Chapter 13: Secrets in the Dark

For the next few months, the RLS Legacy continued to travel through space, and everyone was fulfilling their duties on it. Silver was keeping Jim hard at work. First, the cyborg made the boy scrape barnacles off the hull of the ship, until it was spotless.

"Put some elbow into it!" Silver snapped until the boy managed to scrape off a barnacle.

The cyborg glared at Jim as he still had a thousand more barnacles to remove. Rose would often look down to watch, feeling sorry for him.


The next day, Rose was called to help Jim and Silver peel the vegetables in the galley. Occasionally, the three were all silent as Silver watched the teens. As Jim would peel a potato, he looked up at the sky with a distant expression. The redhead would keep her eyes lowered to the ground as she peeled a vegetable. But sometimes, she looked up to watch Jim; when the boy looked over to catch the redhead staring at him, she quietly gasped and looked down getting back to work, hiding the blush creeping on her pale cheeks.


Another time, the redhead was with her adopted mother and watched from the balcony where Silver was teaching Jim how to make a good, sturdy knot. The boy had a disinterested expression as the cyborg was trying to get him to pay attention to his instructions. As the cyborg turned back to finish his knot, his expression turned to shock to see Jim's finished knot on a hook. He picked it up, glaring as the boy walked away sulkily. He picked up Jim's knot, looked at it, and then looked at his knot, realizing that Jim had gotten done knot tying. Silver looked at the boy, giving an impressive smile.


After two months of the voyage, things were getting smoother and steadier. Captain Amelia and Delbert Doppler had a ton of disagreements when having discussions about his ideas, which made him more offended. The crew left Rose alone, even Scroop not wanting to get stuck in the brig. Whenever the redhead was with her guardians, the spiden would give her a frightening glare, making the girl look away to avoid trouble with him again. Mr. Arrow stayed close to the petite girl's side in protective mode.


Then there was one night where secrets were about to be revealed. On this very night, Rose, Artemis, and Delbert were outside of the captain's cabin to get fresh air. Everyone was done for the day with work and decided to create a bonfire to relax and enjoy the warmth.

Jim was up on the shrouds and watching the view of the Etherium, he felt the cool breeze blowing through his bangs and the stars glittered like diamonds. He gave a heavy sigh, enjoying the peace and quiet. Delbert was a few feet away, keeping his eyes on the captain's daughter. Rose slowly took a few steps away from the doctor to watch the Etherium.

"Hey Rosie," the redhead jumped up and looked over to see it was Silver. He had his smoking pipe within his teeth and gave a toothy grin. As he was close to her, Rose shriveled away feeling puny as the Ursid towered over her, with her head reaching to his waist. "Been a while since t'ere's been a bonfire. Want to join?"

Bonfire? At first, she didn't understand what he meant; it wasn't until when the redhead's eyes faced the bonfire, she froze still and felt color draining from her face. She stared at the flames crackling like firecrackers.

"Oh no," she said below a whisper.

She froze still as a statue and felt flashbacks when her childhood house burned down coming back to her and when she was burned. Feeling the heat and the sight of the flames caused her to sweat, her breathing went swallow, and can hear her heart beating within her ears. Jim noticed the girl's frozen expression and his content mood changed to concern. He climbed down from the shrouds and came up to the redhead.

"Rose are you okay?" Jim asked.

"Oh God," she said as her large eyes grew panicked, and panted frantically. "I can't take this!"

"What's goin' on Rosie?" Silver asked his smile disappearing from his face.

"I… I… I have to get away from the fire!" She exclaimed before letting out a scream of terror and hurried away. The sound of her screaming caused a lot of the crew to stare at her oddly. The girl crashed into Delbert, startling him, and made him glare at her for a moment. But his glare disappeared as he saw her frightened face and her blue-green eyes moistening.

"Rose?"

"Just leave me alone!" she cried and ran to the medical bunks with Artemis.

When the girl was out of sight, the crew shrugged their shoulders and turned their attention back to the bonfire. However, only three grew concerned for Rose, that was Jim, Delbert, and Silver. The boy's eyebrows raised in confusion and concern. He never saw Rose this upset before and grew curious to see why the fire completely terrified her.

He walked towards Delbert and tapped his shoulder. The canine turned to the boy.

"Hey Doc. Have you noticed anything going on about Rose?"

"No, why do you ask?"

"There's something really weird about her. Whenever we ask her about her past, she changes the subject. Just now when I saw her looking at the bonfire, she screamed in terror and ran away. Doesn't that seem a bit suspicious?"

The canine's face grew confused as he thought deeply. Then he remembered the paranoia the girl expressed when she was on the Legacy and why she always stood by the Captain and Mr. Arrow's side, never for once wondering off.

"Come to think of it Jim, yes I have noticed that there's a lot more to her than we've already know," Delbert said.

"What's goin' on fellas?" Silver asked, holding his pipe with Morph resting on his shoulder.

"Rose seemed to be very upset about something," said Delbert.

Jim looked over to the door where the medical bunks were. Just as he was about to make his way to Rose, he was stopped on the shoulder by a heavy force. He looked back to see the cyborg giving him a firm look with his organic hand laid on the boy's shoulder.

"Where do ya think yer goin' Jimbo?"

"I need to talk to Rose. If she doesn't, I'll have to find some way to make her. It looked like she just saw something that she's seen before."

"Jimbo, I don't t'ink it would be wise to force Rosie to talk about 'erself, ya know," Silver sternly said. Then his face turned to a frown. "Well, she's more private. Although, it may be best to stay out of it and not pest 'er business, I'm interested in learning more 'bout 'er."

"Then why did she run away from the fire?" Delbert asked.

Jim looked over to where Rose ran off and figured out where she would be. The boy decided it was time to learn about her past, and said, "Let's find out."


Hi there, sorry if I made this chapter short. I have to make plans on how to write the next chapter, soon we'll learn more of Rose's past next time. Stay tuned!