The Last Human IV - 68 - To Bless and Be Blessed

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The two avians locked themselves together. It didn’t seem to matter that Agraneia was still standing in the room. 

Agraneia coughed awkwardly. “I’ll, uh, see you two later.” She didn’t think either one of them heard her as she slid the door shut behind her.

She knew she should be glad for Eolh and Ryke. They deserved all the happiness that life could offer. Agraneia should feel relieved that the Scar hadn’t crushed the Ark into dust, and that their xeno patchwork of a civilization would find a new home …

But she couldn’t feel it. No relief. No joy. Nothing but her bruised flesh and sharp pains where the Sovereign’s monster had tried to break her.

There was someone Agraneia needed to see, only she wasn’t sure if Talya would want to see her. After all, Agraneia had left Talya—more than once—to seek out some stupid ideal. To do the right thing. And, if the gods demanded it, to get herself killed.

But the gods demanded something else. And that was turning out to be far more difficult.

And now, Agraneia was afraid that she didn’t deserve to see Talya again. Maybe Talya doesn’t even want to see me. Is it cruel to seek her out? Or just selfish? Hells, it was possible the Queen’s wingmaiden had already found someone new. Someone who wasn’t an emotionally-stunted coward with a monstrous past.

But her legs knew something that her mind didn’t, because they were already in motion. Agraneia limped through the Ark’s corridors and crowds of xenos (disheveled and exhausted and crying with relief). Without really meaning to go, she found herself standing in the hospital ward. Nurses with bloodstains and sleep-deprived doctors fretted to and fro like bees tending to a hive, worrying over patients in their cots. The scent of dried blood and old sweat and sharp disinfectants stung at her nostrils. Shouts for sedatives competed with the screams of some poor soul who was being carried away for an amputation. Heart hammering in her throat, Agraneia unconsciously wrapped her hand around her liquid arm. Feeling a surge of dread and sympathy for the unfortunate patient. 

“Patient intake?” A plump red-feathered nurse came charging past her elbow, eyeing her impatiently. “What’s the nature of your wounds?”

“Oh, I’m not here as a patient.”

“No?” she clucked doubtfully, eyeing the burned bands of flesh around her wrists and arms. 

“I’m looking for someone.”

“Family or loved one?”

“I … I think so.”

“You think so? Well, you can find a list of patients over there, but I’m warning you now, it’s long.”

“Not a patient. Looking for someone who works here. Talya?” 

The red avian’s brow feathers rose a few inches, and her crest feathers spiked. “Oh,” She uttered icily, “I see.”

Agraneia swallowed. “Is she here?”

“She is.”

“Can I … see her?”

“If it were up to me?” The nurse sighed heavily, shaking her head as if to say ‘not my problem.’ “Talya’s in the back.” 

Agraneia thanked her, and the nurse gave a curt toss of her head, before tending to the next xeno.

The back was quieter, though the antiseptic smell was stronger. Almost intoxicating, but far from pleasant. A tech was mopping a long, bloody stain on the floor. Agraneia limped through halls crowded with cots and barely conscious patients. In one room, a family was sobbing over a body, covered with a towel, while a nurse gently urged them to take their grieving outside, so they could make room for other patients.

Talya was in the last room on the left, helping a blue-feathered nurse peel the bloody wraps off a patient. Both their white uniforms, and Talya’s white feathers, were stained with blood. 

Agraneia stood in the hall. She couldn’t bring herself to step inside. Maybe she doesn’t want to see me. Why would she? Frozen by indecision, gritting her jaw, Agraneia just watched the wingmaiden work. Two techs hurried down the hall with a gurney, shouting for Agraneia to move out of the way.

Talya kept working, but her partner glanced at the doorway. The nurse’s face darkened. “Talya,” he whispered, and nodded at Agraneia. 

First, the wingmaiden turned. Her eyes widened. Her beak fell open in stages. 

“I …” Agraneia rumbled. “Talyam I’m …” The room was spinning, and she couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t find the words. She never had the damn words.

It didn’t matter.

“AGRANEIA?” Talya screamed. A few conscious patients lifted their heads.

Before Agraneia could open her mouth to say another word, Talya threw herself across the room like a feathered missile. She slammed against Agraneia’s chest, and wrapped her arms around her waist, squeezing exactly where the Sovereign had broken her ribs.

