anything unless I had him as an ally. And this was the way, the only thing we hadn't tried.

“All of the weapons,” Chief said gravely.

“Yes. All of them. Piled up next to the Stacks so the CR-3ans can see.”

Chief rubbed his temples. Then he cradled his head in his hands. Finally, he lifted his head and he said almost inaudibly. “When you asked to be let out was the one time they listened.”

I'd forgotten about that part. But yes, that was true, too.

“But we killed the one that let you out,” he said. My gut clenched. Also true.

“I think we have to ask to stay,” I said.

“If we do this – if I listen to you, we'll be totally and utterly at their mercy,” Chief said.

“We already are,” I answered.

There was a knock at the door.

“Yes,” Chief called.

One of Chief's engineers came in. “Sorry, sir, but I thought…oh, you're here,” he said, his eyes flitting from Chief Up to me.

“What about her?” Chief asked, leaning forward.

“Well, it's just that the prisoner, Legacy? He's asking to speak with the girl,” he said the last part to me.

I couldn't hide my surprise. Legacy was the last person I thought would want to talk to me. And I wasn't sure I wanted to talk to him.

Chief's eyes narrowed as he watched me. Finally I said, “I guess I'll hear what he has to say,” and hurriedly I added, “if that's okay with you.”

Chief shook his head, knowing I'd come up with the last bit for his benefit.

“Okay. But wait, Hope? That boy is confused and angry. But…he's trying.”

“Okay.” I wondered how much Chief knew about it.

I followed the engineer over to the jail, which was nearing completion. Its construction had faltered once the food supply had been cut. It was hard to ask people to work when they were hungry.

The jail
felt
like a dead ship. After years in space a lot of the metal from the Memory had blackened and looked old and beaten. It was dark inside, even in the daytime, and the floors didn't seem to support quite enough weight, the metal clanging with every footstep.

Legacy was on the first floor, in a cell at the end of the hallway. The only prisoner in a vast, empty jail. The guard next to Legacy's cell got up from his small wooden stool and backed away as I approached. I took a seat on the stool, not ready to look at Legacy just yet. I didn't want to feel that same anger I'd felt when I attacked him.

“Hope,” a voice said, and then I had to open my eyes because it sounded so different than what I'd been expecting.

“Legacy?” He looked different, too. Younger. His long black hair was swept from his face and tucked behind his ears. He wasn't hanging his head with a sullen expression, and the black stuff around his eyes was gone.

He was sitting cross-legged on the floor next to the bars of his cell. As I looked at him he brought his hands up to the bars and held them.

“Hope I'm sorry,” he said.

I looked down, fists clenched. Even knowing what I knew, what he'd done was…

“Hope, I-I wasn't thinking clearly,” he said, pleading in his voice. “I honestly didn't think it through. I mean, I meant to kill him but I shouldn't have done it. I just saw him and…I hate them.”

“Well, now they all probably hate us, too, thanks to you,” I said, unable to hide my anger. But it was difficult. After everything we'd been through, I wasn't sure how I felt about the Locals, either.

“I know. I know that. And---” He stopped again, halting over his words, “I'm not saying the right things.” He swallowed. “Aren't you tired of them testing us? Watching us?” he said quietly.

“Yes. Of course I'm tired.”

He nodded. Then he groaned and gripped the bars to his cell. “What I really want to say is, I don't know if there's a way to get us all out of here. I don't know if there ever was. But, if you have a plan… then I'll do anything I can to help you.”

I couldn't look at him.
Now
he'd help me?

“I don't know if there's anything you can do to fix it, Legacy.”

He nodded. “Maybe not. But I'm saying, if the time comes, I'll offer myself up. I mean, if I was really the one to cost us everything then I can't live with that. And if we're all going to die anyway, I want to know that I tried. So, if you have a plan, count me in. They can have me.”

I looked at him. He seemed sincere. If he would really do this…

“I don't even know if I can let that happen. Why now?”

Legacy stood and took a few steps back from the bars, letting his hands fall down to his sides.

He took a deep breath. “I don't know. It was different when I was surrounded by people who agreed with me. I felt like they understood. I hated my dad for always switching sides, he does whatever he thinks will help him most. He doesn't care about people, he cares about how people see him. How his son sees him never seems to matter.”

He put his hands back up on the bars. “I needed to do something. I wanted someone to pay.” Legacy paused. “I'm sorry about the stuff I said to you. The truth is I think you're amazing.”

Quiet hung between us. The words stunned me. I couldn't answer.

“Chief's been coming to see me,” he said.

“He has?” I asked. I should have known.

“Yeah. He didn't really say much, he let me yell at him. But then I yelled so much… I started to think about things.”

He stopped and I could see emotions warring on his face. “And now…” Legacy scrunched his eyebrows together. “You don't always get the chance to save someone. Sometimes the choice isn't up to you. But this time, I decide.”

It was all too terrible, and I couldn't help it, I turned my head away. I'd seen his love for his mother, his guilt, in his eyes.

