by S. A. Lusher
“Looking for...what, exactly?” Greg asked, distracted from his misery by this sudden change.
“They won’t say but I think for signs of betrayal. People are still paranoid about Dark Operations. But I’m also starting to think that someone out there has an ax to grind. Frankly, this is getting ridiculous, and when I try to ferret out where all this is actually coming from, who is actually ordering this shit, I get stonewalled.” He sighed and shook his head.
“Fucking wonderful. We go save a life and put an end to a potentially galactic threat and we get fucking audited and interrogated,” Greg muttered.
“Yeah...that’s life. Our life, anyway. Speaking of which...how are you? Did you make any decisions yet?” Hawkins asked.
Now it was Greg’s turn to sigh. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m staying. We’re stuck with each other, I guess. I’ve got nowhere else to go, nothing else worth doing.”
“Well...not exactly the most ringing endorsement, but I’ll take it. Your one of the best, Greg. Especially now that...” he hesitated.
“What?”
“I shouldn’t say anything.”
Greg turned to face him. “Hawkins. Tell me.”
He reached up and rubbed the bridge his nose, closing his eyes as he spoke. “Callie is talking about leaving. Allan’s still under, and she says that she’ll stay if he stays, but she thinks he isn’t going to want to stay...not anymore. Not after all this.”
Greg felt ashen inside, turning back to the window. Besides Mertz, both Allan and Callie had been his closest friends, even closer than Eve had been. Allan was among the first of his new squad that he connected with. He tried to tell himself that there was a good chance that they would stay, but he just didn’t believe it.
“You feel up to that after-action report?” Hawkins asked, clapping him on the back.
“Yeah, let’s get it over with,” Greg replied.
They turned and left the room.
* * * * *
A week passed.
Greg didn’t ever start feeling much better. Everything he did either only gave him a brief boost or ended up making him feel shittier. Primarily that second one came from the fact that he kept talking Callie into spending time with him. He was afraid of losing her in addition to the other people he’d lost. Allan was still in a coma and they were doing surgeries on him, so it wasn’t like there was a lot she could do. So they spent time together, slept together, ate together, trained together. He split his time between her and Martel, and occasionally Eve. He didn’t want to think anymore, so he kept busy and tried to feel good in whatever ways he could.
Then the day came when they were going to wake Allan up.
So now, here he was, with Callie, Drake, Eric, Jennifer, Eve and Genevieve. They’d all gathered to be there when he was woken, though they were made to hang back, towards the edge of the room, as not to overwhelm him.
Greg was watching the man intently. He looked a hell of a lot better. All trace of Erebus’ augmentation process had been removed. He’d gained back a little bit of the weight he’d lost, as they’d been pumping him with sustenance, nutrients and vitamins, and he wasn’t so pale and bruised now. Now was the moment of truth, however.
The brain surgery might have caused some brain damage.
Slowly, Allan opened his eyes. He blinked several times and looked at Callie. For a moment, he didn’t talk.
“Allan, can you hear me?” she asked, taking his hand.
Two medics were nearby, monitoring him.
A moment passed, then he slowly nodded his head. “What...the fuck...happened?” he asked, his voice rough and weak.
“You’ve been in a coma for the past seven days. What’s the last thing you remember?” Callie replied.
“I...was...oh god...” His eyes snapped back open. “Erebus-”
“It’s dead,” Callie said, massaging his hand. “Erebus is dead. You’re home. You’re onboard the Dauntless.”
Allan’s gaze shifted and he scanned the others who were in the room with him. He stared at them for a long moment, as if scrutinizing them, then he laid his head back into the pillow. “Thank god,” he whispered.
“We should probably empty this place out,” one of the medics said quietly. “We need to do several tests to determine if there’s been any brain damage.”
“What?” Allan asked.
“They had to do some surgery...” Callie said quietly, her voice trailing off as Greg followed the others out of the infirmary.
