Caelum Lex Pt. 3 Chapter 27: Reconciliation

With a jolt, Cyrus snapped his eyes open, exhaled, and sat up sharply. He had no idea where he was: all he could see was darkness, blurred in the corners of his vision. He felt cold concrete beneath his palms. There was a light, natural light, from somewhere up above. It was so blurry. His desperate breaths echoed through what sounded like a small room, but there were no other sounds. Why was everything so blurry? What had happened? Where was he? Where was Addy? He blinked furiously to no effect. What the–

Finally, he put his hands to his face, feeling his nose, his jaw, his forehead to make sure everything was in place, intact. Everything wasn’t. Where his fingers should have met the metal wiring of his glasses, they touched only skin.

Cyrus sighed heavily. “Shit.”

Besides his missing glasses, he seemed to be in pretty good shape. Whatever had happened when that gas that had knocked him out in the library, it hadn’t done much damage. His head ached dully as he crawled onto his hands and knees and started patting down the floor around him and he felt a little woozy, but not well and truly injured, thank the gods. Just, well…blind.

He was hoping that his glasses were somewhere around here, that whoever had gassed him and thrown him onto the ground, had just knocked them off onto the floor and he would be able to find them. The first thing his ungraceful exploration stumbled across, though, wasn’t glasses, it was something better. Fabric. And a warm body beneath it.

“Addy?” he asked, gripping onto her arm. There was no response. “Addy! Adds, wake up!” He shook her gently and his heart skipped a beat as she stirred. Cyrus leaned over to take her other arm and tried to lift her limp torso off of the floor. “Talk to me, are you okay?”

She mumbled something unintelligible and tried to squirm out of his hold in a way she had many a time before. Cyrus groaned and pulled her up again. “Adds, you gotta wake up,” he insisted.

“Few more minutes…” she muttered under her breath, pouting.

“Adrasteia,” Cyrus said sternly, not letting her go. “We’ve been kidnapped or–captured–locked up, something. Wake up.”

“What?” She sounded disoriented, but only for a moment. “Cy–what–” Addy ripped her arms away from him and he could vaguely see her silhouette stumble to its feet. “Where are we? What happened? We were in that library and then–”

“That’s about as much as I know, yeah,” Cyrus agreed, flailing his arm in her direction until he caught hold of something well enough to help him to a stand.

“We need to get out of here,” was her immediate conclusion, to which he couldn’t agree more. But first.

“Do you see my glasses anywhere? I’m not much use blind…”

Addy held out her forearm for him to hang onto as she looked around the room. “We really need to get you contacts. Or surgery, don’t know why you’re so afraid of that.”

“Would you want people cutting into your eyeballs?” Cyrus shot back, clinging to her.

He felt her shrug as she mumbled, “I think it’s lasers or something…I don’t see ‘em, Cy. This place is empty. Just four walls, a window and a door.” She gently slipped away from him and seconds later he heard the pathetic shaking of a locked door handle. “I guess that was too much to hope for.”

“The window?” Cyrus suggested, turning towards the splotch of light.

“Even if it wasn’t so high up, it’s barred,” Addy sighed. “We must be underground. It looks like a basement. Just — a regular concrete basement. There’s even a water regulator in the corner.”

Cyrus held out his hand. “Point me in the right direction and give me something to smash it with.”

Before Addy had a chance to follow his instructions, there was a click from the direction of the door and another source of light streamed into the room. Cyrus blinked helplessly, trying to get a better glimpse at the silhouette that stood in the center of it, but he didn’t need to. He knew the voice as soon as it spoke.

“Ah good, you’re awake.” The man who’d spoken to them about the Transmitter in the library. It would be fine, he wouldn’t do anything, Addy had said. Libraries are perfectly safe, she’d insisted. So much for that.

“So sorry about all that business with the knockout gas,” the man went on, stepping further into the room and shutting the door behind him. “Unpleasant stuff, that. Hope you weren’t banged up too much.”

“We’re …. fine,” Addy muttered, hesitant. “Why are you keeping us here?”