I couldn't hate him.

“Please, Hope,” he said.

My mind swirled.

“I have to go. I'll tell Chief what you said.”

Legacy gave me another pleading look and I walked fast away from his cell, from his misery.

Legacy wanted redemption.

I didn't want to make decisions like this.

***

I ran back to Cairo's quarters where the others were waiting for me.

“You were gone so long!” Marseille said.

“Where have you been?” came a low voice I was glad to hear. I buried my face in his shoulder.

“Hang on, was Chief really that mad?” He asked.

I stepped away from him, running my hands over my face, wanting to be strong but feeling like I couldn't handle all of the conflicting thoughts clashing in my mind. I told them about my new plan, and also what Legacy had said.

“He'd really give himself up like that?” Weeks sounded disbelieving.

“I really think so,” I answered. “I think we need to acknowledge that we're weaker than them, that we need help, so they'll take us in. That's all we are now. Refugees. Not conquerors.”

“But we did kill one of them,” Marseille said.

“Exactly,” I answered. “But one of ours died, too. If they wanted to kill us all why didn't they do it already?”

A voice over the intercom system of the ship broke through our conversation and a chill swept through me.

“All Specimens aboard the ship please report to the Stacks.” There was a wavering in the voice this time.

“They're back?” Gaia asked, jumping from the bed. Chance's arm slid around my waist and pulled me close as we walked.

We were all tense as we made our way through the grass to the tunnels.

A crowd had formed, masses of people gathering around the entrances to the Stacks.

As we neared I could already see that something was out of the ordinary. There was only one Local. And he was standing inside the tunnel that bore the symbol for our group.

Questioning faces watched us as we walked over to our entrance.

As we neared, the Local lifted its arm and its hand outstretched. Toward me.

I felt my heart stop and yet words came out of my mouth as though I'd known I was going to speak them.

“They only want me.”

“No, no way,” came the response I knew was going to come from Chance. I pulled from his arms. I wasn't going to let any of them come this time.

“Hope, I don't care what you say, you're not going in alone,” he insisted. He left me and started walking toward the tunnel by himself. The Local raised a hand.

“Not you,” I said. I had no idea if their gestures were already like ours or if they'd learned from watching us, but either way the meaning was pretty clear. “They won't let you this time. It's only going to be me.”

I grabbed his face and kissed him. “I can't let you go in alone, I can't,” he repeated, staring at the alien.

“I'm going,” I said to him. “And I'll be back soon.”

He looked stunned as he watched me leave, and then he turned to the Local with a fixed, angry stare.
Please, don't hurt me or he'll become the next Legacy,
I thought.

I looked the Local in the eyes as I approached and he returned my gaze. This one was younger. He seemed calm enough. I stepped in and the force field sealed immediately. I could almost feel it brushing against my back.

I usually had company along for whatever rollercoaster ride of torment lay in store for us. This time was different. There wasn't any shuffling or talking, only the sound of my own breathing and my soft footsteps as the Local and I advanced toward the slick white doors.

My heart started to pound as I passed the Local and the doors to the Stack slid open for me to walk inside. Then they sucked shut and there was darkness. Every inch of me was on alert, waiting. My legs were going numb and at the same time my heart was racing, my face hot and cold, my fingers tips tingling with anticipation. I think I closed my eyes. The Stack didn't illuminate. A minute went by in blackness.

I heard a buzzing next to me. I reached out in the dark and felt a force field. And then I was pushed.

I fell, unable to stay upright and it kept pushing me to the back of the Stack like I was garbage under a broom. I struggled but couldn't stay upright while the field was shoving me. It stopped.

I stood and pounded against the invisible wall. I opened my mouth to start yelling but then across from me the doors to the Stack slid open and I heard familiar voices. My Specs.

Chance ran in. “Hope!” I could just make them out from the light bleeding in through the open door. He ran across the Stack. I yelled his name but he couldn't hear me or see me.

He threw up his hands. “She's not here, where do they have her?”

The others were more nervous than I'd ever seen them. They stood in a huddled group, close together, several of them holding hands. Cairo stood in front of Marseille, holding her behind his back. Chance came over and put a hand on Pilgrim's shoulder.

Then the doors shut, sealing us in darkness and the simulation began. I caught my breath, wishing the others weren't here.

As soon as the session started the group was trapped in a cell, a round cage surrounding them.

They gripped the bars and yelled, and I could hear their fear. They were in a cage inside a cage and I was nowhere to be seen.

But then Chance called my name, “Hope?”

My pulse thudded but he wasn't even turned towards me.

And I saw who he was calling for.

It was me. Except it wasn't me at the other end of the Stack. The pretend me was standing still, with fearful eyes.

I stared at my hologram in awe. I started screaming again even though I knew no one could hear me. “It's not me! It's not me!” My throat felt raw but I kept screaming.

When the shot rang out I ducked and sealed my eyes shut.

I heard Chance roar like I'd never heard before. He was pulling on the bars with everything he had, banging on them and turning his fists bloody.