Agraneia toppled over with the smaller avian still holding on. Together, they crashed to the floor, and Agraneia gasped in blissful agony.

“You’re alive!” Talya squealed between a barrage of kisses, “You’re alive!”—kiss, kiss, kiss—“You’re alive!”—kiss, kiss—“By the gods, you’re alive!” 

There was nothing sanitary about this, and Agraneia was pretty sure Talya’s hands were still covered in someone else’s blood, but Agraneia was damned if she was going to stop her.

***

The city built by the xenos on the Ark’s habitation deck was in ruins. While the experts searched for a new home, the xeno survivors had to share the rest of the ship. People slept in shifts in the barracks scattered across the bowels of the ship, or made their homes in tucked-away corners in the halls and corridors of the Ark’s mazelike interior.

Talya had claimed a prime spot in the aftward grow labs, where green stalks grew out of hydroponic beds and broad leaves tickled at the ceiling. Grassy smells and the insect-like buzz of growlights gave it an almost pastoral feel. There were other xenos, other families, scattered through the growing crops, but spread out enough that Agraneia could almost pretend she and Talya were alone. If not for the hallucinations …

The dead faces lurked in the shadows of the ripening nangka fruits and sugar grasses. Their eyes weighed on her, their whispers rustled as soft as leaves. Agraneia fought to keep her eyes on Talya, who patted her bedroll, inviting the cyran closer.

“Agra? What’s the matter?”

“Hmm,” Agraneia hummed through her frown. Shouldn’t it be easier now that they were safe? But the words were stuck in her throat.

Talya watched her, but didn’t rush her. Ever patient, she waited in silence.

Agraneia growled at herself. If Talya could be patient, then why can’t I find the strength to speak? She squeezed her eyes shut, and took a deep breath, and spoke in a rush. “There’s something wrong with me, and it’s been broken for such a long time that I’m afraid it can never be fixed.”

Talya reached out. Feathers brushed over scales as her fingers intertwined with Agraneia’s. And, silently, the wingmaiden waited.

“I …” Agraneia hesitated. The words were getting stuck again. Her chest was tight, and not just from the bandages wrapped around her torso. Agraneia growled, trying to force it out. “Wanted to ask—you—I’m asking—Maybe if you could—”

“Agraneia,” she said, soft and sweet. “Are you asking for my help?” 

Agraneia swallowed. And nodded.

“Don’t you know that I love you?” Talya asked.

“But I left,” Agraneia's brow furrowed. “I left you on your own.”

“Because you stopped loving me?”

“I always loved you.”

Talya’s smile was like a sun burning through the clouds. Yet, just as swiftly, it was gone again. “Then why did you leave, Agra?”

Agraneia stared into the green walls of plants. A sprayer hissed as it showered another crop a few rows over. It didn’t quite drown out the whispers. They were talking to her. About her. Saying all the things she didn’t want to hear. Some of them were even true.

“Because I hate myself,” Agraneia finally said. “Because I don’t think—I didn’t think—I was worthy of your love.”

“Do you want to change that?” 

Agraneia’s eyes shot back to hers. “More than anything. But I’ve always been this way. I don’t know if I can change…”

“Back when Gaiam was occupied, Queen Ryke used to tell me things about the gods. About their great works. Their magical artifacts,” She nodded at Agraneia’s liquid arm. “But Queen Ryke always said these things were nothing compared to their greatest power. What separates mortals from the divine? They had the power to change themselves—with nothing but will.

“And when the Magistrate’s forces took hold of the Cauldron, Ryke always told me to remember one thing. That we are descended from the gods. Even you. If they can change, then why can’t you?”

***

When the xenos chose a new world, it didn’t have a proper name—just a string of letters and numbers in the Ark’s sensor data logs. 

The xeno people were still arguing over what to call it as the Ark descended into the new world’s atmosphere. Without Yarsi to guide the Ark, the descent was more than a little choppy. Teams of navigators, engineers, and other officers chattered and squabbled as they slowly, pendulously guided the Ark to rest at the bottom of a u-shaped valley. Surrounded by towering granite cliffs and rounded slopes, the Ark was protected from the dry winds that scoured this world. Once the dust settled, teams of tinkers and geological experts donned their expedition suits and began to map out the foundations for the Towers that would power the dome over the valley. 

