by Laura Pohl
“What are you doing in here?” she asks.
“Are you okay?”
“What the hell do you think?”
She takes a swig from the bottle. She coughs and sputters a little but doesn’t stop crying. Her sobs shake her body, and I want to do something, reach out, help her, but I’m frozen in place. Because I’ve never done it before. Because I never cared enough before.
“I just…” She sniffles, grabbing a tissue from the desk and blowing her nose into it. There’s a folder lying open on the desk. “I was supposed to protect her. When the shells landed, she was so scared. I didn’t realize that it was because they came here for her.”
She looks up at me. I sit down at the desk, across from her.
“How could she do this to me, Clover? She’s my best friend.”
I feel bad that she’s drinking alone, so I take a swig of whiskey, too. It burns my throat and my stomach, making me cough. Violet slumps in her chair.
“She was never…” She pauses. “Andy is the only one I have left. She’s the only one who never questioned why I am the way I am, why I do things the way I do.” She shakes her head. “You know what it’s like. Always thinking. No feelings.”
It’s easy to put it like that. But I understand Violet. We think alike, always weighing the sacrifices, weighing things logically. Keeping our hearts out of it. Abuela taught me to love and be strong, and Abuelo taught me to shoot and look people straight in the eye. The rest, it all came from inside me. From who I am.
But it’s hard being like that. Not everyone understands it.
Violet shakes her head again. “I love her. But now this.”
She shoves the folder in my direction, and the papers go flying. I catch them before everything falls to the ground and gather them in a pile. The folder is stuffed full of papers, and I realize that it’s Andy’s file.
I glance through pages and pages of information, drawings of her species and their original planet. These aliens look nothing like Andy. They’re well-built and muscular, glowing with the power of the galaxies behind them. Sorting through the files, something catches my eye: the Burst, a self-defense mechanism that supposedly wipes out all existence around them.
The folder doesn’t mention anything about what the Hostemn are actually after—Andy’s knowledge and her power to change the universe.
I close the folder and put it back on the desk. Sputnik approaches Violet, putting her head in her lap. Violet manages a small smile through her tears, reaching out to pet the dog.
“How could she?” she asks me. “Why didn’t she tell me?”
“Would you have believed her?” I keep my voice even and logical.
“It doesn’t matter!” she half shouts, her hands trembling. “She should’ve… I’m the last one,” she says, her voice falling to a whisper. “What if there aren’t any others out there? What if it really is just us?” She grabs the whiskey again and drinks deeply. Just when I think that she’s going to drain the bottle, she puts it down and wipes her mouth. “I don’t want that responsibility.”
“I don’t think any of us want it, Violet.”
“I can’t do this,” she says, shaking her head. “I don’t think I can save anyone anymore. I’m not a hero.” She breaks down crying again.
“I’m not a hero, either,” I say softly. She looks up, her blue eyes wide and sincere. “We’re just here, Violet. And we have to deal with what we got.”
She nods, biting her lower lip. And I find enough courage to get up and put my arm around her. Violet embraces me back, her tears wetting my T-shirt as I stand there, numb, in a three-way hug between two girls and one big dog. I can’t bring myself to say anything else to this girl who never breaks.
“I love her,” she says quietly, into my shirt. “How can I, after all this? But it hasn’t stopped. She’s still my best friend.”
“Love doesn’t just go away. No matter what.”
She holds me, and I hold her. Like Abuela used to do. I try to be the person who she can lean on, when she can’t hold herself up. And after all, I can do this. This small moment of redemption.
And we stay like that, together, even though we’re different and rough with each other. Because in this moment, none of that matters. We’re the last ones left, and our grief unites us all.
Chapter 43
The next day, everyone meets outside Andy’s prison. None of us really feel like talking. Brooklyn’s eyeliner is smudged, and her all-black outfit is rumpled. She looks she hasn’t slept at all.
“Where’s Violet?” Rayen asks.
I shrug. I helped her to her bed last night to lie down and rest, but I haven’t seen her since.
“Look, I don’t want to be the spoilsport, but isn’t it a bad idea to keep Andy here?” Flint asks, his hands stuck in his pockets. “These aliens don’t exactly seem to give up.”
“We thought about that, too,” I answer, sighing. “But moving her seems pointless. They might track us here, but…”
I shut up. Right now, it’s hard to think about anything other than the fact that this is totally pointless.
It’s all meaningless, fighting back, the idea that I could do something to make a difference. The idea that I could honor Abuelo’s legacy. It feels stupid. It falls short. A small part of my brain keeps repeating that it would have been easier if I had just shot myself all those months ago.
Violet shows up a few minutes later, and without saying a word to any of us, she storms past us and locks herself inside the room with Andy. We all wait outside—Avani and Brooklyn on a bench, Flint sitting cross-legged on the floor biting his nails, Sputnik trying to sit on his lap but failing miserably, since she’s too big for it. This could almost be like a regular day around here, except that it’s nothing like it.
Brooklyn is pressing her hands against her head, not daring to look up. Her breathing comes in short spurts, her chest rising and falling. Rayen and I lean against the wall, exchanging looks from time to time. We have no idea what to do next.
