Things happened quickly after that first Councillor’s death. I know that I don’t need to tell you that, you probably lived through it. Peggy kept trying to urge me to write. She said it was important, that it might be important, for future generations. She said that people could be reading this for the rest of the time. Until one of the suns implodes and destroys the entire galaxy, maybe the entire universe.

I hated the idea of that though. I hate the idea of anyone reading this. I know that they will, I know that you are right now, but I don't like anyone witnessing our pain. What we went through.

But then, I know that this is the only chance we will have to tell our story. I’m fully aware that there’s a good chance that, one day, Harvey will succeed. That he’ll get to us before we have the chance to get to him and then I’ll just stop.

I’ll be dead and I won’t be able to write it anymore.

Maybe Cas will take over for me. No. I know he wouldn’t. If something were to happen to me, if Harvey were to win and Cas was somehow left behind, left to live without me, he wouldn't be able to continue this. He wouldn't be able to go on and write as if I was still alive. It'll be the end.

I like to think that he’d leave some kind of message. Some farewell, explaining that I’m dead so that people aren’t left to wonder forever.

Or maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe you’d have to find out through a Council bulletin that I was captured, he’d probably lie and say I was hit by a stray bullet or something during the fight, and that his team of medics and doctors tried their best but I lost my life. If you ever hear that, if they ever tell you that, please. Just know it is a lie.

Harvey would never let me die so easily. He would want to torture me and I know that this time, he wouldn’t have a Guardian do his dirty work for him. He’d want to do it himself. He would want to look into my eyes as he tortured me and finally, when death comes for me, he’d be happy. Victorious.

Maybe Peggy would continue it. She keeps telling me how important it is, she’d have to, right?

Well, if you do have to continue this at some point, Peg, either because I’m dead or captured or ill or whatever… I’m sorry. I mean, I know my notes are a mess. I scribble small bits and pieces everywhere and hope that at some point, when I sit down to write, I’ll remember what happened.

They do help sometimes. Not always though. Some of the things that happened have mercifully been repressed. Hidden by my mind. I’m happy about that, to be honest with you. I wish I could forget more.

But at the same time, I want to remember it all. I want every moment with my crew to be immortalised. I want to never forget the time I spent with Gem or Peggy or any of them.

I just want to remember.

You know, some nights, when I’m exhausted by spending my days liaising between Suloa, Aquila and the kids, I wish that things were back to how they were before. When we were back on the base. Things were so much easier then. I just want them to go back to that.

I was stressed then, of course. There was always another mission on the horizon and I wasn’t sure where I stood with Cas. I mean, I knew that I loved him and that he loved me but we weren’t sure what to do about that or what we could do. Sometimes I think that I’d give it all back to go back.

But I wouldn’t. I can’t.

I will not go back to a life under the Council’s thumb. I will not spend the rest of my life blindly doing what they say and not even stopping to ask if what I am doing is right.

At least now, with all the stress and exhaustion that my life consists of, we are actually helping others. We’re doing something meaningful, not just supporting the Council’s reign of terror.

It’s almost worth it. It’s hard to say it’s completely worth it because any time I think that, Gem’s face comes into my mind and I feel nauseous. Her death was not worth it.

She deserved to live.

They all did.

Every single person who died in this fight against the Council deserves to still be alive. They say that it is the Council’s fault. That the deaths are on their shoulders but I can’t help but disagree. Some of them are my fault too. I should have acted faster, I should have done more.

I hate that I didn’t.

Every time we got the call, my heart would leap into my throat and I’d have to fight to keep my hands from shaking. Most of my crew didn’t see. I know that Cas did, he always gently took my hand in his whenever he noticed, but I think that Peggy and Cory missed it.

Or, at least, they pretended not to see it. I appreciated that about them.

It became a common occurrence towards the end. I’m sure it wasn’t that common but it began to feel like most nights we were awakened by a call from Aquila or Andy.

Aquila was always excited, even if that excitement was mostly hidden, but Andy at least seemed like he felt bad. I do think he felt bad. Every so often, I will catch him looking over at my crew, a look of sadness or possibly regret on his face.

It made me want to apologise to him. To tell him that he didn’t need to look at us like that. That we didn’t mind being dragged into this.

That was a lie, of course. I did mind but there was no way around it. Because we decided to act, we were part of it. We couldn’t back out now.

I wished we could when I got the call that night though. I was immediately wide awake when my screen buzzed, my crew sleepy but conscious too.

“Who is it?” Peggy mumbled as I picked up the screen.

“Andy,” I said, reading the ID before accepting the call. “Hi, Andy. Everything alright?”

It was stupid to ask, he was calling me in the middle of the night so I knew that it wasn’t but still, I had to ask.

“Everything is alright,” he said with a smile but the wrinkles in between his eyebrows were deeper than normal. “I’m so sorry for waking you again but would you mind gathering your crew and bringing them to the war rooms? We have an urgent matter to discuss.”

I nodded, my eyes flicking up to my crew who had already started to climb out of their beds and get ready.

Can you ask him if I need to bring my bag? Cory asked me, glancing at his medKit which waited by the door at all times, just in case.

“Of course. Would you like Cory to bring his medKit?” I asked.

Andy hesitated which sent a wave of anxiety through me.

“No,” he said after what felt like an eternity. “I think we should be alright.”

I nodded, my gaze finding Cory again who shrugged at me and continued getting ready.

“Great. We’ll be down in a couple of minutes,” I said.

“Alright. I’ll make sure there’s a fresh pot of coffee brewing for you,” he replied with a gentle smile before hanging up.

“What do you think?” Cas asked as I dropped the screen on the bed next to me where he had been lying earlier.

“Not sure. Probably just another planet coming to our side? Maybe one of the big ones?” I suggested, thinking back to all of the other reasons they’d woken us up in the middle of the night recently.

“Could be,” Peggy mused quietly as she slipped her feet into her boots. “Or maybe another high up on Nova has openly come out in support of us again?”

I nodded as I climbed out of the bed and grabbed my boots.

We’d started sleeping in flight suits again, just in case.

It had started with Peggy. She said that she wanted to be prepared just in case anything happened. We’d tried to reassure her. To tell her that she’d be fine and that, if anything were to happen, we’d have time to get dressed.

But then we were called to the war rooms every night for a week straight and gradually, we’d all started to wear the flight suits to bed.

They weren’t particularly comfortable, of course, but between the nightmares, screams from my crew mates and being woken up by pings all the time, we didn’t get much sleep anyway.

Plus, they kind of reminded me of when we’d go on overnight missions on Frida. If I closed my eyes and didn’t move for a little while, I could almost convince myself that we were back there. But that never lasted long.

“Ready to go?”