Ouroboros 4: End (11 page)

She had a point. A terrifying one. When you devoted your life to an institution like the Coalition Academy you did so through pride and duty. You did so because you believed the Coalition did good. Without them, the galaxy would be thrust into anarchy. There'd be nobody to stop the Barbarians nor the Kor Empire. The Coalition existed to foster peace and development.

But this, what they were going to do to Remus 12, sounded like something the Barbarians would do. It was perilously, perilously close to mass genocide. Not just the destruction of one race, but the destruction of their entire history.

He gulped uncomfortably, trying to swallow past a hard lump that had formed at the base of his throat. But no matter how hard he tried to shift it, it wouldn’t.

His emotions were climbing up his back, chilling every muscle and bone as they went.

At once he was pulled between the belief that they needed to destroy Remus 12 for the ensured protection of the Coalition, and yet the realization that if they did, they were no more morally superior than the Vex themselves.

The Vex were only trying to survive, after all.

Perhaps Nida saw her opportunity, because she took a stumbling step forward. One hand was held tightly against her chest, her fingers squeezed into a fist as her skin glistened with sweat. Her eyes wide open, the skin at the edges strained as her corrugated cheeks pulled her lips thin. ‘Carson, please. Think about this. The entire history of Vex is marred by people who are willing to do whatever it takes to fix their mistakes and survive. It’s only because the entity went to extremes in order to repair the damage it had done that Vex ended up like that. And it is only through the entity’s manipulation that the Vex are willing to do whatever it takes to fix their own history. Do we really want to join them? Should the Coalition do whatever it takes, too, or can’t we find some other way?’

Her questions were good. And they needed to be asked. But the conclusion would still be the same.

And Carson knew that. Though the guilt and shame washed over him with the pounding repetition of waves assaulting a shoreline, at the back of his mind he still knew the conclusion would be the same.

Regardless of the fact they would be committing mass genocide by destroying the Vex, the only alternative was to risk the entire Coalition and the continued stability of peace within the Milky Way.

When you are in charge of something like the Coalition, and the direct safety of everybody who called it home, sometimes you weren’t allowed moral luxuries. It was a cold, almost brutal thing to point out, but it was true. Admiral Forest and the rest of the Academy board knew that. If they decided there was some slim chance to save the Vex, and risked the entire Coalition based on that flimsy hope, they would condemn everyone.

Nida had put it best when she had prove to everybody in that meeting that the Vex would do whatever it took to survive. There would be kamikaze pilots, desperate soldiers, and an entire race hell-bent on sacrificing everything if only it saved them in the end.

An enemy like that has no compunction. It will not stop in the face of moral obligations.

So of course there was only one thing the Coalition could do.

Living with that conclusion, was harder than making it. For it made him realize the Coalition wasn’t nearly as good and ethical as he liked to make out.

As all these myriad thoughts chased through his mind, he pressed his lips together, his chin dimpling and creasing with deep emotion as he faced her.

Granted, she wasn’t the best recruit, but surely she understood what was going on here? Despite the effect of the entity, surely Cadet Nida Harper understood the Coalition could not risk itself to save what was very likely a doomed race.

If the entity, an incredibly powerful force, had not found a way to save the Vex in tens of thousands of years, how on earth could the Coalition hope to do it in the little time they had left?

Indeed, there was a far more telling fact. They had already lived through the future Vex attack. They had seen Travis a broken man as he led the survivors through the galaxy.

More important than that, however, was the fact the Vex had not reappeared. If their attack on the Coalition had been successful, and they had finally found the technology they required to fix their timeline, then he would have met them in the future.

But both Nida and Carson had stood upon Remus 12, and it was just as barren and dead as it had been the first time they stood upon it.

Which meant the Coalition simply didn’t have the technology the Vex were after. They couldn’t hope to fix their timeline. So the only thing they should aim to do was to protect the Coalition itself.

He wanted to point all of this out, but it wouldn’t make a difference, would it?

Standing there and staring at her pale cheeks, washed out, emotion filled expression, told him that no words were going to make a difference.

Whatever affect the entity was having on Nida, speaking to her, rationalizing through their decisions, it wasn’t going to make any difference.

So instead Carson took a hesitant step forward, his shoes pushing into the trim tread of the carpet below him softly. Half lifting a hand up to her he parted his lips and whispered her name.

She stared at the hand warily. ‘We can’t do this,’ she tried.