Violet comes out a while later, and we stay silent. She closes the door behind her quickly, not letting us catch a glimpse of Andy. She looks exhausted, like she’s aged ten years in the last hour. She doesn’t acknowledge me or what happened last night.
“So?” Brooklyn asks.
“It’s all very true, unfortunately.”
Brooklyn sighs, the sigh of the defeated and the hopeless.
“What are we going to do?” Flint asks.
We’ve been used as pawns, then discarded. All that’s left is the terrible, aching emptiness that we feel inside.
Violet peers at him, shaking her head with a slight movement. “I don’t know, Flint.”
She looks to me, but I don’t have the answers. I was the one who had insisted on fighting back, who had insisted that we should try to push ahead. That the aliens could be defeated and we could take back our planet.
“We should keep going,” I say, and everyone turns to me.
I can’t let something from my past determine my future. I can’t let it shape me and mold me into something that I’m not.
“What?” Brooklyn asks, perking up. “Didn’t you just tell us that we’ve all been lied to since birth? That those awful aliens are in our DNA?”
Maybe there is a tiny part of my DNA that comes from the Hostemn, the merciless creatures who destroyed my home. But there’s another part of me that didn’t come from outer space—97 percent of me still belongs with my grandparents on our farm, still wants to go to Mars, to fly high, to belong in the sky again.
“My DNA doesn’t define me,” I say. “It doesn’t matter. Don’t you see? It doesn’t matter what’s in it.”
No one speaks.
“What Andy said about us doesn’t matter,” I repeat, and every second my voice gets stronger. Because I know now that it’s true. I underst
and. “This is not something that’s going to define me.”
I look around, hoping for some kind of support, but all I see are faces that don’t understand, faces of people who have been crushed and left standing alone. But they’re all warriors in their own right.
“This doesn’t change who I am. And it doesn’t change any of you,” I assert. “Avani, you’re the smartest girl I’ve ever met and your projects are wonderful. You are absolutely brilliant and you always will be.”
Avani looks at me, a light shining in her dark eyes. And even though I’m just another lost girl—I’m not Violet, I’m not the leader—I know what to say. Violet can’t understand this, because she’s human. But I know what to do.
“Flint, you’re the greatest guy on the planet. And I’m not just saying that because you’re the only one.” He breaks into a smile. “Rayen, you’re brave and badass. When aliens have nightmares, they dream of you.” The corners of her mouth turn up. “Brooklyn, you’re the weirdest and funniest person I know. I can’t believe that you haven’t even cracked an alien joke yet.”
Somehow, Brooklyn manages to smile, too.
No words will ever be able to translate what we’re feeling right now, but maybe there’s a part of our DNA that connects our minds to each other, and I’d like to believe that they all know how I feel.
“My DNA has been the same since I was born. I just didn’t know what it was made of. But it doesn’t matter. I’m Clover, someone who survived the impossible and struggles with suicidal thoughts. I’m a pilot. I’m a Martinez.” I take a deep breath. “And they will never, ever take that away from me.”
And when I look around at them, I can see that they understand. It doesn’t matter what’s in our blood or where we come from. There are things that only you can change for yourself. And I’m not going to let anyone else tell me who I am.
“I was born on Earth,” I say. “I belong to Earth. Fuck those aliens who think they can come here and destroy my home.”
Wild cheers break out all around me. Suddenly Rayen wraps me in a hug, and Flint, Avani, Brooklyn, and Violet join us, laughing, in a weird, six-way group hug. And for the first time, all our hearts beat in unison. Sputnik barks, trying to weave her way in between our legs, and somehow, this makes us laugh harder. It fills the room, this strange, hesitant laughter. The laughter of people who have been desperate and hopeless, but have found hope again. Not within the universe. But within ourselves.
I close my eyes for a minute, letting it all sink in. I know who they are. They know who I am. And somehow, despite our mistakes, despite our flaws, despite whatever we’ve done to get here, we forgive ourselves.
“So,” says Violet. “I guess we need a new plan.”
Chapter 44
Rayen, Violet, and I enter the room where Andy is sitting. She has a split lip now. I wonder if she can choose whether or not to heal a wound, and if she chose not to heal this one because it was from Violet. I hadn’t heard them screaming or crying, and I didn’t want to, but I doubt that their relationship will ever be the same again.
“Are these visits going to become frequent?” Andy asks, perking up, her eyes shining a deep blue. “Look, I’ve already answered all of your questions.”
“Yes, we know that,” I tell her.
I pass the keys to Violet, who starts unlocking Andy’s shackles. Andy’s eyes widen, looking at her freed hands in confusion.
“Is this some kind of trick?” she asks.
“No,” Rayen answers. “But if you run, I will shoot you.”
Andy seems to take this threat seriously and doesn’t move. Violet undoes the rest of her chains, releasing her feet, but she doesn’t get up.
“What do you want?” Andy eyes us. She doesn’t trust us, and we don’t trust her, but we really have no choice in the matter. “I told you what I know.”