“Oh, we just couldn’t have you snooping around anymore,” the man explained as if that answered everything.

“But–we weren’t,” Cyrus defended, hoping he’d learned to lie a little better these days. At least enough to convince this one man. “We were just curious, we heard the legend and wanted to see if we could find anything, that’s all. We weren’t looking to make trouble or–”

The man just laughed, far too friendly Cyrus thought, considering he was their captor. “Oh come on now, we all know that’s not true. No one who’s ‘just curious’ would spend that many hours on that much reading. You two aren’t just normal tourists. You know something.”

Addy’s blurry shape stepped in front of him. “But we were going to leave. You told us there was nothing in the library to help.”

“And you knew I was lying,” the man pointed out helpfully. “You weren’t going anywhere.”

“So you kidnapped us.” Cyrus blanched. “Now we’re definitely not going anywhere.”

The man leaned against the door and let out a sigh. “Like I said, sorry about all this. It’s not the way I’d like to do things. But we need to ensure that the information you have stays contained.”

“We don’t even have any,” Addy insisted. “We know there’s a thing called the Transmitter and some clues pointed us here. That’s it. We don’t know where it is, what it does, we don’t even know if it really exists.”

“Though I’m guessing by your reaction, it does,” Cyrus grumbled and then felt the sharp jab of Addy’s elbow in his ribs.

“We know nothing of value and we’re certainly not going to tell anyone else. We just want to make sure it’s safe from the Society, that’s all.”

The man-shape appeared to be nodding. “We have some similar goals then. You don’t have to worry about that. The Society will never have it.” He paused for a moment before asking, “You really don’t know anything?”

“Nothing,” Addy assured him.

“And if you’re sure it’s safe, we won’t need to look into it any further,” Cyrus added.

He was still nodding, and Cyrus could sense the atmosphere getting a little more friendly. Obviously this was just some huge misunderstanding. But they weren’t threats. Hell, Cyrus didn’t even care about this thing. In a few minutes, they’d be heading back to the ship and telling Corra to forget the whole thing. The Transmitter was fine, protected by–well, some random guy they met in a library–but it was fine. All fine. Time to move on.

“Well, that’s great,” he said and Cyrus felt the relief he’d been waiting for. “That’s really great.” But the man turned towards the door, opened it and began to leave.

“Wait–can we…go?” Cyrus ventured, taking a step forward.

The man watched him for a long moment and then laughed cheerfully. Oh of course, sorry, my bad, Cyrus wanted him to say. But when did Cyrus ever get what he wanted?

“Oh no! Origin, no. It’s just great that you probably haven’t told anything to anybody else. But we definitely can’t let you go now, you’ve seen too much.” Even Cyrus’ bad vision could see the grin that spread over his face. “We’ll have to execute you I’m afraid.”

“What?!”

Addy and Cyrus had exclaimed it in unison, but it was Addy who jumped in immediately after. “But–we don’t know anything!”

“About the Transmitter, no, but now you know about us,” the man said, definitely far too cheerful now.

“Who the hell is ‘us’?” Cyrus demanded.

“The Gatekeepers of the Holy Origin,” the man told them proudly. “Don’t worry, you’ll meet us all soon.” And without another word, he slipped out the door and closed it behind them. Cyrus and Addy both stood in shock as the lock clicked into place.

The silence spread out for what seemed like hours. Cyrus’ head was spinning and try as he might to grasp onto a single thought, he couldn’t manage. Too much was happening. The library, the gas, the basement, the blindness, the–gods, the fucking murderous cult?! Could his luck possibly be any worse? How had he even ended up in this situation?

“I can’t believe…we’re going to be killed…by a bunch of crazies,” Addy breathed beside him, breaking the long silence and inadvertently answering his question.

The anger that surged through him wasn’t something he could contain. It rose up like a fire inside his veins and overrode every sense of logic and reason in his mind. He turned on her, his hands balled into fists at his side. “Well I hope you’re fucking happy.”

