All the ways you come back to me
Myosotis (Forget me not)
Part II - Mei
"If you're afraid to take risks, Mei, you're not living!"
How many times has her mother repeated this silly phrase to her? Her whole childhood Mei felt like screaming every time she heard it: the time she was too scared to dance on a stage, in high school when she forced her to take more classes than her schedule could handle, taking the Snow Kids entrance tests, hitting on D'jok for the striker spot, the commercials, the modeling... Taking risks? That's all she'd ever done, and for her mother's sake even. Easy to say when it's her life that's on the line. A ridiculous, immature, absurd, dangerous sentence.
And yet, there, seeing the cell door left ajar after the guard left, she can't help but repeat it to herself.
If you don't take the risk now, Mei, you won't live.
So she grabbed Micro-Ice, and they started to run.
The ship is large and they have never been all over it, their guards only escorting them between their white cell and the various labs. Since their arrival, when the children were still here, and until now, they had never left. It's impossible to say how long the cell / lab routine has been going on, but she can see the little wrinkles slowly forming on her face, and Micro-Ice's brown hair turning gray in a few places. She wouldn't be scared to bet on a good ten years, without any problem.
This is the first time they got an opportunity. Using their fluxes as a beacon never worked, none of their captors came around to try to help them, no one ever came looking for them either... Not that Mei blames them, far from it, but sometimes she has the unpleasant feeling that these people who were her friends, her family, are not real. And yet she knows that they did exist, and that they had to search for them for so long without ever finding them. Time and despair end up playing the worst tricks. But if this time is the one and only chance they have, they have to find something. Anything at all. A radio, weapons, a phone, anything to send a message, leave a clue for whoever might still be looking for them.
They're running around, frantically looking for the slightest hint of hope, when they're finally caught. A man in a white coat, whom she had seen hundreds of times before, comes out of one of the doors in the hall where they arrived, and his cry of shock alarms the rest of his colleagues. Seconds later, as she and Micro-Ice flee in the other direction, a shrill alarm blares as a panicked voice comes out of the speakers, calling for the robots to catch them. Dead or alive.
The next few minutes unfold like a nightmare. At every intersection, robots wait for them, firing in their direction the second they're identified. Micro-Ice and her instinctively activated the Breath, urging their tired and battered bodies to continue running while dodging robots and lasers. As the seconds tick by, Mei feels more and more trapped. All the corridors end up looking the same, the automatic doors have been remotely locked to confine them to one area and the clatter of gunfire makes the air vibrate, making her dizzy. Micro-Ice pulls her forward by holding her arm, taking a random direction to the next hallway, but she can no longer hear the encouragement he shouts.
So when one of the lasers finally hits, making Micro-Ice collapse in front of her, her arm still in his hand, she's ready to give up. Is it really worth the risk? She thinks of her mother, surely grief-stricken somewhere on Akillian, of Sinedd who has already lost so much and shouldn't endure more, of all her teammates with whom she hopes to play again one day, so she puts an arm under Micro-Ice's heavy body and pulls them both forward.
Getting enough speed to break through one of the locked doors proves to be the right strategy. Mei storms into an area that the robots have abandoned, confident that they have restricted their movements in the other part of the ship. Stunned by the shock and her body ready to collapse, she continues to pull her friend with a new determination, looking for something, anything, a sign, a hope...
On the wall, a green sign indicates the direction towards the emergency shuttles.
With tears in her eyes, Mei drags herself with heavy steps towards the direction the arrow points at, praying the way won't be too long. And after a few grueling minutes where she is sure she hears the metallic footsteps of the robots catching up with her, she finally reaches a room where a dozen escape pods are cut into the walls. The capsules look like narrow cabins, with a seat screwed to the bottom and control levers protruding from its walls. On one of the room's walls, pictograms stuck roughly indicate each capsule can transport only one person, and that the expulsion of the shuttle can be done from the interior or from the control panel welded to the wall at the back of the room.
