Blue

Head Above

The trainee's name was Jericho. He told them that he was fourteen and that he had become a trainee only recently. He had hidden during the battle, had tucked himself away so he wouldn't be part of it, and had managed to evade the fight entirely. He was miraculously blood free. His lip was quivering and shaking so much that they had needed Joel to translate for him, because it had been impossible to try and figure out what he was saying.

'He's terrified,' Rose said, her face devoid of any emotion.

'Joel will stay here with him. We can leave them in the Ensign quarters, away from...' Adam couldn't finish his sentence. His eyes had strayed to the slightly ajar door and stayed there. He was watching Zahara be slain, feeling the barrage of swords knocking into his own. He was watching the light leave Malik's eyes, and Nyree's. He was screaming desperately at Phillipe and trying not to crawl inward into himself as the weapons kept assaulting and the people facing him glared, alight with rage. It was a crawling slide of graphic photos, slithering through his mind and sticking to all the crevices in his brain.

Curtis yanked Adam to his feet roughly. Adam blinked rapidly, moving his gaze far away from the mess hall to focus on the opposite side of the hallway. He couldn't get sucked into that trap. He had to keep it together. He turned to face Joel. Joel was saying something to Jericho, but he wasn't facing Adam.

"Let's go," Adam said. Joel jumped at the sound of his voice. They were like wild animals. They crept down the hallway, their eyes so wide it felt like they would fall out of Adam's eye sockets at any time. Any sudden movement or noise had them all jumping and defensively raising their swords. Adam brought his fingers to his temple and rubbed, harder and harder. He wished he could bore away the strange feeling of startled emptiness. It was like acceptance and panic had melded into another far more awful emotion, one he had never experienced before. Their progress was slow down the hallway.

They left Jericho in Adam's room, staring out the large window at all of the fish. Joel grabbed Adam's stiff sleeve lightly.

'Will you be back?' he asked.

Adam nodded, 'Where else could we go?' The remaining Ensigns could breathe water, but it didn't feel right to leave Joel and Jericho here by themselves. Adam had practically nothing now, but what he did have was in the bunker. Joel, Curtis, Rose, Myles. Even Jericho. This was what Adam had left, what Adam was still responsible for. He couldn't abandon Joel to face the empty sea alone.

'We have something to take care of first. Then, we'll be back. We'll figure it out,' he told Joel. Joel nodded slowly, his eyes flicking to the door.

'Don't go back into the mess hall,' Adam said, 'Stay here. There are some books in my trunk over there. Jericho should probably try to sleep it off or something. Don't leave this room.' He didn't know if it needed to be said, but Joel was the kind of person who might try to go and figure things out in the mess room by himself. Adam didn't want him to go back into that room. Ever.

Adam turned back around to face the others, 'I'm going to go back to Blue, now. Do you... Would any of you want to help me? You can stay here with them, if you want to. I can do it myself.'

'What else would we do, Adam? ' Rose said.

They trudged slowly to the airlock.

They had not released their grips on their swords, he realized, and, as he looked around at the other three Ensigns, he was struck by how... demonic they looked. If he had not been able to understand them being called murderers before, he understood it completely now. This was a group of mindless killers, with unfocused expressions and bloodstained clothing. The water in the airlock turned pink around them as the salt water rushed in to greet them, and when Adam took his first breath of water, his mouth was assaulted by the copper taste of metal. Myles shuddered and turned away from the rest of them, his body forcing him onto his hands and knees as he gagged over the taste of blood. Adam patted his back gently. His eyes slid across the bunker to meet Curtis' gaze. It didn't take words. Curtis cocked his head almost imperceptibly to the side. Was Myles alright? Had he been fatally injured? Adam shook his head. No, he was fine. A disgusting mouth full of blood. Curtis helped Myles to his feet. Adam watched the way Curtis and Rose's eyes quickly ran the length of Myles' body. It was a familiar check. Post-squirmish, mid-war. This was the look they gave each other when there was a brief respite in the fighting, just to preliminarily check that their partner was not gravely injured. How many times had Adam received that look? He had done the same thing countless times, to Curtis, to Fabayo. An unsettling feeling was boiling in Adam's blood, making his palms feel strange, like hundreds of millipedes were crawling across his hands.