Addy looked at him and, shapeless as she was, she was obviously taken aback. “What?”

“This is what you wanted isn’t it?” Cyrus growled. “An adventure. Excitement. Well.” He spread his arms dramatically. “Here it is. You found it.”

Her tone was warning. “Cy–”

“Did you really think something like this wouldn’t happen?” Cyrus demanded. “When does this not happen? This is what always happens when you mess with things. You get caught. And killed. All because you were bored.”

“You just love putting all the blame on me, don’t you?”

“This whole ordeal sure as hell wasn’t my idea.”

Addy crossed her arms over her chest and scoffed. “So that’s how it’s gonna be, is it? Just blame, blame, blame instead of actually helping.”

“Help?” Cyrus demanded, throwing his arms in the air. “We’re locked in a basement with no exit and I’m blind. How the hell can I help?”

“Not like you would anyway,” Addy shot back. “You never do. Things go bad and you’d much rather puff out your chest, say ‘told you so’ and make everyone else look bad than actually do anything to mend the situation.”

“How about because if people just listened to me to begin with, we would never be in a situation like this?”

“Right, sure.” Addy grinned an entirely humorless grin. “You’d much prefer we just sit very still and waste away instead of ever taking a chance.”

“Yeah, I would! Chances that lead to death anyway.”

“It was a library, Cyrus!”

“A library full of crazy people, Adds! In which we were searching for mythical ancient devices the Society is hunting for to pair up with another ancient device that Corra stole off the body of an evil awful ally trader!” He spread his hands to his sides. “How is that not a bad idea?”

Addy released a desperate one-note laugh. “You agreed to it!”

“Because I wanted to make you happy!” Cyrus defended. “Which is all I ever try to do but it either doesn’t work at all or ends up like this so clearly I’m just really shit at it. Or you’re just impossible to please.”

“Me?” Her laugh was even more desperate now. “Me?! I’m impossible to please? That’s hilarious, coming from you. When are you not miserable? I have sacrificed nearly everything to try and give you the life you want, but it’s never enough with you. You’re unhappy on a ship, you’re unhappy on the ground, you’re unhappy engineering, you’re unhappy on Archeti, you’re unhappy on Vescent, you’re unhappy on the CORS, at this point I’m on the verge of just giving up and accepting that no matter what I do, you’re just an unhappy person.”

“What?! I’m not an unhappy person,” Cyrus argued at once.

Cyrus heard Addy dropped her hands to her sides in exasperation. “Seriously?”

“Well what about you? I try so damn hard to build a life for our family that’s stable and safe and ensures our daughter will grow up as best she can, but all the while you act like it’s a cage and I’m oppressing you and keeping you from some bigger purpose.”

“Because stable and safe isn’t always best!” Addy snapped. “The Span isn’t stable and safe, if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that. What are we teaching her by trying to shelter her from everything that’s going on?”

“So what, you’d rather bring her into things like this?!” He waved vaguely at the locked door. “You’d rather we just say ‘screw it, she needs to learn!’ and put her in harm’s way.”

“Of course not! But I don’t want her to learn that we’re cowards who just hide from all the Span’s problems either. Not while everyone else in her life is out trying to solve them. I don’t want her growing up to think it’s every person for themselves. To see her parents run away instead of standing to fight.”

“Well, we won’t have to worry about that,” Cyrus began, knowing he was going too far before the words even tumbled out of his mouth, “Since in an hour she won’t even have parents anymore.”

The basement fell into tense silence. Too tense. Even fuzzy as his vision was, Cyrus could see clearly through the dark that he had crossed a line. The woman before him had been angry before, but now she was much more than that. Much worse. He got the sense that if he said another word, he would be slapped straight across the face.

So he let her speak first. Rather, shout first.

“How dare you, Cyrus! How dare you put me in that position.”

“You put us in this position remember?” he shouted right back, thus beginning a volley of vicious words and expletives so loud and booming against the basement walls, Cyrus didn’t hear most of them, even the ones expelled from his own mouth. It was a fight that had been building for months now, possibly even years and now that their lives were so close to ending entirely, it had to come out. It always had to come out at some point.