Once the Towers were built and the dome was up, they would feed Khadam’s printers and fill the dome with a balanced air mixture and generate the other elements needed for life. Only then could the xenos turn their sights on transforming the world into a true paradise. 

In the meantime, Agraneia busied herself around the Ark. With Talya’s help, she searched for a new purpose. At first, she tried to offer her services to the heavy maintenance crews. Though this world had an atmosphere, it was thin, and the ship still needed to pump and sustain interior oxygen levels. But the banging of hammered metal and the blaze of welding torches and the shouted communications aggravated her hallucinations. It made her work dangerous. 

Agraneia tried to help Laykis build her new android body. But once Laykis’s core was grafted into the starter chassis, as Laykis called it, they both knew the android didn’t really need her.

Talya suggested she try working in the makeshift hospital ward. Here, the faces still watched and whispered over her shoulder, even as Agraneia worked tirelessly to feed and clean patients, and help them get back on their feet. Sometimes, a wounded xeno came in, and Agraneia had to cover her nose and mouth to prevent the smell of blood from sending her off. As an aide, she was hopeless in surgery. It was intoxicating. 

Every day was a fight. Every day, she wanted to quit. To somehow leave everything behind. But, she knew, the faces would only follow her. 

And every day, Talya coaxed her back from the darkness. Be patient with yourself, Agra. Some wounds take lifetimes to heal. 

The problem was, Agraneia didn’t feel like she was healing. Not until she found the lost cyran child. 

She was looking for bandages in the back halls of the hospital ward, when she heard a noise. Some of the rooms back here didn’t have power, so they mostly stayed empty. 

Expecting to find a forgotten construct, Agraneia poked her head into the dark. He was staring at her. Dull, aqua scales and crest fins that were just starting to grow in. He must’ve younger than Yarsi, when she and Agraneia first met. 

“Uh,” Agraneia said. “Hello?” 

He flinched, and shrank back into the darkness. But he didn’t blink. She knew that look. Had seen it many times, reflected back at her.

But this was a child. She didn’t know how to talk to children. And shouldn’t his parents be around? Then it dawned on her. You idiot, the faces laughed at her. You fool.

“Are you alone?” she asked.

Silence. He was shaking slightly. Probably, he hadn’t eaten in days. 

“Look,” Agraneia rumbled, “You can’t stay here.”

He shrank back as she stepped into the room. When he bumped into the corner, he curled into a crouch. His wide eyes bored into her. An animal, ready to bite and claw and tear into her if she came any closer.

Agraneia’s blood was up. But she was not afraid.

“Scared?”

He made an imperceptible twitch. Could’ve been a nod. Could’ve been nothing.

“Me too,” Agraneia said. She leaned against the door frame and sat slowly down. Her knees cracked, and the boy flinched with every pop. 

“You and me,” she said. “We’re alike.”

“What do you know?” he snapped. “You’re a noble.”

 “I’m anything but,” Agraneia chuckled darkly.

“Your scales glitter. Mine don’t.” He glared at her. Full of hate. Just like all the other faces that haunted her. 

“You think you have to stay angry, because anger feels better than everything else. You’re afraid of suffocating, so you stay angry. But it eats at you. Hate is an acid. It burns you up and makes you sink to the bottom. Makes it impossible to ever see the light again.”

“What do you know?” the boy spat. His fists were clenched so tight, her knuckle scales stood out.

Agraneia lowered her voice until it was little more than a gentle rumble. “They’re all dead aren’t they? Everyone you ever knew.”

His eyes flicked down, and the rage started to drain away. He frowned harder, trying to summon it back, but the truth had punctured something in him. Tears pooled in the child’s eyes. His lip quivered as he fought, and fought. 

She remembered trying to be that brave. She remembered killing everything inside herself, just to stop feeling the weight of it all. 

“Hey.”

He was breathing hard. Staring at the floor. She was losing him.

“Want to see something?”

Agraneia lifted her liquid arm. Her liquid metal hand melted into a new shape. Chrome fibers threaded together in a semblance of muscle, and her fist turned into a gleaming metal hammer. Then, it changed again, into a long, elegant blade. And once more, becoming an ornate and delicate miniature tree. A small, silver trunk sprouted from her forearm, filigreed branches catching the light from the hall. 

