Not Myself
By Princess Alexandria
Princess_alex24@hotmail.com
Emma could sense Christy becoming restless and took a small peek into why. Christy was becoming uncomfortable sitting like they were. Emma could see that Christy's mind imagined moving to lay on the bed and she decided that could work.
Emma let her hands fall away from Christy's temples, but the connection didn't seem to suffer too much for it. She used her arms to pull back further on the bed and reclined on her elbows looking down her body at Christy's confused expression. "Come here." She spoke softly and smiled at the hesitation Christy showed before doing it. Christy moved to lay down beside her on the bed, and rolled onto her side to look at Emma.
"No we aren't done yet." Emma lowered herself down onto her back. "Come here." She patted her shoulder and could feel Christy's moment of panic, her doubt, and her wishing she could just do it. Emma ignored it all, the whole of emotions Christy projected without realizing it, and patted her shoulder again. "I need the physical connection, lay down."
"Emma." Christy started to move to do what she'd asked but then stopped. Emma barely had to try to read Christy, she could see Christy wasn't sure how to take this move. If she was going to insult Emma by being too informal, and she also had a longing that almost broke Emma's concentration. Christy needed this contact so badly, and was afraid that would show. Christy was still trying to be a lone wolf, needing no one, but that wasn't who Christy was.
"Just get over here." Was all Emma said as she helped Christy, or physically encouraged her, to rest her cheek on Emma's shoulder. She took Christy's awkwardly placed arm and wrapped it around her middle so that Christy held her back. "You must know how this goes." She managed to reproach Christy's embarrassed reluctance without sounding too harsh. "Now just relax." Emma could feel the tension in Christy's body start to relax as she caressed Christy's temple with her free hand and played with her hair, tucking it behind one ear. Emma sighed softly as they both got used to the more intimate pose, and she had to admit it was a nice change from her normal in depth scans, which were usually done against someone's will.
Once Christy finally became comfortable with the new position Emma slid back into her mind gently.
********
The entire tribe stood in the parking lot as Tracey led the ceremony to put to rest the dead hunting team. Christy felt it should have been her up there, talking about Mark and the others. It should have been her up there talking about how brave they were and how they never gave up, but she'd asked Tracey to do it for her. She had to remain strong in the eyes of her tribe, and she was barely able to not cry now. If she had to say those things she couldn't do it.
She gritted her teeth and sat still, refusing to wipe the tears away. It would only bring attention to the fact that they were starting to slowly leak from her eyes. They hadn't even been able to bring home the bodies for burial. It was too risky to go after them, and that was another decision that Christy had to make.
"Christy, is there something you want to add." Tracey spoke loud enough for the entire tribe to hear and Christy tensed up and looked back at Tracey. She'd become lost in her own thoughts and pain and didn't notice Tracey wrapping it up. A brief glare at Tracey got nothing but a sympathetic look and a more softly spoken additional comment just for Christy. "They need to hear from you."
Christy took a deep breath and stood up. She'd been sitting with the other hunters in the front, on chairs brought out for them. She glared at Tracey as she passed her to stand at what served as the podium. How could Tracey do this to her? Tracey knew why Christy didn't want to talk now.
The soft murmuring of the tribe stopped as she tried to subtly wipe away her tears, and she knew she hadn't been able to cover up what she was doing. She took a shuddering breath and prayed that she could just say a few words without losing it. Just a few. "Hunters are a brave lot." She was going to try and keep it as impersonal as she could. That might help her maintain control. She didn't want to appear weak. "It's a dangerous job and they do it so that we all can continue to live." Her head made the motion of looking at the crowd, but she wasn't really looking. It was hard to look through her glassy eyes. God Dammit, her tears were completely visible. Everyone could see it. Christy gritted her teeth and stared down at the podium for a moment, trying to get that waver out of her voice. "Mark's team was incredibly brave." Her voice cracked, but she couldn't stop now. "He and his men dealt with unbeatable odds and lost. We will see them on the other side." Her fist clenched on the podium and she went quiet. That was all she could get out.
The dead silence from her tribe panicked her. She needed their respect to lead, and it felt like she'd just lost it. There was more that could be said, but she just looked around at the faces she could now see because her tears had fallen from her eyes. They looked stunned. Why? She turned with a heavier heart than she had before she stood up to talk, convinced that she'd just lost all the respect she'd fought so hard for. She walked past the other hunter's seated nearby, past a concerned Tracey that should have known better than to put her up their now, and into her office without saying another word.
She could hear the hum of more words being spoken, but she didn't try to listen. She finally let herself cry for what she'd lost. An entire team. Mark. She cried because in the end the only help she'd been able to give them was to kill the ones still left standing.
It felt like an hour later when Tracey stepped into the office alone after finishing the ceremony. "How could you?!" Christy's face was still red from crying, but it grew redder as she hissed at Tracey. "I told you I couldn't do it." Christy wanted to yell, but there might be some of her people near enough to hear that. She'd shown enough pain, shown enough weakness for one day.