But Cyrus hadn’t considered the consequences of shouting in the basement of wherever they were, nor would he have cared if he did. He was too full of despair and frustration to give even half a thought to other occupants. That is, until one of those occupants, a young woman by the look and sound of her, barged in through the door and shouted, “Would you two quiet down in here?!”

“No!” Addy shouted right back, resilient, but by some miracle, Cyrus experienced a brief stroke of genius. Or at the very least, cleverness. An opportunity had presented itself, one he hadn’t expected or even considered, but to hell if he wasn’t going to take it.

He couldn’t see much, but he could see the light from the space beyond the door and anger or frustration or rage be damned, he was going to get there.

Before anyone else in the room had a chance to act, Cyrus seized Addy’s wrist, yelled “Run!” and dragged her towards the light, not hesitating to shove the intruder aside on the way.

——————

There was nothing there. Nothing left of what was once the great Ellegian Consulate Archives, save a dramatic set of stairs and a small maze of hallways with very well-made, if aged, tiled floors. Corra stomped down one of those halls, her heavy footsteps echoing through the entire chamber.

“I can’t believe this,” she growled under her breath as she passed another room with rows of shelves that had been stripped clean. “Not even a scrap page of a book.”

“Weird that Eriaas guy didn’t have the sense to think this place would be raided as soon as his team left,” Finn commented, sounding far less angry than she felt. “Or he didn’t care…”

Corra groaned. “I can’t believe this,” she said again. She didn’t even bother peering into the next room they passed. It was dark and spacious and completely devoid of contents. Like everything else down here.

“I guess the bright side is that the Society won’t find it here either.” Seriously, Finn was way too cheerful. His positivity was grating on her nerves. “If it was here at all. Seems like it’ll be lost to time. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

“Yes,” Corra snapped and then corrected, “No. Nothing’s lost to time. It’s out there somewhere. Somebody has it.”

“And you have the Transmission,” Finn noted. “So as long as you never meet, it’ll all be fine.”

Corra looked back at him, a glare set deep in her brow. Somewhere inside her, she knew he was probably right. Whoever had the thing, at least up to now, seemed content keeping it a secret. It was safe to assume they’d continue to do so and with any luck, the device was useless without Corra’s puzzle piece anyway. It was logical.

But Corra wasn’t feeling very logical right then. A stroke of anger mixed with frustration mixed with despair had overtaken her and logic from Finn was the last thing she wanted to hear.

“You just don’t get it, do you?” she barked, turning back to face him.

“No, actually,” Finn admitted with a casual shrug. He was examining a rock he’d picked up between his fingers.

Corra’s jaw dropped half an inch before it tightened. “Seriously? I dragged you out here to look for this thing and we find–” she waved her hands around them “–nothing! And you don’t get why I’m upset.”

“It was a longshot anyway.”

“It wasn’t a–” Corra ran her hands down her face then stared at him, feeling fury behind her eyes. “Why aren’t you angry?”

Finally, he met her gaze, but it wasn’t with the determination and hatred she was expecting, or that she craved. He simply looked confused. “Why would I be angry?”

“Because it’s my fault!” Corra despaired, without hesitation. “It’s my fault we’re in this stupid cave and there’s nothing here and I wasted your time and your crew’s time and–”

Finn’s face screwed up and he made a ‘pfft’ sound. “We were already here anyway. It didn’t take much time. And it’s not your fault we didn’t find any–”

“It is my fault!” Corra argued at once, marching back down the hallway towards him. “It’s completely my fault! So why aren’t you angry, huh?” She growled and then, without thinking, put her hands on his chest and pushed him.

“Wha–hey!” He stumbled backwards and she followed, a storm brewing inside and over her head.

“I brought you down here for nothing. I hijacked your whole ship for a stupid wild goose chase.” Her fingers curled and she pushed him again.

