Reyna ran down the hallway, tears in her eyes. She wasn't sure where she wanted to go, but she wanted to get away from there. She ran outside, despite several Locust attempting to stop her due to the stalks and Polyps. She ran out into the garden in the back that the botanists loved so much. As Reyna sat in the garden, crying by herself, she realized something. Reyna walked out of the garden and couldn't believe her eyes.
The skies were clear and beautiful and beautifully blue. The Maelstrom had been turned off.
Reyna panicked, confused by what was happening and ran up to a Drone. "You there," she said, attempting to clear her voice of the sobs she was suppressing. "Where is the storm?"
The soldier growled at her in Tyran, "Humans."
He then ran off to join his brothers in their fight and Reyna ran around to the back of the hotel. She ran in the back entrance and up the stairs to the top floor. The guards were still posted at the door to Adam's room and there were even more of them scattered over the whole floor, as if ready to attack. "Let me in now!" Reyna yelled at the Locust.
He grabbed her by her skinny arms and carried her away and into the hallway and growled at her, "Stay."
Reyna yelled in frustration as she sprinted back to her room. She climbed out the window and flinched at the deafening sound of helicopters overhead.
Reyna looked out into the horizon and saw black helicopters flying to the island (she knew about helicopters thanks to Adam). Reyna quickly climbed over to Adam's room and saw the window was opened as it had been for several weeks.
As she was about to climb in, she stopped when she heard a voice besides Adam's. She quickly ducked out of sight and attempted to listen in on the conversation, which was not easy due to the noise of the helicopters. "How dare you tell her those things!" Myrrah yelled from the room. "Thanks to you, I don't even know where my daughter is! You told her everything I said to her were lies!"
"Because they were!" Adam yelled back. "I didn't know she was your child, Myrrah. If I did, I might have kept your secrets for you. But you never even said you had a child, let alone that she was here. Your secrets have ultimately become the death of you Myrrah."
"If you continue to help your son in any way, I will not hesitate to have my forces destroy him and his little friends."
"You stay away from Marcus!"
"Continue on your project and I won't even dream of it. But, if you help in any way, shape or form, I will personally kill all of them."
Reyna then heard shoes clacking on tile and the door close. She then jumped into the room and Adam exclaimed, "Reyna!"
"Adam, there are humans coming. The Maelstrom is down and there are helicopters circling us! We need to hurry!"
"Reyna, I helped to deactivate the Maelstrom. Come with me. The soldiers are going to save me and help me activate my machine."
"But you said it wasn't done. You said that it will still kill the Locust."
"Yes it will. But think of it this way. Myrrah lied to you your whole life. Do you really want to side with her?"
"It's not that easy Adam," Reyna said, trying to keep a rational voice. "My mother might have lied to me my whole life, but she is still my mother, and they are still my family. Isn't there any other way that we can stop the Lambent?"
"I've run out of time Reyna. If I only had more time. I'm sorry."
There was a crackle from one of Adam's radios and they both moved towards it. Reyna recognized the voice on the device as one of the humans that had been in the Hollow shortly before it flooded, the gravelly one. "Dad, we're here!" he said. "We're just trying to work out how to bypass this firefight."
The sound of gunshots could be heard from outside and Adam smiled slightly. "I can hear it Marcus," Adam said to the radio. "And Myrrah's tracking you. Watch your back."
"Yeah she's been on our asses the whole way. Standby!"
The radio then crackled off but the gunfire could still be heard. "Reyna, you need to make a choice," Adam said calmly. "Us or them. You need to choose before it's too late."
"I don't know," Reyna said quietly as more gunfire went off. "I'm sorry."
There was then another crackle from the radio but Adam pushed the device in his ear so Reyna couldn't hear it. "It will work. Don't worry. And trust me Corporal Baird-I've tested it.
Adam went quiet for a minute before saying, "On the top floor. Watch out for Queen Myrrah, Marcus-she's desperate."
"Please don't tell him everything Adam," Reyna said, begging.
Adam sighed and turned on his radio again. "This is a last stand for the Locust too, Marcus. My device will kill the Imulsion-but it'll harm the Locust, too."
Adam sighed and said, "I needed more time. Just like E-Day."
Reyna went silent as well, knowing what Adam went through on Emergence Day.
Reyna turned to run out of the room but froze when she heard more gunfire even closer. There was a fight happening right outside Adam's door.
Reyna was about to hop out the window when she heard the gunfire stop. The door knob jiggled a bit and Reyna, with no other option, ducked under Adam's desk. Adam quickly moved so his legs hid the Locust Princess as the door opened.
"Marcus...Anya," he said, a joy in his voice Reyna had never heard.
She looked at the humans and gasped. They were the humans she had seen in the Hollows, except the sad looking light brown skinned man was nowhere to be seen. Instead there was a cream skinned woman with short cropped blonde hair.
"It's good to see you again. I thought I never would. I'm...so sorry about Dom."
"Hard to know where to begin Dad," the gravelly voiced man said. Reyna then realized that this man was Marcus, Adam's son.
"Yes, I always wondered what I'd say if I ever saw you again, but...we always run out of time."
Adam then grabbed something off of his desk, a trinket that Reyna had never seen. "Just my insurance," he said to Marcus. "It won't work without command keys. The same failsafe I designed into the Hammer of Dawn. I'm an old hand at mass destruction, aren't I?"
