I was silent the entire journey back to the medBay. The weight of Aquila’s word played heavily on my mind. The rest of my crew were subdued too. Cas and Gem’s voices were too light, their jokes too forced. I knew they were also struggling but they didn’t want me to feel worse. Guilt stabbed through my heart. I was their Captain. They should have been able to tell me what they were thinking.

They lingered as I climbed back into bed, my body and mind both feeling sluggish. My head fell back against the pillow and a sigh slipped out of my mouth. I longed to ask them to leave so that I could finally sleep and not be tormented by my thoughts but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was so happy to see them but so plagued by shame and fear. I should have done more. I should have been better. I had no right to feel so bad but I couldn’t push it away. With a hint of hope, I realised I needed to talk to Dr Suel. She always helped. She could help me process everything and maybe she could put me back on medication. That had helped before. Everything just felt a little easier to deal with when I was on it. I was less afraid of my thoughts.

The door whirled open and Chal walked in, his eyes landing on my face for a second before surveying the rest of the crew.

“Alright, you lot. Out. Aries needs rest.” He ordered.

I suppressed a sigh of gratitude as my crew erupted into protest.

“Nonnegotiable!” He called over the noise. “Aries has only been awake for a few hours, she needs sleep.”

Cas glanced back at me and I quickly tried to arrange my face into a frown, as if I was unhappy with what Chal was saying too, but he saw right through me.

“Okay. We aren’t too far. If you need anything, call us.” He squeezed my hand gently before disappearing out the door with the rest of my crew.

I slumped my head back against the pillow, my eyes fixed on the white ceiling as Chal read from the medBot screen and gave me a minute.

“How bad was it?” He asked without looking at me.

I rolled my head to the right to look at him but he continued to look at the screen.

“Horrible.”

Chal looked at me finally and I almost had to look away from the empathy in his eyes.

“I thought it might be. I saw your face when you first came in and called Andy to come have a word with you.”

A groan slipped out of my mouth.

“Chal, why would you do that?”

“You have to talk to people about what’s going on. You can’t keep it to yourself. That’ll just make you old, bitter and angry like me.”

I groaned loudly again and stared back at the ceiling.

“Plus, something tells me you aren’t comfortable talking to your crew about everything that’s going on.”

“I can’t,” I said quietly with a shake of my head, “I feel like I’ve failed them.”

“See, that’s why you need to talk to Andy. He went through a pretty similar situation when he was just a kid. It tore him apart too.”

I didn’t want to talk to him but I knew I needed to. I could at least ask him whether Dr Suel made it to the ship or not.

“How long will he be?” I asked reluctantly.

Chal paused before he spoke.

“About five minutes or so.”

I nodded and fell quiet before remember what I’d been worrying about pretty much since I woke up.

“Chal…” I asked hesitantly, not really wanting to know the answer to the question I was about to ask.

“Yes?”

I swallowed before speaking, my anxiety skyrocketing.

“Is there any chance the Council has hacked into my crew’s thought stream? I mean, if they have Peggy… Could they have done it?”

His eyes narrowed slightly as he thought hard.

“No. I don’t believe so. The implants use a unique channel. Only the five of you can access it.”

I picked at the cut my nails had made on my palm earlier whilst he spoke, trying not to voice the worries I had but they burst out anyway.

“What if they took the implant out and put it in someone else?” The question came out rushed, worried.

“Even so, they still shouldn’t be able to. The implant develops specifically for each person through a process of two-way communication, sending and receiving. It can’t develop independently and once removed, they’re basically useless. They learn how to work with one particular brain, they learn the neural paths and connections. Everyone has slightly different structures because we’re moulded by our experiences and our biology so there’s no way an implant would work for someone else.”

My brain struggled to keep up with his explanation and I found myself double-checking.

“So, we’re definitely safe?”

“Yes.” He smiled softly.

Relief washed through me. We could talk using our thoughts again. It had been weird to be not really using them. We’d become so reliant on it. It was strange having to actually speak.

Crew! Chal said that there’s no way the Council can hack into our stream! I thought, excitement rushing through me.

Oh, thank the Gods! We weren’t sure and didn’t want to ask! Cas’ been trying to find out the answer but he couldn’t find anything online! Gem thought back over the cheers of the others.

“Any other questions you want to ask?”

My mind shot back to the medBay outside my room and the excitement I had been feeling was quashed.

“When can I leave?”

Worry creased Chal’s forehead.

“Are you sure you’re ready to?”

