Want (Numbered Book 1)

by Magus Tor

  The Clone sighed and looked out into the night. “Then I suppose the best thing to do is to get caught.”

  For a moment his face showed the same indefinable aged quality that Jonathon's had. Then he turned to her and grinned. “Bet there aren't many people who want to get caught by sec Workers, huh?”

  She smiled back. He was afraid, she knew. But this really was his best chance. If he went back to the Arena, or was caught trying to live outside of the Arena, he would be injected without question. This way he would grasp, at the very least, a few more days of life. More, if Jonathon kept his word and then agreed to help him. She stroked his arm.

  “Good luck,” she said.

  “Thank you.”

  For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her, but at the last second he broke eye contact, and without another word he began to walk through the yard of the Crematorium. Aurelia watched until he disappeared into the shadows. Only when she was sure that he was gone did she go back inside.

  Michael was still waiting alone when she entered the room. She sat on the couch beside him.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked.

  “Fine,” he said, smiling at her.

  She scratched her nose. “I suppose I owe you some sort of explanation of what's going on around here.”

  Michael put out a hand to stop her. “No,” he said. “I don't want to know. What I don't know, I can't tell other people. I will do as you have asked me to do. And I'll make sure that whoever is stationed to guard the Clone in Mr. Hansen's house is someone I trust, someone who doesn't beat on prisoners as sport. But that's it.”

  “I understand,” said Aurelia. And she did. She wished in a way that she had his strength of character, the willpower not to get herself involved with things. “And I'm grateful.”

  “Not as grateful as I am to you,” he said. “And I've got a wife and a three who are even more grateful than I am.”

  She smiled. “I would like to meet them one day.”

  “Maybe one day,” said Michael. But they both knew that wasn't going to happen.

  When Jonathon came back, the sec Worker stood. He took a moment to check his screen.

  “Okay, it's on the wire. Full description and number. I'll get going, then.”

  He gave a nod to Aurelia and Jonathon and left without saying goodbye.

  They had already moved a still-sleeping Elza back to the hospital and were installing her in her room when the call came.

  “They've got him,” Jonathon said, pressing a button on the intercom to close the conversation.

  Aurelia's heart sped up. “And?”

  “It was Michael. He's being escorted to my home as we speak. Everything went according to plan.”

  Aurelia gave a sigh of relief. She covered Elza with a blanket.

  “I think it's probably best if you go and wait in my rooms,” she told Jonathon. “I'll get hold of Jason and get him up here. I don't think it's a good idea for him to see you here.”

  He stroked her hair as he left.

  Jason appeared shortly after she called him. She explained her treatment plan to him, and he nodded in agreement.

  “It seems like the best plan. But, Aurelia, how could she get herself into this mess?”

  “She has a very stressful life,” Aurelia reminded him. “I don't think she deliberately chose to do things this way. And what's important now is that we help her.”

  He looked down at Elza's sleeping body. “Yes, yes it is. She's helped me before.” He smiled. “I think she's helped pretty much everyone in the hospital.”

  “But no one can know, alright? If she has to deal with this kind of scandal, then she'll never have authority again.”

  “Understood,” said Jason. “Speaking of which, have you heard the latest gossip?”

  Aurelia was starting to leave but turned around. “No, what happened?” Hospitals were always hotbeds of gossip.

  “Dr. Ellis, the guy you replaced - rumour has it that the reason he disappeared is that he's gone off the rails. Tons of people saw him drinking in Elite clubs, and apparently he's been sleeping with someone he shouldn't have, and, well, you know what Lunar's like.... Shoot first, ask questions later, right?”

  Interesting theory, Aurelia thought. “And has a body shown up?”

  Jason shook his head. “Only a matter of time, though, I bet.”

  Aurelia wondered, as she left the room, what other strange rumours would circulate about Ellis before something else happened to take the gossip spotlight off him.

  Jonathon was waiting in her rooms, and he took her into his arms as soon as she entered. He kissed her, and it wasn't until much later, when the dome was already a pale white-blue colour, that they eventually talked about what had happened.

  “Do you really still trust Elza?” Aurelia asked him, idly.

  “Yes, yes I do. The more I think about it, the more it all makes sense. I mean, in her own head she was protecting the Resistance by hurting me. She was afraid that I was going to side with the Clones or spill our secrets. And the same when she was trying to hurt you: she was protecting us all. Even under the influence of drugs, she still believed so much in what we're doing that she was willing to do anything for our cause. And I admire that.”

  He had a point; Aurelia hadn't thought of things that way.

  “This is all very difficult for me,” she said, closing her eyes.

  “Which part specifically?”

  “All of it. The changes. The newness. But mostly, I think, the idea that to achieve goodness you have to compromise, do things that are wrong to get what's right. It's a difficult concept.”

  Jonathon propped himself up on his elbow to look at her. “It is,” he said. “Very difficult. I could tell you that the means justify the end, but that's not always true. That depends on what the end is, and we have no idea what the true consequences are of what we're doing.” He placed his hand on her breastbone. “I can't help you with this idea, Aurelia. It's either something that you have to accept or not. There's no halfway.”

  He sighed. “And as much as I believe in what we're doing, I can't deny that there have been many others in history who have believed just as much in what they were doing. Belief doesn't equal rightness.”

  “What do you hope for?” she asked quietly. She put her hand over his own.

  “Peace,” he said simply. “It's only a matter of time before others realise the same as I have realised, and then there could be war again. And this time, I honestly think that we would destroy ourselves. What I hope for is that we solve the problem before it starts. And then we'll have peace.”

  There was work to be done. It wasn't going to be easy - Aurelia knew that. She knew she was going to have to lie, maybe even kill sometimes. And the thought didn't sit easy with her. But she also knew that she would follow the man beside her wherever he went. He had right on his side, and she was sure of it. They would deal with the problems together. Face them together. Solve them together. Because she loved him. And that was the last thing that she said to him, before she closed her eyes and surrendered to sleep.