Tracey didn't even have the decency to look guilty. She just gave Christy a sympathetic look and sat down in a chair across from her. "Do you remember when you had to torture those raiders? When we all watched you cut that boy into pieces?" Christy flinched at the memory and the cold way Tracey was able to talk about it. "We all thought you were a monster for being able to do that. Mark, Aaron, Tom, Jake… All of us." Christy couldn't believe Tracey was kicking her when she was down. Tears started to fall yet again as she stared down at her hands rather than look at her.
"If you all think I'm such a monster, why are you still here?" She managed to growl out. Dammit, she knew a lot of people thought she was… but she really believed that her team, her friends…
"We stayed with you. We realized it wasn't that you were a monster, but that you were that desperate to protect us all." Tracey's voice cracked for the first time since the ceremony started. "It was because you cried that we realized that. If you'd been able to walk away from that without appearing to feel pain, we would have continued to believe that you were insane."
Christy took a shuddering breath but couldn't think of anything to say. Just when she thought this day couldn't hurt anymore, Tracey had to bring that up.
"We've been trying to tell you that the others in the tribe were starting to think you weren't even human. I'm sorry I tricked you, but they needed to see that you still are. I heard people talking when they realized you weren't going to give the ceremony. Some people thought that you didn't care, and that is so far from the truth." Christy felt Tracey move closer and saw her rest a hand on Christy's leg. "Christy, we love you… but you made a mistake in pretending that nothing fazes you. People don't want to follow a ruthless leader with no emotions. They'll follow you if you feel pain, they won't turn on you and call you weak because you cried when your best friend died. You're under-estimating them. Your tribe isn't your enemy." When Christy started to cry Tracey pulled her closer. "This tribe isn't going to turn on you like the last one did. Christy, they know why we are all still here when so many of the neighboring tribes aren't, and it's you. You just have a P.R. problem, but they all know we need you."
P.R. problem? Christy almost laughed in spite of her pain. She had far more than a Public Relations problem. It sounded like her people thought she was Satan himself.
********
Shelley was standing in her doorway. Christy just stared at her, a bit surprised. She hadn't seen much of the girl since they started this tribe. "Shelley?" The look in the girl's eyes had Christy standing back and letting her in.
"I'm so sorry for your loss." Shelley spoke quietly. "I heard you and Mark were… together, but I hadn't believed it until…"
Christy was still shaken up from the ceremony that morning and talking to someone about it wasn't on her list of things to do. She turned away from the girl she hadn't seen but in passing for months. Why did Shelley decide now was a good time to visit? "We weren't together like that. It was just a rumor." Not for lack of trying on both their parts. Now Christy wished she had slept with him, even if she didn't feel it. She wished she'd given him that.
"Oh." Shelley went quiet for a moment. "I could go get you dinner if you don't want to sit with us." Shelley spoke so softly, as if Christy were fragile. She almost brushed the offer away, but she wasn't feeling like having people stare at her, and she knew after that disaster of a speech they would be staring.
"Okay."
Shelley looked hesitant to ask, but she did. "Do you want me to eat with you?"
Christy had the feeling that Shelley was trying to take care of her, kind of like Mark had. She didn't know how to feel about that. "No, I kinda want to be alone right now." She answered gently.
"Okay." Shelley glanced at the door and then back at Christy. "Well, I better go get dinner for you then." It was interesting to watch the flustered girl's body fight between leaving and staying, but finally make it out the door. Shelley was clearly out of her comfort zone, but she came. No one else besides Christy's friends had even acknowledged Mark's passing to her yet.
The next morning she couldn't just hide away anymore. She'd already indulged in her pain when she probably should have been working the day before, and life waited for no one. She had to make sure the hunting teams understood the new procedures so that they didn't lose another team, and she needed to try and create a brand new team, because they needed to replace the dead. She was going to have to split up a hunting team so that they didn't have an entire team of rookies, and that was always an adjustment for the hunters.
When she went down for food before starting work, she could feel the eyes on her yet again, but this time it felt different. She caught a few people looking and could tell there was a difference, but she wasn't sure what it was.
********
Emma briefly touched on a few lesser memories for a while, and noticed the change in Christy and her tribe. Tracey was right. The tribe stopped treating Christy like a demon walking in their midst, and Christy stopped being so controlled when she realized that it was keeping people away and afraid. Christy realized she was wrong, and she was allowed to be human after all. Shelley and Debbie became a part of her life again, and she spent time talking with Debbie's kids after having been away from them for months. Christy's life was healing, and Emma hated that she knew the ending, that Christy lost all these people she was starting to let back into her heart.
They were getting closer to the memory Emma had started with, the one that had Christy coming into this world, and the memories became brighter and more emotional the closer they got to the end of the world. They retained a clarity of someone who tried to memorize every last thing, knowing that these memories would need to last a lifetime, or perhaps even longer.
