Want (Numbered #1, YA Scifi Dystopian) Wattpad Featured Story

Chapter Eleven

As much as she tried, Aurelia couldn't contact Nicholas at all. In the end, she left him a message and went to bed. Her sleep was interrupted, filled with nightmares and dreams. In some she was with Jonathon, in some with Nicholas. Sometimes she was a brave Resistance fighter; in others she was a traitor. When the dome slowly started to change shade to a lighter blue, Aurelia pulled herself out of bed and took a shower. If she wasn't going to be rested, at least she could work. And working always helped her think better. Sometimes taking her mind away from a problem was all she needed to do to solve it. She checked her intercom before she left, but there was no message from Nicholas, nor from Jonathon.
The hospital was buzzing, and she found plenty to keep her busy. As head of trauma (with the red-and-white flash on her uniform sleeve to prove it now), she saw cases that were interesting or difficult and found that the challenges, no matter how hard, were surmountable. Jason, her grinning second in command, was turning out to be a very skilled physician in his own right, and Aurelia enjoyed working with him. He even remembered to bring her a coffee every now and again, which surprised and pleased her. It was early afternoon when he brought her a fresh cup.
"There's someone looking for you," he told her, placing the cup on a counter next to her screen.
Aurelia, who was trying to decipher some hospital paperwork, didn't even look up. "Yes?"
"It's a Clone."
The dismissal in his voice was obvious. Like a Clone wasn't important enough for her to step away from her desk. Sure, he'd helped her out in the Clone ward, and done a good job too, but he still had the same attitude as anyone else in Lunar.
"Did he give you a name?" Aurelia asked him, wrenching her aching eyes from the flashing screen.
Jason shrugged. "I didn't ask. I just overheard him asking for you at reception."
Aurelia took a gulp of her coffee, then grimaced. It was hot. She rolled her screen up and stood, stretching. "I'll go there, then," she said. "Oh, thanks for the coffee."
"No probs." Jason smiled, watching her walk out the door.
Weird, thought Aurelia as she made her way through the corridors to the hospital's main reception. He was so worried about being seen together or overheard before, and then he just shows up here like it's perfectly natural? She saw him before he saw her.
"Nicholas!"
He turned, and she could see that he was pale, worried looking. But when he saw her he smiled.
"You're okay?"
"Sure, why?" she asked.
"Just...well, I was just worried that maybe I'd put you in danger or something, that's all."
His voice was quiet, and she could tell that he really had been worried about her. It was sweet in a way. She could also tell that he was nervous about being seen or overheard, despite his trip to the hospital.
"Fancy a coffee?" she asked him.
"Now?" he said, with surprise.
"One of the pluses of being head of trauma is that there are other people to do the work sometimes." She smiled. "Besides, things are quiet now. I was just catching up on some paperwork."
"You know," said Nicholas, as they began walking back into the main hospital itself, "paperwork used to be actually done on paper."
Aurelia laughed. She remembered that he'd talked about coffee being made from beans when they'd met at the shuttle bay. He seemed to take an interest in history. "I know," she said. "Thank Gods that it's not now; I'd be killing three trees a day with the amount of forms I need to fill in."
She took him to the cafeteria and grabbed both of them a coffee before finding a small table in a corner.
"So, everything went okay?" he asked once they were seated.
"That depends," said Aurelia. "Well, no, not really, well..." She pursed her lips. Where to start?
"But you're okay?" he pressed.
His concern was touching, though she didn't understand quite why he was so worried. "I'm fine. Why do you keep asking?"
He frowned. "Because I've potentially put you in danger, that's why."
And she could see that he felt guilty for this. A pleasant change from Jonathon and Elza, she thought; they seemed to feel no guilt about placing her in this position.
"Look, I think we should probably go upstairs," she told him. "So that we can talk properly. Okay?"
He nodded. "Fine."
She quickly arranged for Jason to cover for her absence and met Nicholas back at the elevator. They didn't speak again until they were in her room. Then the story spilled out.
"I was fairly sure he was Resistance," said Nicholas, after she had told him. "I've been tracking the guy, after all, and some things didn't add up."
"If you could figure that out, then so could someone else," Aurelia pointed out. "Which could be why you're supposed to kill him."
"Doesn't make much of a difference, really," Nicholas said. "And what about you? Are you comfortable with your decision to join them?"
"Maybe," she said, thoughtfully. "It's the right thing to do, I guess. But where does that leave us?"
"You didn't mention us?"
Aurelia shook her head. "You're supposed to kill him, so, no, I didn't exactly say anything."
Nicholas was beginning to get angry. "Do you understand how short time is?" he asked her. "How few days we have to get things sorted out?" He stood and began pacing around the living pod. "What's at stake here?"
She understood his anger, knew he had to let it out. But she didn't have the chance to respond to him.