No. That was the answer. Pain still shook my body with any movement and tiredness threatened to drag me down even as I spoke.

“I can’t stay in here whilst the others out there need it more. You know that.”

Chal sighed deeply but didn’t disagree.

“You should stay in the medBay. You’re still not fully healed.”

I frowned without meaning to, already dreading the looks I would get if I were out there with everyone else. People would get used to my presence, I hoped, but until then it would be horrible.

“Do I have to? Could I not stay in a normal room with my crew? Then Cory could keep an eye on me and send me back if I need anything?”

I waited hopefully whilst Chal mulled it over.

“You need to stay here for tonight then tomorrow morning I can get all of your medication ready and discharge you. You need to be on antibiotics and painkillers for a little bit longer.”

I nodded.

“And, if Cory asks, you need to come back immediately.”

I beamed.

“Okay!”

Footsteps approached the room and my smile faltered as Andy walked in.

“Looking to leave the medical bay so soon?” He asked with a pleasant smile.

“I’d leave now if I was allowed,” I answered honestly.

“I’ll get your things ready to go first thing in the morning,” Chal promised as he swept from the room.

Andy settled into the armchair beside me before look at me intently.

“How are you doing?”

“Fine.” I tried to sound light but my voice wobbled.

“Aries. You don’t have to lie. This would be difficult for anyone.”

I bit my lip as unwanted tears threatened my eyes.

“It’s really tough,” I whispered.

“Tell me more?” He requested softly.

The dam broke and tears dripped down my face.

“I feel horrible. I caused this. I caused everyone to suffer. People are dying because of me! My crew don’t even trust me enough to tell me what’s going on and Peggy—”

A sob interrupted me and I couldn’t keep speaking.

“Aries, you did not cause this.”

I shook my head, unable to believe his words.

“The Council caused this. Your crew’s story might have been the catalyst that kicked it off but people had been looking for an excuse, for any reason to escape the Council’s reign. Yours was just the first they could get behind. It is the perfect example of the Council punishing people who didn’t deserve it for the crime of helping others. You showed the universe exactly how evil the Council is and many people realised they couldn’t ignore it anymore. No one blames you. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. People hold you up as a symbol of goodness. Of doing the right thing.”

My sobs quietened slightly as he spoke but they still wracked my body painfully.

“But people are dying because of it.”

“They are,” he agreed, “but even more people are free. Any time people revolt against a stronger power, some die. They know the potential consequences before they act but they judged them to be worth it. Many, many people would rather die than staying under the Council’s rule. And as for your crew, they still trust you. They’re just giving you a chance to heal and trying not to overwhelm you.”

I shook my head.

“They shouldn’t though. I failed them. I should have done more to protect them!”

He sighed empathetically.

“Aries, you’re just a kid. The Council were stronger, more practised and more informed than you. They had access to way more resources. There was nothing more you could have done. They outsmarted fully grown adults who have dedicated their lives to fighting them. You did the best you could.”

I swiped the tears angrily from my face as shame rushed through me again.

“I should have done more though! I just feel so guilty.”

“I know. I know exactly how you feel. It’s really difficult.”

I watched him, confusion muddying my thoughts.

“I never told you what happened with Elliot and my crew, did I?”

I shook my head, trying to remember.

“You said it was a mission gone wrong and that it led to you retiring?”

He smiled slightly, his eyes far away.

“That’s true but it’s not quite the full story. We were in our final year, about to graduate but already working professionally. We got called out to a search and rescue of a Council shipment. They wouldn’t tell us what it was, just that it was dangerous and that we needed to handle it carefully. It wasn’t that unusual so we didn’t think too much of it until we arrived at the scene. An IA ship had been knocked onto some deserted planet with a breathable atmosphere but there were no IA there anymore. We’d almost managed to get the package back to our ship when it started to heat up. We opened it up, expecting to find weapons or food or something but it was a bomb. It had already been primed and was ready to go back. We didn’t have enough time to get Mersa off the planet so we hid behind her and radioed for everyone to avoid the planet, just in case. It was a small bomb and Mersa was strong enough to protect us but a piece of shrapnel had caught Elliot in the head. It tore through his flesh and his eyeball.”

Andy paused, fear played on his face even years later.

“We didn’t have a doctor on the crew, that wasn’t required back then so we just had to do what we could to keep him alive whilst our engineers fixed the ship. I put out a distress beacon immediately and called the base to prep an operating theatre for him then called the Council to try and get emergency evac.”

Anger crossed his face now and he fiddled with his ring subconsciously.