Only one person per capsule, but no radio and no way to program a route in advance, forcing each of them to fly to find a hospitable planet before being caught by their captors.
Slumped against her shoulder, Micro-Ice is still unconscious.
Mei is overwhelmed with doubt. What can they do? If two of them get into a capsule, the air supply would surely be too poor to keep them both awake, and given the size of the capsule, she would never be able to pilot it. But is the other option reasonable? By sending Micro-Ice alone in a capsule she has as much chance of saving him as killing him. And yet she can't leave him behind, can she?
Her mother's voice echoes in her head.
"If you're afraid to take risks, Mei, you're not living!"
If you don't take the risk, Mei, he won't live.
Angrily wiping away the tears burning her eyes, she lifts her friend again and places him in the capsule farthest away from the front door. Installing him with haste she forces her brain not to think too much about what she is doing. To the choice she's making for him. To the risk she is taking. Once he is harnessed to the seat, head drooping and blood staining his jacket, Mei takes a few steps backwards until she hits the wall. To her right one of the ejection buttons glows on the control panel.
She looks at her friend for a moment, praying to all the gods this galaxy can count that it won't be the last time, and then she presses the button. Immediately, a window slides out, sealing the capsule shut with a sharp snap, and the shuttle ejects backwards. Through the glass, the shuttle shrinks until Mei can only make out a dot, then disappears into space.
A cold silence takes place in the room.
Her eyes widened by fear, Mei feels guilt already biting her heart and her blood freezing in her veins. She takes a few painful breaths, and advances towards one of the capsules, almost running. She has to leave, maybe she could catch up with him, even follow him. She has to leave before the guards realize she is still there. She has to leave.
With trembling hands, she hurriedly harnesses herself, grabs the pilot's levers and angrily presses the ejection button.
The window slides, compressing the air in the cabin and nearly cuts off her breath, and Mei feels herself being propelled backwards. Through the window in front of her, the ship shrinks at a dizzying speed, and soon disappears behind a galactic haze.
She stands still for long seconds, maybe a few minutes, her hands clutching the controls and her heart pounding in her chest. Stars and asteroids pass quickly over the horizon, and she suddenly realizes that she had forgotten what a galactic landscape could look like. Mentally shaking herself, she ends up pulling on one of the control sticks to redirect the trajectory of the shuttle, frantically looking for a planet. Despite the lack of a time reference, Mei knows she searched for a long, long time before seeing a small emerald green spot in the distance. Her exhausted brain has switched to autopilot, and she heads for the minor planet at high speed, letting the capsule's autonomous landing program handle the approach to the ground. Mei lands in the grass of a field of small purple flowers, a few hundred meters away a small village of farmers stands out on one of the hills.
And it's only by putting one foot on the ground that Mei finally realizes. She made it out. She managed to leave, to survive, to find help.
She didn't see the Micro-Ice capsule.
With trembling legs and forcing herself not to think about it, she starts walking towards the small houses she saw further away, praying the planet is developed enough to find a phone and maybe even a helping hand. The aliens, small bipeds with gray skin and bulging eyes greet her with lots of kindness, offering her hospitality the second they spot her. Maybe her condition is worse than she imagines so these people don't question her arrival, or maybe years of doubting everything has made her paranoid. Both are probably a little true.
After a warm welcome and a hot meal, one of the aliens offers her a place to rest in one of the small houses, which she gladly accepts. The hut offers rudimentary comfort, and she would never fit into the bed, but the room has nothing to do with the white-tiled cell and it's all she could hope for. In the corner of the room, on a small piece of earthen furniture, rests a telephone: the model is old, with a dusty dial that doesn't even have a camera and the microphone is connected by a cable, but Mei doesn't need more. She falls to her knees in front of the device, tapping feverishly on the dial until Sonny Blackbones' number is written on it, one of the advantages she had by dating his son, and she presses the "call" button.
The line beeps three endless times before a hoarse voice answers, and Mei bursts into tears.