The door slid open, though she hadn't rung anyone in or given anyone her code. Elza strode into the living pod, something metal and shining in her hand. In one movement, and before Aurelia could even get up, Elza had extended her arm and clicked something. Nicholas opened his eyes wide, then collapsed to the floor.
Elza turned to Aurelia. "We trusted you," she hissed. "We believed in you."
She manipulated the metal device again, but Aurelia held up her hands. "Wait!"
Elza paused.
"Elza, what are you doing? What are you talking about?"
The woman laughed bitterly. "I heard, Aurelia. I heard everything."
"Heard what?" Things just weren't making sense.
"You told him everything," she said, gesturing towards Nicholas lying prostrate on the floor. "You told Jonathon's assassin everything. We trusted you!"
Aurelia was starting to panic. She could feel her breathing getting faster, her mouth drying. What in hell was going on? She glanced over at Nicholas.
"He's stunned, that's all, for the time being," said Elza.
"I don't understand," Aurelia blurted out, and she didn't.
"I heard everything." Elza's voice was cold, the device was ready in her hand, but she didn't move it.
Aurelia thought back over the conversation that she'd just had with Nicholas. Gods. She saw how it could be misinterpreted, looking like she was feeding him information.
"But, but you said it was safe to talk in here!" Aurelia was playing for time, trying to think of a way out of this.
Elza laughed that bitter laugh again. "Do you honestly think that anywhere on Lunar is completely safe? The only reason I knew that no one else could hear you in here was because I knew that the Resistance were the ones listening to you. We had to check you out, make sure you were as trustworthy as you appeared. And it seems like it was a good job we did."
Aurelia took deep breaths. She tried to relax her muscles and seem as nonthreatening as she could. "Elza, you don't understand. This isn't at all what you think it is."
"So Nicholas wasn't sent to kill Jonathon?"
"Yes, he was, but listen..."
"No, you listen. All you had to say was no. All you had to do was turn around and leave the restaurant, and we'd have let you go. But this." Elza shook her head. "This can't go unpunished."
Aurelia was thinking as quickly as she could but could come up with no way to get out of the room. "Elza, will you let me explain things?"
"Why should I?"
Hurry, hurry, think - what was the right answer to that? "You're right, you shouldn't," said Aurelia. "But Jonathon should. I'm sure you'd agree that I owe him an explanation."
Elza ran her tongue over her teeth. Then she nodded. "Fine. Get him here. Intercom him and get him to come, and then we'll see which of us he believes."
It was a start. A small one. She wondered why Elza was making her make the call, but then, it was her home. And Jonathon would respond faster to her voice; she knew he would. Very slowly she got up off the couch and walked to the intercom on the wall. Elza's eyes never left her. With shaking hands she pressed the appropriate icons. To her relief, Jonathon answered immediately.
"Jonathon, I need you to come to my quarters."
"Sure, I can drop by later this evening; is that okay?"
"No, now, please. Quickly."
"Aurelia, is everything alright?"
She wanted to scream "no" but controlled herself. She didn't need Elza getting excited. "I just need you over here, please. It's a bit of an emergency, but I'm alright right now."
"I'm on my way."
The intercom clicked off, and Aurelia turned, making sure both of her hands were in full view. "He's coming. Do you think we can relax a little now?"
Elza nodded towards the couch with her head, and Aurelia took her seat. The doctor then took a chair opposite her.
"Elza, I promise you that I can explain everything. Please believe me. I thought we were friends."
"I don't befriend traitors." Her mouth was a thin line.
"I understand how you must be feeling, what you're trying to do." Aurelia's voice was as smooth and calming as she could make it. "You're only trying to protect what's yours. But I'm not a traitor."
"Protect what's mine? You have no idea, girl. No idea at all. You're so young." She sounded almost sad at that.
Aurelia remembered that Elza had been recruited in much the same way she had. She presumed that she'd been torn away from Earth, had left her family, her friends. And then had been forced to live a double life. It was hard to feel sympathy for someone who thought you were a traitor, but at the same time Aurelia found herself feeling bad for Elza.
"I'm old enough to hear you out when you explain things to me," countered Aurelia. "To listen to what you have to say about the Resistance. To decide to help you."
But Elza's eyes were blank; she obviously didn't want to listen to reason. She kept flickering her gaze down to Nicholas on the floor, then back up to Aurelia, as though daring either of them to do anything. Nicholas wasn't about to help, though. Aurelia saw that his breathing was deep and even, but his eyes were firmly closed.
She decided that it was pointless to talk to Elza further. She wasn't listening, and she was angry. It was far better just to sit and wait, and then Jonathon would be there. For a second she worried that he might not listen to her either. Elza was head of the hospital and presumably had worked with Jonathon for a long time. Would he take Elza's word over her own? She didn't think so, honestly didn't. She trusted him, though she had no real reason for doing so.