No, they could do this. They shouldn’t have to, but unless he was very much mistaken, there wasn’t an alternative.

There was no way to save the Vex.

‘Nida, please,’ he tried, lifting his hand up higher.

He didn’t want to lose her, which was incredible considering they'd barely been together for more than several days.

It felt longer though, of course it did. They had just endured one of the most stressful missions imaginable. For every step of it, she’d been by his side. He would have wanted no one else.

But now he was facing the very real prospect that she would never want to have anything to do with him again.

Though he could hold onto hope that once the entity was removed, Nida would return to normal, there was every possibility she would still hate him.

He'd lied to her. He'd sided with the Admiralty.

Sure enough, she took a sharp step backwards, then another. For a split second she stared at him, her wide eyes filling with tears. With shimmering, flickering attention, she faced him, then turned around on her heel so sharply her loose hair flicked against her cheeks and shoulder.

He actually stumbled forward, as if reaching a hand out to her had made him lose his balance.’ Nida,’ he said desperately.

She ran away.

Straight for the door.

She was out of it before he could push her name once more from his lips.

He could go after her. Maybe he should go after her.

Yet he found himself standing there, frozen to the spot as if his feet had sunk deep inside the icy body of a comet.

Did he deserve this?

Yes.

He was about to be complicit in the total destruction of an entire race, so he most definitely deserved this.

But did it have to be done?

Yes.

On old Earth there was a saying about being stuck in a Catch-22, being trapped against a rock and a hard place.

Well that was Carson’s life right now.

Yet, he didn’t stop.

He mustered the courage to turn from the door. His gaze drew naturally to the windows at the opposite side of his office.

Beyond he could see the sprawling grounds of the Academy. People walked along the paths, enjoying the streaming sunshine from above.

Beyond the Academy lay the city and the bay.

Earth had been through much in its short celestial history. Humans had gone from hunters and gatherers to technological masters of their own destiny.

There had been wars, brutal skirmishes, and periods in history so dark it was best not to remember them.

But now, now humanity deserved the peace it had wrought itself.

The city out there, the people below, they deserved this beautiful sunny day in this shiny peaceful city.

Carson would not rob them of that.

If destroying the Vex was the only way to say the countless citizens of the Coalition and ensure the entire peace of the Milky Way, then so be it. Wasn’t it a tremendously small price to pay?

It was wishful thinking to assume they could save the Vex anyway. So why risk all this for such a slim chance?

He couldn’t and he wouldn’t.

He just hoped Nida would understand in time.

Right now, he had to prepare for the mission.

Though it was hard, and it felt as if a little of his heart withered up and died, he turned sharply on his foot and walked towards his desk. Carving a path through the junk, he brought up a holo terminal and got to work.

He was the head of the Force, he could not turn back now.

Yet even as he thought that, he half pushed away from his desk, angling his head down, scanning the grounds below, hoping to see her. That unruly head of messy hair, that uncoordinated, klutzy form, and that smile. The one that took your mind off your problems, and filled you with hope.

He couldn’t see her.

He turned back to his work.

Cadet Nida Harper

She wasn’t entirely sure what she was doing.

She wasn’t entirely sure what she could do.

She simply knew this was wrong.

Some part of her could appreciate Carson and the rest of the Coalition Academy had a point. An incredibly important one. They could not risk the Coalition with all of its countless worlds and trillions of people on the slim hope of saving the Vex.

Especially when it wasn’t clear there was any way to save the Vex.

To them, the conclusion was clear.

To her, it was murder.

The Vex deserved better. They deserved better, she kept repeating in her head as she clutched her left hand tighter and tighter. Soon her fingers wouldn’t just push through the flesh and draw blood, but likely punch all the way through the bone too.

She didn’t care though.

This was so wrong.

The Vex hadn’t asked for the entity to push through and damage their timeline. They hadn’t asked to live through countless iterations of their history, only to be obliterated time and time again.

They hadn’t asked to be turned into a race hell-bent on survival, manipulated into being the coldest, most brutal, most efficient creatures they could become.

It had simply happened to them.

And now they would be destroyed.

You could argue that would be putting them out of their misery. It wouldn’t though. The only way to save the Vex would be to fix their timeline and repair the damage that had been done.

At first she’d hoped Carson understood that. Now she realized he didn’t.

All he was thinking about was the Coalition.

A part of her understood that of course that was the case. Yet the rest of her, the part that understood how guilty the entity felt, it couldn’t accept this.

