“Hello, Dane.” His voice sent chills down his own spine. It was brooding in a way he never thought possible.
“Jeff! Oh, my God, Jeff! You’re alive!” Dane’s face lit up in pure happiness; there wasn’t a hint of the fear that Jeff had expected. The series of emotions cut him worse than the laser from Horus’s wings ever had.
“I came back for you after . . . I looked for you for days . . .” Dane was choked up, and the flood of emotions was too much.
Jeff was shocked—he hadn’t expected this reaction. Clearly, Dane thought he had done no wrong. And Jeff wanted to believe him. The weeks of letting his hate drive him resurfaced, demanding a payment if the rage hadn’t been misplaced.
“I . . .” Jeff released his friend and took a step back. The world slowed as Dane stumbled back from the release of tension, falling into the trap that Jeff had prepared for him. Jeff watched in slow motion as the laser he had pressed severed Dane’s legs with a hiss that Jeff would never forget.
Jeff pressed the laser out of existence and rushed to his friend, who had collapsed on the stairs.
“My legs . . .” Dane whined. He looked to be entering a state of shock.
The gruesome scene ate away at Jeff’s heart. He landed next to Dane and grabbed his friend by the back of the head and the hand. Words poured from him, as he’d lost all control of himself.
“I thought you betrayed me! You left me! You left me, Dane. Why did you leave me? We have to get out of here. There are bombs. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry . . .” Jeff tried to help Dane up, but he resisted.
The sound of footsteps on the stairs drew his attention; there was another person inside in the house.
“Jeff . . . save him . . . I’m sorry.”
The sound of more footsteps led Jeff’s gaze to a young boy standing on the stairs above Dane. There, staring down at Jeff’s former best friend, was Everett, Chad’s oldest son.
Jeff screamed at the same time Everett did, but the horror he felt was worse than the fear written across the boy’s face. Dane had left him so that he could go for Chad’s children. It was exactly what he would have wanted Dane to do; he had been just as close to them as Jeff was.
Jeff tried to press in a shield, but he couldn’t get his mind to connect to another reality, as it was in a state of panic.
Dane looked up to Everett and smiled bravely.
The charges were about to explode, and he couldn’t stop the trap he had laid. He couldn’t press.
“Save him,” Dane said.
Jeff dove forward and wrapped himself around Everett just as the explosion hit the house. He used the force of the blast and the thrusters behind his calves to push him forward, crashing through the wall into the outside air.
They landed outside as splinters and embers filled the air around them. Jeff cradled Everett, unable to do anything else.
“Dane!” Everett pushed himself away from Jeff without looking at his face and ran toward the fire. Jeff almost thought the boy was going to throw himself inside after his fallen caretaker, but he stopped short, dropping to his knees and letting out an anguished scream.
Jeff closed his eyes and tried to press himself into a different reality.
42 RECRUITS
EVERETT WAS ALIVE. DANE HAD saved him. And Jeff had killed Dane for raising his nephew after all of Everett’s family had passed. He tried harder to press himself into a time line where this hadn’t happened. To somewhere where he could still live with himself.
“Jeff, time to go!” Stefani said urgently. He could feel her next to him, and he could hear the sounds of people rushing to tend to the fire, but he didn’t care.
He opened his eyes just to get Dane’s face out his head, but he saw only Everett crying in front of the burning house. All of his nights of brooding and dreaming solely of his revenge had brought him to this. He wanted to throw himself in the fire with his friend.
“Hello? Jeff?” Stefani was getting nervous now; he could hear it in her voice. She should leave.
“You should leave me,” Jeff said. “Go!”
“I thought we were over this,” Stefani said. He felt her picking him up, but he fought against her, pushing her away until he felt his feet and arms lock in place. “I don’t know what just happened, but you’re coming with me whether you like it or not.”
He didn’t fight her anymore as she lifted him into the air. The fire from the burning house lit up the scores of people rushing to Dane’s house. But Jeff cared only about one person, the young boy crying over the death of the man who had somehow saved his life.
Jeff started crying. The pain of regret and self-loathing was too much for him to bear. It was far more painful than any punch or wound had ever been. He didn’t stop crying when they arrived back on the sleepy fortress, and he didn’t stop until his body fell asleep from exhaustion hours later.
His throat burned in the morning, but he refused to drink anything. Easing the pain seemed cheap, like he was cheating Everett and Dane; he deserved to suffer. Stefani had sat next to him all night, not saying a word, and when he woke up, she was still there next to him. It made him hate himself even more.
“We’re going to pick up the recruits, if we have any, in a few minutes,” Stefani said. “Are you going to be OK if I leave you here?”
He nodded, fearing that if he spoke, he might gush out all of his shame to her. He didn’t deserve her care.
“Look, I don’t know what happened down there last night, and I don’t care. I’m here for you, so take as much time as you need, cry as many tears as you want, and when you’re done, I’ll be here to talk with you about it. Or not talk about it.”
Jeff nodded again, but he didn’t look up at her as she kissed him lightly on the cheek before leaving him. He didn’t realize how much he had needed her there until she was gone. The room had enough bunk beds lining the walls to sleep a dozen vagrants, but Jeff had made it his personal quarters for now. There were only four such rooms in the fortress, so he knew he would have to share soon.
It didn’t feel right. He wasn’t ready to be around more people. He left the room behind and stepped out into the daylight. Smoke rose from inside Old Unity, and Jeff’s heart reeled at seeing the aftermath of his murder.
Beneath the smoke, Jeff could see Carlee and Stefani in their vagrant uniforms meeting with a handful of men and women outside the borders of the community. Ross stood next to them; he was young, but he was already taller than both women by a foot. They would be coming back soon, all of them. He didn’t know how he would face them. How he would face Carlee.
But worse than that, he didn’t know how to face the reality that his plan had been to make life better for humans by arming them, but so far all he had done was make life worse for the only human alive who shared his blood. He owed Everett a debt that he knew he could never pay.
Then he realized there was something he could do. Something that would give him the chance to benefit Everett, honor Dane, and even redeem himself. Something that he knew now that only he could do. His mind cleared with the realization that this was the reason he was still alive. He rushed back to his room, not with a newfound sense of life, but of duty. He didn’t waste time in assembling his flight armor once again; instead, he pressed in a set around himself. It came naturally to him now. He now hated the reality he lived in, so forming a connection with a different—and therefore better—reality was easier than ever before.
Jeff rummaged through his small pack of belongings until he found what he was looking for. He turned it over in his hands and stepped outside. Stefani and Carlee were still meeting with the new recruits, and Jeff watched them for a minute, thankful that he had spent the time with them that he had. He cared for them both, differently, and he would miss them. Thinking of what might have been with Stefani in a different time line was too painful.