“Corra–”

“You should be angry. You should be resentful. Why aren’t you mad?!”

When she reached out to push him again, this time he seized her arms and held her back. “Corra,” he said sternly, but not sternly enough. “What the hell is the matter with you?”

“What the hell is the matter with you?!” She ripped herself out of his hold. “Why don’t you hate me?!”

A strange silence fell in the echoing hallway. Corra searched over Finn’s face, desperate to find what she was looking for there. Desperate to see the rage and the fury, even disappointment, but she found none. He was just watching her with confusion and, god forgive, sadness.

“What?”

Corra’s hands clenched into fists and she rubbed her knuckles into her temples. “Why don’t you hate me?” she asked again, calmer this time as reality set back in. She’d lost her sight of it for just a moment.

And Finn put her fear into words. “We’re not talking about the Transmitter anymore, are we?”

Well, this conversation was going to have to happen eventually, right. It had been gnawing away at her from the inside out all week and perhaps they had reached the point where she could no longer avoid it. Slowly, her fists fell back to her sides and she drew in a deep breath.

“I don’t get it, Riley.” Her voice was quiet when she spoke, barely even a whisper. “After everything I did–all that I did to you–God, Riley, I spent years believing that if we ever met again, you wouldn’t even look me in the eye. As you shouldn’t have. As I deserved. But–I come back and–and you want me to stay? You ask me to stay.”

She could feel Finn’s intense gaze upon her, but she couldn’t bring herself to return it. “Corra–”

“No,” she cut him off harshly because she wasn’t sure she could bear to hear what he had to say. “I nearly got you killed. I acted stupidly and put your life in danger. I risked our ship, our livelihood and our lives.”

“What? The whole thing with Callahan? Corra, he was transporting allies, I wouldn’t expect you to–”

“No, that’s not even it,” she interrupted again. “Even if I hadn’t done all that. Even if–” She shook her head. “I mean Archeti…”

Now, Finn immediately jumped in. “I don’t blame you for that. No one blames you for that–”

“Well they should,” she barked sharply. “You should.”

“Cyrus told me everything. You didn’t know what you were doing, you didn’t know–”

“I did know,” she snapped. “It took me a long time to realize that and come to terms with it, but I did know.” She expected him to interrupt again, but he’d gone quiet, watching her patiently. “Cyrus told me what the Caelum Lex was, what it could be used for. And I gave it to a man who I knew would do bad with it. It was a mistake, but it was an informed mistake. I’m done claiming ignorance.”

Finn was still staring at her, more stunned than anything else, which only made the frustration in her core deepen. He didn’t get it. He wasn’t going to get it. She had to make him get it.

“You’re right, I never had any bad intentions. I never meant any of it to happen.” She started towards him. “But it happened because I made choices and I took risks that I shouldn’t have taken. And I nearly destroyed you in the process.” She stopped just inches from him and prodded her index finger into his chest as she spoke. “So. Where. Is. Your. Anger?”

Finn looked down at her finger for a long moment, saying nothing, but she could see by the way his shoulders lifted and fell, his breathing had become heavier. His jaw was clenched. And when he finally met her gaze, she saw it. The rage and the fury she’d been craving. The retribution she deserved. When he seized her hand and threw it aside, she didn’t resist.

“You want anger? Fine,” he growled, lowering his face to glare at her. “Fine, I’m angry. I’m angry you left.”

It wasn’t quite what she was expecting, but the force of it was about right. “That I left?”

“Yeah! You left,” he said again, his tone cold and harsh. “When I needed you most. Injured and dying and having just lost–” He let out a crazed laugh. “Everything! My home, my family, my friends, everything that mattered to me. Do you know how miserable that was?!”

“Yes! And I caused that!” Corra wasn’t sure if what she was feeling was relief that she was finally getting the backlash she was owed or fear at seeing Finn like she’d never seen him before. Regardless, she barely noticed the water forming in the corners of her eyes.

“No you fucking didn’t!” Finn snapped. “Callahan stabbed me. The Society destroyed Archeti.”