There had to be another way.

She found herself wandering through the corridors in a daze.

Though she was still aware of the entity’s presence, it was no longer close to taking her over. Though she’d endured a brief episode with Carson, she was once again in full control.

In fact, if anything, what had occurred in Carson’s office meant she had even more control than before.

For the entity was giving up. She could feel it receding within her. As it realized what the Coalition was going to do, it surrendered to hopelessness.

She barely had to concentrate to control it anymore.

Perhaps she should have celebrated at that fact, she couldn’t. It simply made her sad.

This whole thing was so terribly sad.

Though she’d joined the Coalition Academy on the premise she could go out there into the galaxy and make a difference, she now realized the emotional cost that often brought.

Solutions weren’t always easy, peaceful, and nice. You didn’t always have the luxury of choosing between two distinct options, one of which was moral and decent, the other of which was obviously abhorrent.

Sometimes, like now, you found yourself choosing between two different versions of Hell.

Though Carson kept trying to tell her she wasn’t the worst recruit in 1000 years, and Nida had started to believe him, now she wasn’t so sure.

A proper recruit, who understood the remit of the Coalition Academy, and the tremendous responsibility that came along with it, wouldn’t second-guess Carson. They’d understand this was the only way.

Yet as she plumbed the depths of her feelings and reason, she couldn’t.

She really never had been cut out for this life, had she?

She was soft on the inside, too sensitive. She couldn’t turn her mind off and do what was necessary. All she could do was obsess over how much she’d lose.

Feeling bitterly disappointed and on the verge of tears, she barely paid attention to where she was walking.

Soon she found herself heading out towards the grounds. It was an incredibly beautiful day, and gorgeous sunshine was streaming down from above. The grass was lush, green, and soft. The oak trees were resplendent in young spring growth, their leaves gently shifting about and rustling in a refreshing breeze that danced off the bay beyond.

As she looked around, the various personnel and cadets at the Academy were all smiling and enjoying their day. Granted, a few were hurrying by with worried expressions on their faces, either shouldering the same burden she did, or another. But the majority of people were simply enjoying the day.

It was strange to see them so oblivious.

Strange, and painful.

She found herself gravitating towards her favorite oak tree. It was off the beaten path, and if you were lucky, you could lie underneath that great gnarled trunk without anyone disturbing you.

She needed to be alone right now. Alone with her thoughts and the entity’s bitter grief.

She didn’t make it.

As she was walking across the grounds, she ran into a group of her classmates. Though she tried to walk around them, she couldn’t.

Their faces exploded with expressions of surprise and wonder. She didn’t exactly know how much of her tale had spread through the student body, but she could safely assume they barely knew a thing. Just enough to be intrigued, but not enough to run the heck away from the entity currently residing in Nida's left palm.

She closed her fingers tighter as Cadet Rosali half-ran over to her, his enormous blue face bobbing close to her own as his red eyes widened with interest.

‘I heard from one of the officers in the docking ring that you arrived with Carson Blake. You haven’t joined the Force, have you?’ Another cadet asked, their voice arcing high in surprise.

The group kept assaulting her with their questions. They bombarded her with the same ferocity as the Coalition would soon bombard Remus 12.

She didn’t answer. She couldn’t.

To face their curiosity and rapt attention, despite what was happening, felt so wrong.

She went to push past. Maybe she’d head back to her room in the medical bay. There it would be silent. And though no doubt the medical equipment would keep scanning her, she’d still be alone.

She didn’t get the opportunity.

Somebody raised their voice and coughed very pointedly. ‘So are the rumors true?’

Nida, though she desperately wanted to run away, found herself turning. She recognized that voice.

Bridget.

Alicia's friend was standing there, one eyebrow raised as she crossed her arms defensively in front of her chest. There was a very sour expression crumpling her usually pretty face. ‘So, is it true? Are you,’ she brought up a finger and pointed directly at Nida, ‘somehow with Carson. Or is this just some dumb joke?’

Bridget’s tone was forceful and belligerent.

And it washed right over Nida.

Really? This was what people were concentrating on?

The galaxy was going to hell, and all Bridget cared about was a little romantic competition?

Nida’s lips simply parted open in disbelief.

She felt cold. And disconnected.

How could these people be so oblivious?

They were cadets in the Coalition Academy, they knew the responsibility they shouldered. So why weren't they shouldering it? Why were they massing around her, more interested by the possibility of intrigue, then the probability that something dangerous was happening?

