"What do you mean, I'm not leaving?" Cress demanded, panic crawling up her throat. Just like in the dramas, she thought.
Mia Martinez looked down at her with disdain. "Are you really that stupid? I mean," She said, bending at the waist to that she was eye level with Cress. "That you aren't leaving the Rampion. At least not anytime soon."
Cress bit back her tears and slumped back against a crate that was nearby. The action reminded her of the first time she had boarded the Rampion, when it had still been full of all the stuff that Thorne had stolen.
Mai, apparently bored with Cress already, flicked her wrist in a dismissive manner and left the room. As soon as she did, Thorne moved toward Cress and swiftly spun her around so that her back was facing him. She squeaked.
"Th-thorne?" She stammered, trying to twist back around to look at him.
He didn't answer, and instead began fiddling with the cords that tied Cress' hands together behind her back. Within a moment, they were loose.
Cress whipped around to face Thorne, her mouth open to ask a thousand different questions, but stopped when she saw his face. His body was completely still, holding the blue cord in one hand, but on his face showed every single emotion that Cress had felt since the whole fiasco had begun. Confusion, anger, longing, sadness, fear, weariness, hopelessness, even joy, somehow all at the same time.
"You're going to be here a while, you might as well be untied."
Cress almost cried at the sound of his voice. It wasn't his at all; it was flat and entirely emotionless, but he was speaking. The expression on his face was louder than his words, and Cress knew exactly what he was saying.
"Oh, Thorne." She moved toward him, wrapping him in an awkward hug. His body didn't respond, staying as still as a statue. After a few moments she let go. Thorne's face had had returned to its previous state of blank emptiness, and Cress sighed. So that's how it would be then. Mia Martinez was controlling Thorne down to his every movement, and if Cress wanted to have a moment to talk to Thorne, well. She knew she wouldn't have much luck.
Cress got up and wandered around the cockpit for a few moments, then turned to Thorne, who hadn't moved.
"What am I supposed to do now?" She asked him. She wasn't surprised when he didn't answer.
Sighing, she reached into her pocket for her port, but felt nothing there. With a start of realization, she reasoned that it must have fallen out of her pocket when Thorne had hauled her up to the cockpit.
She walked to the door, edging past Thorne nervously, and tried to enter the hallway and search for her port. She squealed as a hand grabbed the back of her shirt and dragged her roughly away from the hall.
"Thorne!" She glared at his emotionless face. He didn't move.
Okay. She really couldn't leave. Not even to go get her port. She still had one ray of hope left: Iko was still in the Rampion somewhere.
Cress sat back down on the floor, and for several minutes she pondered her options. Thorne moved to stand sentry-like by the door to the hallway.
She thought about using the Rampion's communication system to get in touch with Iko or Winter. It would be easy. She had used the ship's comm system many times, but somehow she felt Mia might be expecting that. She could make a mad dash to escape, but there was no way she could out-run or overpower Thorne. Briefly, she debated yelling and screaming for Iko, but that would reveal Iko and reduce their chances of escape. Could she bribe Mia to let her go? But what did she even have to offer?
Dejected, Cress rolled over onto the floor. For now, she decided, she would stick to reconnaissance. Find out as much as she could about Mia, how and why she was controlling Thorne, and also find out what in all the planets, stars, and moons was happening, and wait for Iko to show herself. She wasn't sure where her friend had gone, but she was fairly certain that Mia Martinez hadn't seen her.
For what felt like days, Cress sat in the cockpit of the Rampion with Thorne acting as her prison guard. She wasn't sure how much time had passed, she guessed over four hours, and she still hadn't seen a single sign of Iko.
Cress was busy counting the number of bolts in each panel on the wall and ceiling of the cockpit when a figure appeared in the doorway. Cress leapt up, hoping to see the familiar perfect face and braids of her friend. Instead, she was greeted with the dark hair and a cold smile.