The boy’s eyes were wide with awe. 

“A god gave it to me,” she said. “Want to hear the story?”

This time, she was sure he nodded.

Agraneia talked for hours. She talked until her mouth went dry, and her voice croaked like a corvani’s. She told him about her life before Eolh, skirting around the goriest details. And she told him how everything changed. And how Poire entrusted her with the liquid armor. 

“It took me a long time to learn how to shape it,” Agraneia said. “But now, I don’t even have to think. It just knows what I want. It can even do this—”

She threw out her arm, and the liquid metal extended into a long blade. It sliced into the nearest wall, carving a long hole into the Ark’s hull. Sparks flew, and light poured in from the next room over. 

“Oops.”

The cyran boy stared at the wall. Then back at her. Completely enraptured. 

“Uh,” she said, “Don’t tell anyone about that.”

He wanted to hear the rest of her story, but she convinced him it would sound better over a few plates of food. “I’m starving. Tell you the rest once we get some grub.” 

“Okay,” he said. Sounding small and uncertain again. 

This time, it was Agraneia’s turn to flinch, when a small scaled hand pressed into hers. 

In an instant, it was clear. The dead faces were all around her. Screaming and laughing and raging at her, for what she had done. 

But, for the moment, Agraneia couldn’t hear a word they said.

The boy’s name was Krusan, and his parents had been on the Ark. They pushed him through the bulkhead doors, right before their compartment was ripped open to the vacuum. With Talya’s help, Agraneia helped little Krusan start on a new path. “One day,” she said, “Not today. Not tomorrow. But one day, it starts to get better. You have to work at it, though.”

Krusan was only the first of many. Next, Agraneia found two avian girls who had watched their siblings get ripped apart by the Sovereign’s drones who had managed to burrow into the Ark. 

Unlike Krusan, who took hours to start talking, the two avian girls latched onto Talya in minutes. Then, there was a young gaskal with red and green and yellow scales, who didn’t talk for weeks until Krusan taught him how to play ships and pirates. After that, nobody could get him to stop talking. 

Still, the voices whispered to Agraneia. Her dreams were as vivid as ever. Sometimes, she could feel her fingers wrapped around the throats of her enemies, even as they clawed back at hers. On those nights, she woke up sweating. And rolled over, and held Talya tight.

The Towers went up around the Ark, and the new shield dome came to life, trapping in the oxygen and moisture they would need to turn this place into a living paradise. They named the planet “Maker’s Haven,” such that Khadam’s great deeds might never be forgotten. The first plants began to take root in the soil around the Ark. New buildings rose—in the Ark’s half-ruined habitation deck, and on the planet’s surface.

Agraneia and Eolh walked the perimeter of the dome, watching the newest highrise roost go up. It was the tallest one yet, and there were already bridges connecting it to the Ark, and a handful of shorter buildings built higher on the slope. Outside the shimmering blue dome, the valley was desolate and red-brown. But here, fields of sprouts were already flourishing. Little green plants, braving this new, alien world. Despite her wrenching nerves, it gave her hope.

“Eolh,” she said, finally summoning the courage to ask, “I was wondering if you could help me.”

“Is that right?” he cocked his head. “Help with what?”

“Starting a group.”

“Another one? All those little followers, I don’t know how you and Talya keep up with them.”

“The kids? Easy. Throw them around for a few hours, then let them run wild, feed them and let them run around again. They sleep like rocks.”

“Didn’t know rocks were so much work.” 

Agraneia waved him off. “I have to do more.”

“Have to?” He eyed her carefully.

“The voices in my head. They’re never going away. Problem is, they’re right. They always have been.”

“Oh, Agra … ”

“But I won’t let them be right forever.”

Eolh cocked his head the other way. “What do you mean?”

“I want to start a group. Broken. Lost. Anyone who needs it. We’re going to, uh, help each other. Thing is, I’m not much of a leader.”

“Come on,” Eolh said. “Reckon it’s easy. All you have to do is say the right things, and say them a lot. Just a lot of talking.”

“Hm,” she grunted. “Talking.”

 Eolh clicked his beak. “Fair point.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I reckon it’s a skill like any other. I mean, when you first started at the War Academy, you had a lot to learn, too. Didn’t you?” 