“Neither of which would have happened if I–”

“No!” Finn groaned loudly. “No, just stop. God, you want me to yell at you? You want me to get mad and scream and shout so you can feel punished and seek redemption? Fine. Whatever. If that’s what you need. But I’m not going to just read the lines you want to hear. You want my anger, you can have it, but only for what you actually did.”

Corra braced her fists sternly at her side. “I know what I did.”

“And that’s easy isn’t it?” Finn growled. “It’s easy to assign yourself blame for a knife you didn’t wield and a terraformer you didn’t pilot.”

“Easy?!” Corra repeated indignantly. “You think that’s easy to admit my fault for that? Do you know how many people died?!”

It was the wrong question. Finn’s glare intensified instantly. “Oh I fucking know how many people died.”

She swallowed the lump in her throat. “Then how can you say it’s easy?!”

“Because it’s all distant causality! You were one of many factors that lead to something terrible. So was I for working with Callahan to begin with. So was, God, Cyrus, for letting us take the Beacon at all. So was the fucker who first thought ‘hey wouldn’t building a spaceship be neat?’ Fuck all that, you want to make amends, admit to the one crime you actually did commit.”

“And what the hell is that?”

His tone was colder than she’d ever heard him speak. “Abandoning your friend when he needed you at his side.”

No matter how many times Corra had dwelled on this inevitability, she wasn’t prepared for it. Instantly she felt like all the air had been knocked from her chest. She couldn’t breathe. Certainly couldn’t speak. She just stood there, staring at him, completely dumbfounded, with lines of silent tears streaking across her cheeks.

It felt like ages before she was able to manage, “I–I had to–”

But Finn was already shaking his head in distaste. “You didn’t have to do anything. You wanted to. Because you thought it would be easier.”

“I didn’t want to hurt you.”

“You didn’t want to hurt yourself. You didn’t do it for me. You left for you.”

“I had to make amends–” Every choked word sounded like a cheap excuse even to her own ears. “I joined the Conduit — I– I wanted to save people to–”

“And you could have done that anyway.” He was still watching her as though she was a disappointing child and he her father. “You could have told me. You could have said goodbye. You could have kept in touch. I could have helped, Corra. You didn’t have to disappear.”

Her mouth opened as she hoped a response would come from it, but none did. She didn’t have any excuses left. She’d made a choice that day and she’d made a vow to stick with it. But she had no defense for it, no offering to make up for it.

Finally, Finn’s expression softened a little. “I think that hurt the worst, by the way,” he admitted, quieter now. “When I heard you’d reached out to Leta, but not even a word to me.” He grimaced and shrugged. “I know you two are closer than we’ll ever be, of course you’d talk to her, but–I don’t know. I thought we had something too, you and I. More than just a friendship. A–well, partnership.” His eyes had been locked onto her through this whole revelation, but now they looked away. “You’d really come to mean a lot to me then, y’know. I really cared about you.”

For the second time, Corra felt the wind had been punched out of her. “I–I really cared about you too,” she admitted quietly.

A tiny smile curled into Finn’s lips. “Then why didn’t you ever contact me?”

Corra heaved in a deep breath. “Because I needed to be alone.” It was an admission she hadn’t even really considered until it came out of her mouth. “I’d always been surrounded by people. On Kadolyne, the Dionysian, the Beacon. And I just…needed to be alone for a while. I don’t know, it doesn’t really make sense maybe, but–”

“It makes sense,” Finn interrupted and he shrugged again. “Soul searching. Been there done that.” He nodded slowly before tilting his head at her. “Did it help?”

“I think so,” she muttered, brushing a nervous hand through her hair. “Maybe. I hope so…” She looked down at her feet before finally saying in a hurry, “Riley, I’m so sorry, I didn’t ever mean to hurt you even more, I just–”

“Hey, it’s okay.” He came towards her and put his hands on her shoulders. “You gotta do what you gotta do, I get that. Just one thing.” She looked up at him, trying to wipe her crying eyes with the back of her hand. “Are you done? Can you come back now?”

