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It was another joke, but the truth hits me right in the fucking gut. The starship is just past the trees. We’re closer than ever before.
I take her hand. Both of us keep low and quiet as I find the path to the starship. Around the corner is the rusted metal of my home. But it’s not just my home. It’s Zakar’s, too.
He could be anywhere.
Lucky for us, when we get near the entrance, I don’t sense him.
“Do you think he’s here?” she asks.
I shake my head. “I can’t be sure, but Fassbender has been too boisterous for his own good. Zakar won’t be able to hold himself back.”
It’s crunch time. As fun as the games are to my brethren, they will run their course. With time, Zakar will succumb to boredom.
Once that happens, things might get a little messy.
A gunshot echoes, almost right on command. Zakar’s roar follows. However, none of the sounds are coming from the direction of Fassbender’s camp.
We both look at each other, confused.
“Keep still,” I say.
More gunshots, followed by an eerie silence.
“He’s far away,” I say.
For now. He could be here in less than five minutes if he ran fast enough. I leave all that out because I can tell she can’t take any more bad news.
“Come,” I say, pulling her into my arms. “Let me show you my home.”
I tell her the history of this place. As the starship hit Avalon’s atmosphere, their system coordinates malfunctioned. The maps totally cut out, leaving them flying blind.
They crashed into the jungle, smashing through the giant trees. Lucky for them, there were no casualties. The ship, however, was ruined.
Decimated.
All of this happened before I was made, of course. The scientists never brought it up to us, but Zakar‘s ears picked up on it with sharp precision. We pieced together the facts, and we slowly figured out they had no way to leave this planet.
Like the beings they designed, they were stuck. They weren’t happy about it either.
Many relay calls to Earth were rejected by the spotty network. The calls that went through were met with hesitance.
NASA couldn’t do a damn thing about it. They were beholden to their donors, a massive defense contractor industry that refused to risk profit over human life.
After years of trying to come up with a good enough reason to get them out of there, they found one. The alien subjects escaped. We were a threat to their weapons project. If we won this fight, trillions of dollars in investments would be destroyed.
They’d lose everything.
Naomi lives in fear, but I was born in it. Decay is all I’ve ever known. But I’ve always welcomed death, if it ever came.
The one thing I’ve never done is sacrifice for another. I wouldn’t do that for Zakar. Hell no.
If it ensures that Naomi lives, I would sacrifice for her.
She paces the starship control center, running her hand across the broken tablets and computers. Quietly, she examines the trinkets that the earlier scientists left behind. There is sadness in her eyes, but she must understand my side. I never killed any of them, but they were not good people.
They knew what program they were signing up for. They had paramilitary training and everything.
“How could someone sign up for a program so cruel?” she asks.