"Bedtime, my darlings! Come along, now." Mia beckoned with her finger and turned out the door, sashaying her hips as she walked. Cress hated her even more.
In barely a second, Thorne was behind her, re-tying her hands with the same blue cord as before. This time when he picked her up, she didn't scream or yell at him, simply let him carry her to one of the crew cabins and deposit her unceremoniously on the bottom bunk.
While Cress desperately tried to loosen the cord around her wrists, Thorne left. Cress twisted and turned, pulling frantically at the tight knots. A moment later, Thorne returned with a plate from the galley which he left sitting on the floor near the berth.
"Stop."
His voice held no emotion or any tone that might scare her or persuade her into obeying, but she did anyway. She had a feeling things would not go well for her if she didn't.
Thorne reached for her hands and untied the bonds for the second time that day. His blue eyes, once full of laughter and mischief, were now like empty blue circles in his head. Once her hands were free, he got up quickly and left the room, locking the door behind him.
"Wait! Thorne!" Cress jumped off the bunk and rushed to the door, pounding on it and calling out for Thorne. She heard no response.
.oOOo.
Cress lay staring at the bottom of the bunk above her. After several hours of trying to ignore the plate of rapidly cooling food on the floor, she had eventually given in to her hunger and devoured the whole thing. The green beans, roast beef and mashed potatoes barely tasted like anything, but she had scarfed them down anyway. Who knew when her next meal would come?
There was only a small window in the crew cabin, but the Rampion was still safely in the hangar, Cress had no way of knowing what time it was other than her rough estimation. She guessed it was around four in the morning when she heard a small noise from the door.
Immediately alert, Cress scrambled around in the bunk, trying to untangle herself from the sheets.
"Thorne?" She whispered, playing it safe. She dared not call Iko's name, for fear that it was Mia Martinez at the door.
The scratching sound paused, then continued with more urgency.
Cress made her way to the door and tried pulling it open, but the door held fast.
Suddenly, the noise stopped and the door swung open. Cress jumped back, ready to fight her way past whoever was at the door and get out of the Rampion, but stopped in the tracks when Iko came through the door.
Placing a finger on her lips, Iko turned around and pushed the door shut slowly, taking care to be quiet. When the door was closed, she grabbed Cress and pulled her into a tight hug.
"I'm so sorry Cress, I went back to the cockpit and I saw you and Mia Martinez and Thorne-!"
Cress nodded in understanding. "It's okay. I'm fine, and I don't think Mia even knows that you're here." She pulled away, turning instead to sit down on the bed and pat the spot beside her. Iko obliged, and sat.
"Cress," Iko said, her voice low and serious. "Thorne is-"
Cress cut her off. "I know. I know it's horrible to watch. Especially because of the moments when…" She explained to Iko the time when Thorne's face had seemed to show emotion, to be back to normal, to be Thorne.
Iko nodded. "Like the first time you were here, and he came back from getting lunch and he remembered you."
"Yeah. I think-I don't know, but maybe Mia Martinez is giving me all these little glimpses of him just to toy with me. Ugh!" She almost yelled, but quieted down when she saw the look of warning on Iko's face. "Sorry." She whispered. "This whole thing just feels like a big ploy to mess with me. What's their motive? So far, it seems to be to make the entire world forget I exist. Just like when I was still living on Luna and then in the satellite. It's like someone believes that I shouldn't be remembered because I'm a shell or something."
Iko didn't answer. Cress knew why, there were way too many theories in consideration right now to pin the blame on one specific one without confirmation.
"Mia Martinez told me that I can't leave. She doesn't know you're here, so maybe…" She trailed off, unsure of how to continue.
A look of determination settled across Iko's features, turning her eyes a dark hue of indigo. "We have to get Thorne out. It's scary seeing him like this, and maybe he can helps us figure out what's going on if we can get him away from Mia and her brainwashing. And we have the biggest advantage against her." She smiled and poked Cress on the shoulder. "We can't be controlled." Iko stood, walking quickly to the door. Opening it slowly, she turned back to Cress.