She sniffled a laugh and her vision blurred as it filled with tears. “Yeah. I think I can.” She only got one quick glance at the smile that broke over his face before he pulled her into a hug that threatened to crush her.

“Good. We missed you.”

Tears were still streaming down Corra’s face when Finn finally loosened his hold on her. But they dried quickly when suddenly he said in a tone she hadn’t been expecting, “What’s that light?”

Startled, she whipped her head around to see what he was seeing over her head. There was no light that she could make out, but when he let go and headed forward down the hall, she followed. It wasn’t until he pushed open a heavy door that had only been cracked open that she saw what he was talking about.

The archive was deserted entirely. Except, it seemed, for this one room. There were a couple of folded chairs, a table with some cards on it and a wall of console monitors. “Is this–” Corra began and Finn nodded.

“Security monitoring, looks like.”

The whole thing was shut off for now, the room dark, but it didn’t have the layers of dust the other areas had. This place had been occupied and not too long ago at that. But empty as it was now, there was one singular light on one singular console in the corner. It was tiny, red and flashed insistently, begging for attention.

Finn got there first, turning on the screen and examining its contents. An incoming message, Corra realized as she peered around his shoulder.

“All members,” Finn read, mumbling through some parts of the message, “emergency meeting…town hall…intruders? Looking for–Transmitter. The Holy Origin must be protected at all costs?”

Corra’s eyes grew wide and she swallowed as Finn whipped his head around to look at her. “What the hell? Who are these people?”

“I don’t know,” Corra answered, feeling suddenly short of breath. “But they found Cy and Addy.”

——————

The grand escape plan might have worked, had a few conditions been different. If the Gatekeepers of the Holy Origin had been fewer in numbers, for instance. If the basement Cyrus and Addy had been in wasn’t directly underneath their meeting hall. If Cyrus had been able to see well enough to not run them straight into the middle of a meeting.

“Well it was a good effort,” Addy mumbled behind him. She had her back to him, and his back to her, all four of their wrists tied together and attached to pole in the center of the group’s hall. The blurry shapes of crazed people surrounded them, still debating how exactly they were going to dispose of the fugitives. One woman thought they should be burned because it would be cleaner. Another man wanted to simply shoot them. A more creative cultist thought something with knives would be more meaningful.

Cyrus couldn’t bear to listen to it anymore.

“Would have been better if I’d found the exit,” he found himself saying, voice hoarse, as he turned to look at her. “Hey. Addy. I–I’m really sorry. All that stuff I said–”

“Would have been better if I’d found the exit,” he found himself saying, voice hoarse, as he turned to look at her. “Hey. Addy. I–I’m really sorry. All that stuff I said–”

“I know.” Vulnerability shone in her wide, round eyes. “I know. I’m sorry too.”

“You and Kalli, you’re–you’re everything to me,” Cyrus admitted. “And I can be an ass sometimes, you’re totally right, but it’s only because I am absolutely terrified of losing either of you.” Carefully, so as not to pull something the wrong way, he twisted his hand around to squeeze hers. “I love that you’re adventurous and brave, really.”

Addy released a sad chuckle. “And I love that you’re logical and dependable even when everything else has gone to hell.” He felt her fingers lace through his and squeeze even tighter. “There’s no one I’d rather raise our daughter with.”

“Me either.” Cyrus looked up at the people still hovering nearby and swallowed. “I love you so much. If I ever gave you a reason to doubt that, I–”

He could feel Addy shaking her head. “No, don’t. Cy, I know and–gods, I love you too, don’t ever think otherwise.” Her voice was starting to shudder. “I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry…”

Around them, oblivious to their discussion, it seemed the Gatekeepers of Whatever had made their decision and that decision looked a lot like a double-barrel shotgun. Cyrus squeezed Addy’s hand tighter as a blur approached them and the man from the library spoke. “I promise this’ll be real quick,” he assured them. “Won’t feel a thing.”