Adam moved away from the desk and Reyna shifted a bit to see what he was doing. She saw him punching something into his monitor before he turned to face the group of humans. "I've had years to think things over,Marcus," he said, hope in his voice that Reyna had never heard. "You and Anya-all of you-live your lives to the fullest when this is over. Promise me you'll all do that. No regrets. No looking back."
As Adam moved to a different monitor, Marcus said, not really listening to his father, "Yeah, sure Dad. We better get going."
"If the Imulsion hadn't reached a critical stage, I might have found a way to save the Locust as well, and they could have gone back underground."
"Tell me you don't feel sorry for them."
"Responsible, not sorry," Adam replied. Reyna listened very carefully, hoping to hear words that would assure her faith in the professor. "It's my fault they're here, Marcus. I failed to stop the Imulsion spreading all those years ago. It drove the Locust out of their warrens. I tried to persuade Myrrah to keep her people underground, but they couldn't, so then-"
"Wait, wait, wait,-did I hear right?" the blonde interrupted, making Reyna groan slightly. Humans always had a way of interrupting important things, and Reyna cared much more about what Adam had to say than this useless pile of flesh. "The government knew E-Day was coming? And none of you bothered to warn us?"
"No, just me," Adam said, and Reyna realized something. Her mother wasn't the only one who kept important secrets from everybody. Adam kept secrets for Myrrah at the risk of his entire species. But the question was, why? "Even Prescott didn't know until much later. I had so many ideas...just too little time."
"Dad, stop this," Marcus said bluntly, a hint of guilt ringing in his voice. "Come on."
"Whoa," the blonde interrupted yet again. "What else don't we know?"
"You're a scientific man," Adam told the blonde, and Reyna scoffed quietly. There was no way on Sera that this blonde imbecile practiced the same studies as the brilliant mind of Adam Fenix, who had struggled so hard to save both races, was there? "Look at this later and try to understand what I wanted to do and what I had to do."
Adam then handed the blonde something, a disk that Reyna had never seen before.
"Yo," the man from the speakers said. "Less talking, more walking."
He then gestured to outside the room, where the noise of humans fighting Locust and Locust fighting Lambent could be heard. They all looked at each other before running out of the room, leaving Reyna alone.
She waited until she couldn't hear the clatter of the loud metal boots the humans were wearing and got up from under the desk. She thought about the conversation she had just heard and didn't want to believe a word of it. Those humans still believed they were in the right, even after Adam attempted to explain what had happened to cause the war.
Reyna would never understand humans. Now even Adam had given up on the Locust and was prepared to start up the machine that would not only kill the Locust and Lambent, but him as well. He had told Reyna that there would be no way he could survive the anti-Imulsion bomb he had built, but he was willing to sacrifice himself to save, not his planet, but his son.
Reyna realized then that she had to stop Adam. There was no way that one human, let alone a common soldier, was worth all this effort. Did Adam honestly believe his son was worth sacrificing a whole species and his own life? Because that was what he intended. He intended to sacrifice everything just to ensure his son was safe.
As Reyna ran up the back stairs and eventually towards the roof when she heard the sound of a machine starting up. Reyna reached for the latch to open the door when there was a loud sound of destruction followed by a buzzing sound. Reyna gathered that Myrrah had flown the Tempest through the floors to the top and flinched as she heard the Tempest scorch something, presumably a helicopter. She heard yelling as the helicopter crashed to the ground.
Reyna ignored it all and finally opened the door, not caring if she was seen. She ran past the fight and to where Adam was working his machine. "Adam, please don't do this!" she shouted over the noise of the battle.
"Reyna!" Adam exclaimed, turning off his mic for a brief moment. "I thought you were still in my room! You need to hide!"
"Not if it means you do this! Please! You won't survive that bomb! You know that! You're going to kill an entire species and yourself just to save your son! Please, see reason!"
"Reyna, I've thought of it all. I'll be fine. Trust me. You're going to grow up to be a fine woman someday, Reyna. I promise. Now go. Live. My time is almost done."
"NO!" Reyna screamed as she ran for the controls. Adam grabbed her by her arms and picked her up, kicking and thrashing.
"I'm doing this for your own good Reyna!" he exclaimed, opening a secret latch with his foot. He dropped Reyna in it carefully and closed it, putting a large crate over it.
Reyna could still hear the sounds of the battle from her spot and banged on the door repeatedly. "Adam!" she yelled, knowing the scientist could hear her. "Let me out! Let me out this instant!"
She continued to yell and pound on the door for several minutes before she realized her efforts were useless. She started to bang her shoulder against the door, hoping her weight would make the door open. She did this quite a few times before a sudden purple shock wave went through her body.
Reyna gasped at the feeling of the shock wave and knew she was too late. More shock waves continued through her body but the Princess kept thrashing against the door, sobbing as she did so. She hoped desperately that Adam would be alright, along with the Locust and her mother, but she knew that was wishful thinking.
Reyna finally succeeded in breaking out of the secret room and ran out onto the gasped at the sight before her.
In front of Reyna was a pile of dust and a lab coat which she knew to be Adam Fenix's remains, along with the body of Queen Myrrah surrounded by a pool of blood.
Sorry I haven't said anything here in a while, but there was nothing to say until now. These last three chapters had to have some serious considerations to then, and I actually rewrote the last chapter twice because I didn't like what I wrote. I knew from the beginning that I wanted to have Reyna eventually question her mother, but when she did, I didn't want it to sound like she had nothing to argue against, which is part of the reason Adam is here. Adam is meant to be the means for which Reyna learns about human life, and as a result, starts to question Myrrah. I think this part turned out very nicely, and I hope you think so too.