It didn't take long for the Pirates to arrive. A few hours after her phone call, as one of the suns of the planet is slowly setting, the Black Manta appears in the purplish sky.
Sitting in the grass, leaning against her escape pod, Mei watches the ship land in the field a good hundred meters away from her, her hands nervously playing with one of the small purple flowers she picked. Her brain fogged by fatigue, when the ship's door opens she hardly recognizes the pirate leader wearing his usual red coat in the middle of the small group of men. The pirates walks the distance between them with a quick step, stopping only a few meters away from her, and when she sees the expression on their faces Mei realizes they didn't really expect to find her there. Maybe they thought it was a mistake, that some silly kids had found the phone number and played a prank. Or maybe they'd just thought she'd been dead long ago and had made up their minds. Mei purses her lips, still forcing herself not to think too hard.
- Arty, I want you to find out where this capsule came from. Mei, you're coming with me.
Sonny holds out his hand as the man at his side walks around her escape pod, scrutinizing every detail. The Pirate takes her aboard the Black Manta at a slow pace, keeping one hand behind her back for support. Stunned by the overflow of emotions from her day, Mei can't even exchange a few words, she can't even show how happy and relieved she is to see them. To know she is saved.
The leader of the Pirates makes her sit on one of the benches, beckoning a member of his crew. Mei is suddenly aware that the man is talking to her.
- ...me here by yourself?
- I... Sorry, I didn't...
- Did you come here by yourself?
She struggles to formulate an answer.
- The capsule... I... For one person...
- Okay, okay, okay.
In spite of his smile which wants to be reassuring, Mei sees Sonny gritting his teeth and throwing a glance towards somebody else, as if he hoped for another answer. With her mind still fogged by tiredness, Mei takes a long moment to realize: Sonny was looking for the children and Micro-Ice besides her, he is sad to see only her... Micro-Ice...
Mei jumps so hard even the old Pirate is taken aback.
- Mice! I put him in a capsule too! He's gotta be somewhere! Sonny, you have to find him, please please please please you have to find him, you have to find him!
The sobbing starts again and Sonny takes her in his arms, promising in a comforting voice that he would look everywhere.
The ship's doctor must have given her some painkillers, or sleeping pills perhaps, because Mei doesn't remember how she ended up there. The sickbay bed she's lying on is comfortable, soft blankets surround her, her clothes have been changed, and the smell of flowers wafts through the air. Through the window at the back of the room, large flakes fall gently through the air.
Fingers embrace hers.
Turning her head, Mei almost comes face to face with a man. Pale complexion, black hair, long and thin face, Sinedd gives her a tight smile, as if he is afraid of her reaction. Recognizing him feels like the easiest thing in the world, and yet by discovering him here, Mei can't help wondering again how many years have passed... Sinedd tightens the gentle hold he has on her fingers, something he used to do often when they walked hand in hand, and Mei feels her bottom lip start to tremble and her eyes fill with tears. Sinedd takes her in his arms right away, as if to summon her to dry her tears, not to cry, proving this moment isn't a dream at the same time. She dreamed so much of it. They stay like that for a long moment, embracing each other tightly, but without saying anything. Simply listen to their breathing and feel their hearts beating strong in their chests.
- Sanja... I'm so sorry about Sanja...
Mei feels Sinedd's breathing itch, and he pulls back a little to face her, nodding:
- You're not responsible, it's not... I had already... It's okay Mei, it's okay. You're here, it's okay, it will be okay...
Mei feels her heart tightening a little more in her chest, was she going to be okay? Really?
- Mice... did Sonny...
In front of her Sinedd purses his lips, and after a few moments of looking into her eyes, finally shakes his head to answer "no".
"If you're afraid to take risks, Mei, you're not living!"
- It's my fault... Mei's voice breaks with every word. I'm the one who has it... It's my fault...
Sinedd continues to shake his head, and takes her in his arms again.