“Yes, Andy, but now we have a proposal for you,” Violet replies.
She narrows her eyes, an expression that is so human that it makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. But if we haven’t changed, then neither has Andy.
“I’m listening.”
“You’re the last of your species,” says Violet. “So are we. Now you have a decision to make. Are you going to help us fight the aliens who destroyed your planet or not?”
She doesn’t answer for a couple of seconds. “I told you, I’m a pacifist.”
“No one can afford to be a pacifist in a time of war,” Rayen says. “That’s just being apathetic. You can’t say ‘I won’t use a gun’ when other people are shooting at you.”
Andy is focused on Violet, who avoids looking in her direction.
“It’s not that I don’t want to help,” Andy finally says, with a small sigh. “It’s that I can’t help.”
“Why the hell not?” demands Rayen.
“I don’t have enough power or knowledge,” she says, pointing to her body, as if we’re supposed to know what that means. “Remember what I said about being the most powerful beings in the universe? Well, that only happens once you’ve gone through some deep emotional happening.”
Rayen groans by my side. “And being the last of your species isn’t emotional enough for you?” she asks, frowning.
Andy shrugs.
“What about the ship?” I ask.
“The ship?” Andy replies.
“Yes, your freaking spaceship. The one we found in the bunker.”
The ship had recognized Andy’s fingerprints or DNA or whatever was in that pair of gloves that she’d lent me, so there’s a chance that it could help us.
“We need that knowledge, Andy,” Rayen says. “And we’re gonna find a way to get it.”
* * *
Rayen keeps her gun pointed at Andy while we head down to the bunker.
When Andy sees the beautiful spacecraft, the chromed silver shining like nothing this planet has ever seen before, her eyes water. She skips toward it, and for a minute, it’s like we’re not even there—like it’s just Andy and the spaceship, her last connection to her people and the place she came from. Rayen, Violet, and I follow her as she climbs up the ramp. Sputnik, refusing as usual to be left behind, follows me.
As we enter, the computer screen lights up, displaying a hologram of the universe.
“Scanning complete,” says the pleasant female voice. “Welcome Andromeda, last of the Universals.”
Just like last time, I comprehend that the voice isn’t speaking English, but I can still understand it. A deep chill runs through me. Rayen glances at me, and I know that she can understand it, too. It’s like this language was etched deeply into our bones and our memories, but so long ago that we had forgotten it.
“And welcome Rayen and Clover,” the voice continues. “The Protectors.”
Rayen and I exchange another look. Violet steps forward, close to Andy, frowning. The computer screen, seeming to recognize her, changes to a deep tone of blue, like the ocean, and a round blue planet appears, spinning on the screen.
“Violet Deveraux, human,” says the voice.
Violet sets her jaw, like she’s determined to keep alive whatever legacy has been left for her. She watches the little blue planet turning and turning on the screen, like she can’t get enough of it. Then, with a conscious effort, she steps back.
“What exactly is this?” Rayen asks.
“The Arc,” Andy says, awe in her face. She presses her fingers against the spaceship, as if she’s trying to absorb a feeling. “This is the ship that we used to make the crossing to Earth. It’s thousands of years old.”
Andy reaches for the screen. “Computer, please tell me the status of the Universals.”
“One moment,” the voice says, as the computer gathers data.
“What language is that?” Rayen asks, confused.
“It’s the universal language of creation,” the
computer’s voice responds. “Every being is able to understand it. It’s built into the genetic code of life.”
Sputnik sniffs, unimpressed. She walks through the spaceship, nose to the ground, making sure that she sees everything.
Rayen narrows her eyes at me, trying to communicate in the silence. She seems to find it atrocious that, in the end, she wound up in a scenario that really does resemble something out of Interstellar.
“The Protectors are wary,” the computer states. “I can assure you that I mean no harm.”
Sputnik barks.
“Then shut up and do your job,” Rayen says.
“Rayen, don’t abuse the computer,” Andy scolds her, and I can’t believe that this is a conversation that we’re actually having. “Computer, please assemble all the data left behind by my species.”
“The data is locked.”
Andy cracks her knuckles. “Computer, find the data.”
“The data is locked,” it repeats stubbornly.
“Are you sure that your ancestors built this thing to work?” Rayen mutters.
“This is the most powerful computer in the universe, designed to contain the knowledge of all species.” Andy glares at her. “Of course it works.”
“Well, it doesn’t want to cooperate.”
I sigh heavily, moving forward to the screen, and say, “Computer, tell us why the data is locked.”
“The data can only be accessed by a Universal at their full power,” it says. Sputnik follows me and puts her head over the screen, sniffing it. “Please remove that object from the panel.”
I look at Sputnik. She seems slightly offended that she’s been called an object. She keeps her paws on the panel, in complete defiance of the computer.
Violet turns to Andy. “So when exactly does your ‘full power’ happen?”
Andy sighs. “It’s complicated. As I said, it involves a deeper calling, something that makes you understand the nature of the universe. Something happens between you and the world.”