“Sergeants said I was a natural. Best they’d ever seen.”

“Of course they did,” he crowed out a sigh. “Well, then. You’ve got all the time in the world to learn, old friend. We’ll start small, yeah? Just a handful. Can you handle that?” 

“Don’t know.” Agraneia rolled the tension out of her shoulders. “But we’ll find out.” 

“Don’t worry, Ags. Some day, you’ll be an orator unlike any other.” 

“And if not?”

He shrugged. “Really, if you think about it, it’s not about you. It’s about who's listening. And good authority says I’m a good one. A natural listener, even. Best they’ve ever seen.”

Eolh couldn’t hide that stupid, smug smile on his face. 

***

Terrible thunder and rain storms battered the Shield Wall, but inside the crops were in full bloom. There were insects—actual insects—buzzing inside the shield wall. Apparently Khadam had found frozen samples of genetic material deep in the vaults on Gaiam, back when it still existed. Combined with the stowaways aboard the Ark, new life had come to Maker’s Haven.

Agraneia had started the first support gathering with one rule: only those who want to become better may join. The first time, nobody wanted to talk. So Agraneia stood at the front of her small crowd, and told them about herself. 

“Hello,” she said awkwardly. Her voice echoed uncomfortably loud in the compact amphitheater. There were less than ten of them, including Eolh and Talya, gathered in a ruined park on the Ark’s habitation deck. The ribs of the Ark rose high around them, and above that, the crystal-blue shield protected them from the onslaught of the storms.

“My name is Agraneia. I was a first lieutenant in the Emperor’s expeditionary forces. Part of a special battalion, until the end. The things I did … I’m not proud of them.”

She took a deep breath. Eolh nodded at her. Talya leaned forward. And Agraneia plowed ahead.

“I killed many, many people, and I regret every single life I took. Even the ones I took to save others. But the truth is, fighting made me feel alive. We were the best of the best. The Emperor’s tech kept us head and shoulders above every force we encountered. It was terrifying, how strong we were. I became addicted to it. I lost myself. Became a machine for an Empire I didn’t believe in. They told us that the xenos were beneath us. Lies to make us feel important. It was a xeno—a friend—who helped me make myself anew.

“Today, we’re here to remind ourselves that we don’t have to be alone. As a god once told me,” She held up her liquid metal arm, “Reach out. And I will reach back.”

The next gathering, there were more than fifty. Sure, some of them just wanted to hear some old war stories, but it didn’t matter. Agraneia had finally begun to be.

The groups came and went, but mostly they came. Sometimes ex-soldiers showed up, just because they’d heard about her. The legendary Agraneia. Even a few of Eolh’s less-than-gentle Lowtown friends joined up. Some even made friends with the very cyrans they had once sworn to kill. Some.

“Surprised there haven’t been any knife fights,” Eolh said over dinner one night. They were sitting round a long, wooden table that one of Agraneia’s support groups had carved from printer fabricated wood.

“That’s because the Sovereign wiped out most of the Ark’s alleys,” Ryke smirked, “Give them a few months to repair the City and—oofh.” The Queen rubbed at her rounding belly, wincing with discomfort. 

Eolh touched her wing. “The egg, love?”

“Tomorrow, I think.” 

“No. Already?”

She winced again, but smiled happily at her corvani mate. 

Across the table, Talya could barely contain her excitement, “So? Have you settled on a name yet?” 

“No names until it hatches—” Ryke said. 

At the same time, Eolh said, “Vaolh if it’s a boy, Nyka for a girl.”

Ryke glared at him.

“What?”

“Nyka av’Ryka?” Ryke asked. “What kind of name is that?”

“Oh, so she’s taking your last name now?” 

“She will be half oqyllan.”

“And half corvani!” 

To Agraneia’s left, Laykis finally perked up, as if she’d just heard the question. “What about Poire?” she asked. 

“Not Poire!” Eolh and Ryke said together.

“Well, I’ve always been partial to the name,” Laykis said. 

And Talya was trying so hard to hold in her laughter, but it came out in a chirping outburst. 

That night, after everyone had left, and the two of them were lying in bed, Agraneia curled up against Talya. The wingmaiden nestled against the cyran, using the liquid arm as a pillow, and squeezing the other around herself. Talya sighed with deep content.

And Agraneia’s face hurt from smiling.

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