********
The asteroid was getting a bit too big for comfort, and Christy could tell almost everyone spent time staring up at it. It was visible even in the day sky now, and the feeling of dread was actually painful. Here was their death, come calling.
Before the televisions and radios went dead they all heard the scientists estimates as to when that thing was going to hit them. Many people kept calendars that they carefully marked each day so that they could track when it was going to happen, and now the careful record keeping was paying off. Christy wasn't sending her hunting teams out again once they all got back. They all deserved to die together if they wanted to. The last week of their lives will be their own.
They'd stockpiled enough supplies lately to take the time off. The new method of dealing with raiders ended up being very lucrative, if not dangerous. They used women as bait and set their own traps. Christy had been bait herself a few times, and it was terrifying to be unarmed in battle, but she trusted her men to protect her. They never let her down.
The raiders flesh wasn't the only food in their cache now though. Christy sighed. Those that didn't want to live to see the end had seen her and requested death. She herself had to kill fifteen of her own people so that they didn't suffer a botched suicide, and she always made sure to be as sympathetic and caring as she could. They willed their flesh to the rest of the tribe. She hated asking them to do that, but not even one of them didn't understand why she was doing it. The hunters needed time off. It was a hard task to strip people she'd known, but she did it herself so that no one else would have to. She held these peoples hands when they died and comforted them. She stripped the flesh from their bodies, and she buried them where no one would have to see what had happened to them. No one should have to know they were eating a friend. It was the last gift these people gave their tribe.
She watched as the last hunting team came home unharmed and sighed. She was always worried now when they went out. Tom smiled up at her before going to check in his teams take.
Christy stared after him. Tom was barely twenty. If this hadn't happened his life would just be starting. Her eyes traveled over to Ian playing with a ball she'd found for him last time she went out. Maybe there was no God, because how could a God do this to all these people? She sighed. She couldn't afford to think like that, because the only thing keeping so many of her people going was the belief that they'd see their fallen loved ones on the other side.
Christy wasn't so sure she wanted to see them. How could she explain to her family what she'd done? She'd become someone they wouldn't even recognize. She was pretty sure that no one expected her to become a leader of a cannibal tribe. She wasn't voted most likely to commit serial murder in high school. She remembered high school. She'd been the quiet one with few friends. Students she barely knew told her they expected she'd be someone great when she grew up and cure some fatal disease. She was chosen to be a judge in one of her classes because the other students thought she was fair. It was just the impression she apparently gave them. Christy took a shuddering breath as she remembered those days of hope and planning for the future. Boy wouldn't they all be surprised. Christy Taylor, the girl they all thought was going somewhere, was responsible for the deaths of over a thousand soldiers, knew how to torture information out of a man, and was the matriarch of her own tribe. And to think she used to wonder what those nameless students would think if they knew she was gay.
"Christy?" Shelley spoke quietly, interrupting Christy's thoughts. That girl was a little more clingy than she'd been before. Shelley didn't have any family around, and apparently she'd adopted Christy to fill that role. Christy wiped her tears away before turning to look at Shelley. There was another tragedy. Shelley was just seventeen, and she'd lived in a dying world since she was fifteen. "Can I talk to you after dinner?"
God no. Christy stared at Shelley, wondering if she was about to have to help the girl die. Shelley sounded so nervous about talking with her, and Christy had heard that before from the people asking her for that final favor. "Shelley…" Christy couldn't do it. The girl was like family. Someone she'd been watching out for. "I can't kill you. You need to ask someone else, please." She felt guilty for denying her, and had to add something even though she didn't want to. "I'll be there for you, but I can't."
"No." Shelley seemed surprised and it made Christy relax. "That's not it. I'm going to see this to the end."
Christy pushed Shelley's bangs off her forehead and kissed it before speaking quietly. "Thank you." It took her a moment to remember the request. "Sure, you can come by after dinner." Shelley probably just needed someone to comfort her. It was hard to comfort the dying, but Christy would try. She'd practically adopted the girl, and was the closest Shelley had to a mother right now.
********
Emma could sense Christy's unease about the memories she'd tapped into. Something she'd rather Emma didn't see was obviously coming up, but this time Emma wanted to see it. This was how Christy dealt with her own imminent death, and that told you a lot about someone. She gave Christy's forehead a kiss like the woman had done to Shelley and caressed her cheek to get that hint of desire flowing again so that the connection stayed strong. It was starting to fade a bit as Christy fought it.
Christy was barely aware of her body. That happened with non-telepaths, they started to think of their astral form as the real thing and couldn't pay much attention to what their real body was doing during a deep scan. Emma had to move her own astral form to take Christy's hand and to comfort her before moving ahead with the memories. The next one was rather bright, and clearly had a lot of emotion attached to it. Christy could have told her no, but she'd become rather compliant. Emma wondered if she was going into shock at having to relive this. She'd have to monitor Christy carefully.