“They refused. They told us to leave him on the planet and come home with anything else we could scavenge from the IA ship. They said his performance was unremarkable and that he could easily be replaced. I refused, obviously, but a service ship interrupted our signal before I could tell the Council just where to put their order. It was Captain Sammer’s Sandwiches, Soups and Snazzers.”

“Chal,” I breathed.

“Yes. He flew down to the planet and stabilised him right there in Mersa’s bay before taking us all back up to his ship. He showed me how to contact Elliot without the Council knowing and how to fly Mersa back to Nova so that we’d get there but she’d be destroyed. We pretended not to be comfortable completing missions in other ships and it bought me enough time to graduate and retire immediately. I was plagued with hatred and guilt. I couldn’t believe that I’d put my crew in that position or that the Council sent us there without warning us.”

“How did you overcome it?”

“It wasn’t easy. It took a lot of therapy and medication before I could even look my crew in the eye. I blocked countless calls from Elliot believing that he hated me.”

I nodded, knowing the feeling too well.

“But it got better. I stopped blaming myself. Yes, there were things I could have done differently but the Council was at fault more so than me. When I was given the option to retire, I finally called him to ask him if he still wanted to marry me.”

Andy smiled and looked down at his hand.

“What did he say?” I whispered.

“He said yes but he told me to stay on Nova.”

“Why?”

Andy chuckled.

“That was my question. I was sure it was because he was lying and just didn’t want to see me. It took him a while to convince me otherwise but he was right. I could do more on Nova with the Council than I could do here with him and against them.”

My eyebrows came together.

“What do you mean? How could you still work with the Council after everything that happened?”

“It was difficult. I’d lost all trust in them. I wanted to run and not look back. To take the rest of my crew and run to a place far from the Council where I knew we could be safe.”

“Why didn’t you?”

His lips twitched up in a faraway smile.

“Elliot. He persuaded me to stay. I’d already been told that I could begin teaching, take over as Interim Director when the old Director retired the next year and stay until I was ready to move on. I wanted to make a difference. Make a safe space where kids could grow up to be healthy, happy, well adjusted and have options other than fighting in the pointless Council wars. It was a struggle to interact with the Council but I was able to offer most of my crew roles as tutors and Commanders and finally, I got the Council to relax their rules on mandatory service after graduation. A lot of my students had become disenchanted by the Council over the years and I sent as many as I could here. I hate the Council and the society they’ve created more than anything but I was able to carve out a safe space for kids for almost twenty years. Elliot was right, I was able to do more good on Nova.”

My heart shattered as I debated telling Andy about the base and how different things were but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. My promise to Sammy bounced around in my head but I pushed it aside.

“Things do get better, Aries. They just take some time.”

I forced myself to nod, trying to believe his words.

“I hope so. I think therapy and medication might help me too. Did Dr Suel manage to make it to Freo?”

My heart thumped in anticipation of his answer but it dropped as his expression changed.

“I’m sorry, Aries. We weren’t able to get her out in time. There’s a therapist on this ship who might be able to help though. His name is Doctor Hila.”

I hate how used to writing these damn apology notes I’ve gotten. Before, I wasn’t absolutely sure if the person I was writing about was definitely dead but this time, I know for sure. That doesn’t make anything easier though. Hell, it probably makes it harder. Before, I could cling to the belief that they’d somehow managed to get out and I’d be able to see them again and apologise for what happened but… I definitely can’t this time.

Andy told me that Dr Suel had stayed at the base after we left. Apparently, she’d insisted on staying. She said she wanted to be there for the kids because everything on the base was changing and a lot of them were struggling to adjust but they lost contact with her a couple of weeks back. Her body had been found in a ditch not too far from the base a week after. Andy wouldn’t tell me all of the details but I think they tortured her. I’m not surprised. Not really. She knew all of our secrets but she’d never tell. I know that. I guess that’s another name to add to the list of people who died because of us. She really shouldn’t have. They needed her on the base. She was wonderful. I’m sorry Dr Suel. You deserved better.

I started seeing Dr Hila not too long after Andy told me about Dr Suel. He’s fine but I don’t think he gets it. I find that I have to explain everything too much to him. Dr Suel just got it. She’d been working with us for long enough that she knew how we thought, what our fears were but we had to tell Dr Hila everything from the start. It was tough. He suggested I started writing this again. He said it seemed to help me process everything last time so it might this time too. I don’t know. I don’t even know what the point is anymore. No one is going to read it. It’s not going to help anything.