For a moment, he stood there in the hallway, watching the others disperse. He didn’t know what to do. Finally, slowly, he turned and started walking to the observatory. There was nowhere else he felt like being.
* * * * *
“Are you okay?”
Greg glanced back over his shoulder at Drake.
“Fine,” he muttered, turning back to the windows. He was in the observation deck again. It had been three more days since Allan had woken up. He was going to be fine, Greg was immensely relieved to hear. No brain damage, no permanent damage. After about a week of rest and a bit of rehabilitation to help with his cloned limbs, he’d be good as new. What was less than thrilling was that Callie’s prediction had been correct.
They were both leaving.
Allan had told him that he’d had enough of it all. Enough of the craziness, the monsters, the constant threat of not just death but dying in strange, unique and downright bizarre ways. From what he’d told him, Allan had gotten it a lot worse than Greg had when he’d gotten his arm chopped off. Allan had been awake and aware for most of the implantation process. So Greg couldn’t really blame him at all for wanting to walk away.
He’d just tried to do the same thing, only it hadn’t worked for him.
Callie had told him that she needed some distance from it all. She’d realized that she’d been emotionally compromised by the whole thing. She’d come very close to putting Allan first, before taking down Erebus. She hadn’t, but she also hadn’t been seriously tempted. If she had known exactly where he was...she admitted that she wasn’t sure if she could have maintained her objectivity. She told him that Hawkins was going to hook them up with Special Operations, give them some more normal assignments.
Greg had wished them both good luck.
“You don’t seem okay,” Drake said, cautiously sitting down next to him.
Greg laughed and emptied his glass. The ice clinked as he set it back down. He unscrewed the cap on the bottle of booze he’d procured from the galley. He didn’t know exactly what it was, but it was strong stuff that tasted like starship fuel. One of the side effects of having both the cure for the Necro Virus and the virus itself swimming through his veins was that it was a lot harder to get drunk. He was just getting reacquainted with the habit.
He lit up a cigarette and rubbed his temples.
“What do you want me to say?” he asked quietly. “I just lost six fucking people, Drake. Kyra closed the door permanently, John and Laura died, Allan and Callie are leaving, Eve pretty much closed the door on a serious relationship.”
“You two couldn’t reconcile?” Drake asked.
“No. She just wants to be fuck buddies. I loved Kyra, and I think I loved Eve, I had something serious developing with Callie and kind of with Laura, John and Allan were my best friends...” He heaved a sigh. “And I’m stuck with this fucking job. Doesn’t matter whether or not I can stand it, it’s this or nothing...I suddenly have a great sympathy for Enzo,” he muttered.
Drake didn’t say anything for a moment. Finally, he seemed to find his voice again. “Hawkins has pulled some strings, gotten us leave while the investigators go through the ship itself. He says we can have a week. A lot of us are heading out to Mezzanine. You wanna go?”
Greg was silent for a long moment. “Yeah, sure,” he said finally. “When are we leaving?”
“Three hours.”
“Fine. I’ll be there...thanks,” he said.
“You’re welcome.” Drake stood. He he
sitated. “We’re your friends, too, Greg. I know what it’s like to lose someone. I’ve been there. If you ever need to talk, middle of the night, whenever, just contact me...okay?”
Greg looked up at him, nodded. “Okay. I appreciate that.”
Drake nodded once more, then turned and left. Greg stared back out of the windows and took a long drag on his cigarette.
As he blew a large, formless cloud of blue smoke, he found himself seriously wondering how he was going to handle this life he’d fallen into.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sean A. Lusher was born in the Midwest. Raised on a diet of Goosebumps and YA Horror, he eventually graduated to mature fiction and began cutting his teeth on the likes of Simon R. Green's Deathstalker series and Bob Mayer's Area 51 novels.
Lusher has been writing seriously for over a decade now, though he only began to get any good at it over the past few years. (And there's still some debate over that...)
Currently, he lives in Columbia, MO with his wife and two cats.
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INTO THE VOID. Copyright © by S. A. Lusher. All rights reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entire coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.