He nodded, his neck so tense it felt like moving a tree trunk. ‘You’re okay now, though?’
She blinked languidly, but offered a mumbled, ‘yes.’
He breathed hard. Relief washed through him, though not completely.
She looked at him. Despite the fact she looked worn out, a sharpness returned to her gaze. ‘They’re going to destroy Remus 12?’
He couldn’t lie. So he nodded. Again it felt like moving a tree trunk. It also felt like breaking up with her.
Christ, they’d only been together for less than a few days. A few wild, insane days.
And he’d ruined it.
‘I’m so sorry, Nida. I . . .’ he couldn’t defend himself.
She looked nauseous, and clamped the back of her hand to her mouth.
She didn’t say anything.
It was hell to endure her silence.
Moments before, she’d thought he was incredible. What did she think of him now?
‘I . . . can’t defend what I’ve done. The decision is out of my hands now, but that doesn’t change the fact I . . . agreed with it. I thought, and maybe still think, destroying Remus 12 is the only way,’ he admitted painfully.
She watched him.
What she thought, he could only begin to imagine.
He guessed it would be hatred and revulsion.
‘So many lives are at stake,’ he tried to reason, his words quiet as his resolve crumbled before her gaze, ‘the Coalition can’t risk losing to the Vex. They can’t risk fighting them only for their ships to break through any containment line. They can’t risk evacuating Earth, nor do they have the time. They just can’t risk it. It’s the only way to be sure we’ll all survive.’
‘But the Vex will all die.’
‘It’s us or them.’
She stared at him, her attention fixed. Her gaze so piercing, her eyes felt like searchlights. ‘Why?’
‘Because . . .’ he pushed a sweaty, shaking hand through his short hair, ‘that’s the way it is sometimes.’
That’s the way it is sometimes? What kind of explanation was that? Here was his chance to convince her they were doing the right thing. He was stuffing it up. Why? He was no longer sure he was doing the right thing . . . .
Maybe she could see his hesitation, because she looked up at him sharply, her usually soft eyes narrowing in clear confusion. ‘Carson?’ she questioned directly, ‘you don’t believe that, do you? You lived through exactly the same experience I did. Granted, you don’t have the entity,’ she noted in a shaking voice as she brought a hand up and clutched her collar, ‘and maybe you’re not as affected by shame as I am. But you’ve met the Vex. Yes, they’re brutal, and yes, they’re willing to do whatever it takes to survive. But we can’t fault them on that, because we're exactly the same. The Coalition is willing to completely obliterate Remus 12, knowing it will condemn the Vex forever. Surely there’s another way.’
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.
Chapter 16
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.
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