The minutes ticked by. Elza seemed jumpy, but Aurelia guessed that was understandable. Aurelia concentrated on getting her story straight. She wanted to explain to Jonathon in as few words as possible what had happened here. The dome outside was slowly changing in hue, becoming darker, and Aurelia was just about to switch the lights on when there was a knock.
Elza stood and opened the door, and Jonathon rushed in. He took one look at Nicholas on the floor, Aurelia on the couch and the device in Elza's hand, and stopped. He looked around cautiously, and the door slid shut.
"Aurelia, are you alright?"
She nodded, dumbly. He crossed to her and gently pressed her back to the couch.
"Elza, what's going on here?"
"She's a traitor, Jonathon. We made a mistake. I heard them." She nodded towards Nicholas on the floor. "He was your assassin."
"I can explain everything," Aurelia cut in. "But you have to listen to me, please."
Elza began to speak again, and Jonathon held a hand up to her. "Let her speak," he said. "If she's going to be accused of something, she should be allowed to defend herself."
Aurelia suddenly felt very, very tired. She craved the stimulant patches that Elza had given her on the night of the accident. Her whole body felt weighed down. And now she had to find the words to rescue not only herself but Nicholas too. She laid her head back on the couch and closed her eyes.
"Let's start with the truth," she said after a few moments. "Nicholas was sent to kill you."
She heard Jonathon draw in a breath, but he said nothing. She opened her eyes and looked at him.
"But he didn't. He saved you. It was Nicholas who pulled you into the stairwell on the shuttle, thinking that it was the safest place for you to be. The plan was that you would either be killed in the attack or he would kill you in the chaos of the aftermath. But instead he saved you."
She thought about telling them why, but the story was too long and complicated. She had to find a way to simplify things. As briefly as she could, she explained that Nicholas had asked for her help, asked that she communicate a message to Jonathon. All that had happened this afternoon was Nicholas checking on the status of the message. She also admitted to telling him about the Resistance.
"But you never told me not to," she pointed out. "I trust him as much as I do you, and I decided to help him for much the same reasons that I decided to help you."
Elza gave her frozen laugh. "An excellent story, but it doesn't hold up, does it? How are we supposed to know that you and the Clone weren't in it together?" She spat out the word Clone.
"Why would he save him, then?" Aurelia said, her anger rising. "That makes no sense."
"Maybe he didn't; maybe things went wrong and he couldn't kill Jonathon when he needed to. Gods know, maybe you were going to blackmail Jonathon for something. There are a million reasons that Jonathon could have got off that ship alive."
Okay, the story was weak. But it was the truth, and the truth was so often less satisfactory than a lie. Sometimes that was what told you something was the truth, Aurelia thought.
"I don't know how to prove myself," she said, quietly. "It's the truth, but I don't know what I'm supposed to do to convince you."
Jonathon had been silent. Aurelia sensed that he was turning matters over in his head.
"Elza is right," he said, finally. He looked at Aurelia, and she saw pain in his eyes. "I want to believe you, Aurelia - I do, but I can't take chances. Not now. Not when I'm so close to getting where I need to be." His voice sounded miserable.
"So what?" Aurelia demanded. "So you're going to kill me here and now? Inject me? Turn me over to the authorities? What?"
Jonathon tapped his fingers on his leg, thinking. "There is one thing we could do," he said.
"Anything," Aurelia said, rubbing her tired eyes. "Just tell me what it is."
"It's not nice." Jonathon sat back on the couch. "But, technically, we could get inside your head. See if you're telling the truth."
"That's against the Convention," Elza said.
Jonathon shrugged. "So? If Aurelia gives her consent, then I think we're okay. What do you think, Aurelia?"
The thought of Jonathon's being inside her head made her anxious; the thought of Elza's being there terrified her at the moment. She had little choice, though. She nodded. "I'll do it."
Jonathon was all business now. "Elza, go and get what we need from the main hospital, please."
She looked far from pleased about this development, but she did as she was told, leaving the room with a backward glance at Nicholas, who was still lying on the floor.
"Jonathon, I had nothing to do with any of this, I promise you."
He gave her a small smile. "My heart believes you, Aurelia, but my head says that I have to be careful. Do you understand?"
"Yes, I think so."
They sat apart on the couch until Elza returned with the device that was needed. Aurelia sat quietly through the exam; there was no feeling involved, and she didn't have a sense of anything changing inside her mind. Elza and Jonathon asked her questions, and she responded with one-word answers. That was all.
"She's clean," Jonathon said finally, standing up.
"Fine," said Elza. "But the Clone isn't."
"Agreed."
"Wait!" Aurelia said. "He is - I told you he is."
They weren't prepared to stake anything on the life of a mere Clone, however. The decision was made to take Nicholas out of the hospital.
"We'll interrogate him, find out what he knows," Jonathon explained.
The only concession that Aurelia could get was that she was allowed to go with them.