Cyrus heard Addy choke down a sob. Her hands were shaking. Or were those his? He’d been near death before, especially living on the Dionysian, but never had it been presented as such a clear, unavoidable reality. He couldn’t say he was afraid exactly. It wasn’t fear that struck him then, as the clicks of bullets being loaded into a gun sounded by his ear. It was sadness, pure and simple. Sadness that he wouldn’t finish his work on Archeti. Sadness he’d never see Satieri again. And especially sadness that he’d never see the woman beside him again. He’d never get the chance to make up for the past few years. He’d never get to lay around with her in his arms in the morning. Never raise their daughter together. Never grow old together.

His own life didn’t feel like that big of a loss. But losing Addy’s? Losing Kalli’s? The very thought made his insides feel like they were imploding in on themselves.

“Which one of you wants to go first?” the man with the shotgun asked. Now, Addy wasn’t holding back her weeping, it was coming out in sharp, hoarse breaths.

Cyrus swallowed the lump in his own throat. “Me,” he managed, only barely.

“Cy–no,” Addy sobbed, pulling against the bonds.

“Better me than you,” Cyrus grunted, fighting back the water from his own eyes.

“You–I can’t–” she stuttered, but suddenly her sadness turned to anger. She twisted towards the man with the gun. “You can’t do this! We have a daughter! She needs us! You can’t do this! You can’t just–kill us!”

“Sorry, miss,” he replied, sounding a bit taken aback. “Don’t really have much choice.”

“You do have a choice!” Addy snapped, but her voice was already cracking. “Please! Please don’t do this.”

“The Holy Origin must be protected at all costs,” the man said and Cyrus yelped as he felt the cold barrel of a gun press against his forehead.

“The others–the people on our ship–they’ll come for you,” Addy bit angrily, but her heart was only half in it. He could practically hear the tears streaming down her face. “You won’t get away with this.”

The man with the gun sighed and applied more pressure. “The Holy Origin must be protected at all costs,” he repeated and Cyrus could hear the others in the room whispering along in unison.

The gun’s safety clicked. Addy let out a horrifying wail. Cyrus just drew in a deep breath and squeezed his eyes shut. And then, there were two loud bangs. And a shout of, “Wait!”

Cyrus snapped open his eyes and looked around at the blurry shapes frantically rushing about in surprise. “Who–” began the man with the gun who pressed it even harder against Cyrus’ head.

“Wait, don’t!” said the interruptor again and Cyrus finally got the relief he was craving.

“Corra–” he heard Addy breathe.

He strained his neck to get a better look at the short brown blurry shape flanked by the tall brown blurry shape marching into the hall. “Don’t kill them. I have something you want.” She raised something shiny in the air, catching the light and flashing brightly in her hand.

All around them, the Gatekeepers gasped. “The Transmission” — “It’s the Transmission” — “How does she have–”

“Let them go, now,” Corra ordered, “Or I’ll destroy it. I swear to God, I will, don’t test me.”

“No!” shouted one of the Gatekeepers, lashing out towards her, but her companion, Cyrus assumed was Finn, seemed to raise a gun that stopped them in their tracks. And that was when things got weird.

“Look! Look at her ear!” someone else shouted.

“She has the mark!” said another.

“The mark of the slave,” gasped someone else to which Corra snapped, “Hey! I thought I said–”

But the man with the gun spoke over her. The gun fell from Cyrus’ temple and he lifted his hands into the air. “Friends! Gatekeepers! Release these captives at once.”

“Well–thanks,” Corra said, though she sounded less sure of herself than she had a minute ago. And for good reason.

“A great day is upon us,” the man went on. “The day we have long awaited. The slave has delivered unto us the Transmission. The prophecy is complete!”

As Cyrus and Addy were forcefully untied and raised to their feet, everyone in the room erupted into a chorus of cheers and celebration. Cyrus couldn’t see Corra’s face across the room, but he had a feeling it displayed the same emotion he himself was feeling just then.

He turned to Addy beside him. “What the hell?”