Granted, none of them knew about the Vex. But Nida couldn’t listen to her own reason right now. All she could hear was the anger bubbling up inside her.

These people were so damn naive.

They had no idea what was waiting out there for them. Who cared about their romantic troubles and tribulations in the grand scheme of things? When they graduated, they would be responsible for the Coalition, for the galaxy, for countless lives.

Nida had never been a particularly forward-thinking person, and though she had always acted responsibly and diligently, she wasn’t the most mature of souls.

Well, maturity had been thrust upon her.

Her once narrow perspective had been blown apart. She no longer had the luxury of caring only about herself and what was happening to her immediate friend group. The future of the Vex now weighed upon her shoulders, and it changed her as she stared out at her friends and colleagues.

She could no longer understand them.

Nor care about their petty problems.

Rather than face Bridget, she turned around.

She went to walk away.

Bridget pounced forward, grabbed her arm, and held her in place. ‘Come on, tell us. What happened? Are you really with Carson? Or is this some elaborate trick?’

She didn’t usually have a problem with Bridget. She was a little like Alicia. She was just fiery, but deep down, she was a good person.

Today, Nida had a problem with everyone.

The more the shock of realizing the Coalition were going to destroy Remus 12 settled in, the more powerful anger began to grow within her.

She was a lot of things, but she was very rarely angry. And the sensation was such an odd one, and so different to her usual character, it felt like someone had switched her body with someone else’s.

As strange as it was, however, she couldn’t deny that growing feeling.

She was angry at Carson. She was angry at the Coalition for their decision. She was angry at her friends and classmates for being so damn naive.

She was angry at herself for being so weak.

The emotion kept building and building, like a flame being fed more and more fuel. Soon it would rise right from her toes to her head, and she’d burst.

Without thinking, she roughly tugged her hand free from Bridget’s grip.

It was easy enough.

Surprise shot through Bridget’s expression, but then once again her face crumpled with clear animosity. ‘You know, you don’t deserve a person like Carson. You’ve never tried at the Academy, you’ve never put your heart and soul into it. He has. No matter what he faces, he always does what’s right for the Coalition. It’s in his blood. You wouldn’t understand that. You run from your problems when they get too hard,’ Bridget said.

Maybe her comments drew laughter, or gasps, but Nida could hear nothing but her words.

She didn’t deserve a person like Carson.

Carson always did what was right for the Coalition.

‘You don’t meet people with loyalty like that too often. You mostly meet people like you, too weak to bother with,’ Bridget said as she crossed her arms in front of her chest and flicked her head to the side.

Though Nida was now free, and could walk away, she found herself grinding to a halt, her face directed at the ground.

She stared fixedly at the grass.

If she wanted to, she could silence Bridget easily enough. All Nida would have to do was point a finger at the sky, and she could send Bridget soaring off into the clouds. Or she could simply turn around and flatten a hand on her chest, and crush her body with all the force of a meteor slamming into the earth.

. . . .

She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. Although the anger kept building inside her, Nida held onto herself. To the scrap of identity that always remained within.

And she walked away.

Bridget kept calling out to her, and maybe the rest of her classmates kept assailing her with questions, but Nida turned her mind from them.

She focused her attention within. Towards the boiling anger as it rose and peaked through her belly, feeling like acid eating at her guts and heart.

She brought a hand up and flattened it over her chest.

She did not, however, at any point turn around and attack Bridget.

No, she was different.

Despite the anger curdling within, she was not that far gone.

Instead she turned, Bridget's words still shadowing her.

Carson was a good man. He always did what was right for the Coalition.

Nida, on the other hand, was a worthless recruit who didn't know what it was like to sacrifice herself for others.

If she'd been in a daze before she'd walked across the grounds, it was nothing compared to the stupor she experienced as she headed back to the medical bay.

Her head was elsewhere. All the way back on Remus 12, to be precise.

Despite the fact she kept drawing quite a crowd, though nobody else accosted her, Nida felt alone.

Completely and abjectly alone.

She hadn't felt this way when she'd been nothing more than an ordinary recruit, even though people had fastidiously ignored her.

Nida had never been popular. It hadn't bothered her though.

Yet now, in the face of all this limelight, she had never felt so distanced from people.

She tried to tell herself it was just the entity. Carson was right. This grief and shame and anger, it wasn't hers. She simply had to hold on. Push back the deluge of feelings until Vex was destroyed and the entity was removed from her.