"I'm going to find out where Thorne is, and I'll be back in the morning. I'll also send a comm to Kai." She closed the door behind her and was gone.
Cress lay back down on the bunk and resumed her staring at the bottom of the top bunk. However small the crew cabins were, they never made her feel claustrophobic. Maybe it was because she had spent half her life in a satellite, or because she often hid in small enclosed places for hours at a time. But Cress suspected it was actually because of Thorne. She could be anywhere with him and be comfortable. When she first stayed aboard the Rampion, she might have hated being in a ship again after the vast emptiness of the desert, but Cress hadn't felt that way. She'd been with Thorne, and that was all that mattered.
Groaning, she rolled onto her side and closed her eyes. It was very late, and it was beginning to sound like she would have a busy day tomorrow.
Sleep evaded her for several more minutes, during which Cress tossed and turned in the bunk. Eventually, she drifted off into restless sleep filled with troubling dreams.
Cress awoke to a loud commotion outside of her door. Yells and shouts assaulted her ears, and she scrambled out of bed and rushed to the door. Yanking on the handle, she cursed when she found it still to be locked.
"Thorne?" She called, banging on the door with her fist. The sounds of fighting continued. A particularly loud grunt sounded in her ears, followed by a yell that sounded like Iko.
"Iko!" Cress pulled on the handle as hard as she could – leaning away from it with all her might and bracing her feet against the wall. Suddenly, the door opened and sent Cress sprawling on her back. Her hands shaking, she pushed herself to her feet.
Rolling around on the ground, sometimes one on top of the other and both of them trying to choke and hit each other, were Mia Martinez and Iko. Yells and grunts sounded from both of them, and for the first few moments after she got up, Cress was frozen watching them. A shriek from Iko startled her into action and she jumped into the fray.
Desperately trying to extract Iko from Mia's death grip, Cress knelt on the ground and shoved her hands in between Mia's hands, prying them apart.
"You-!" Mia exclaimed, letting go of Iko to lunge at Cress. Cress tried and failed to dodge her hands and gasped when she felt them grabbing at her hair and pulling. Hard.
Cress screamed and tried kick pull Mia's hands out of her hair. The look on Mia's face was pure fury and loathing, her beautiful features twisted into a visage of hatred. For a brief moment, Cress wondered again what she had done to make this woman so angry. Then Mia was being pulled away from Cress, kicking and screaming at Cress, her dark eyes still focused on Cress' blue ones. Mia fought back, twisting to land a punch on the side of Iko's head. Iko winced, but kept pulling Mia away from Cress with inhuman strength. Cress suspected that wince was more of a habit like reaction to an action that would cause pain, and not a real wince.
Cress crawled back and let Iko take Mia. Running a hand through her hair, she winced when she felt the tenderness on her scalp from where Mia had grabbed and pulled. Mia was still shouting at Iko to let her go and struggling frantically, but Iko was ignoring her. With a particularly violent jerk of her body, Mia was able to free her arms from where Iko had pinned them at her sides. Cress whimpered as Mia started to crawl towards her, then gasped in surprise as a hand came whipping down on top of Mia's head. Iko yelped as Mia toppled to the side, unconscious.
"I didn't mean to do that!" Iko looked at Cress, her eyes displaying a gut dropping shade of green. Iko was terrified.
Cress shook her head and started to cry. She felt embarrassed about it, crying for what was probably the millionth time in nowhere near as many days, but the tears came anyway. She cried for a moment, silently, then sniffed and looked at Iko.
"Now's our chance. We can get Thorne out of here while she's out, she won't be able to control him. We can go to the apartment and meet with Winter." She finished speaking and stood, her legs wobbly but holding. "You take her to her room and put her on the bed, maybe tie her up or something. I'm going to look for Thorne."
Iko nodded and picked up Mia's arms by the wrists, repositioning her body in a way that would make her easier to drag. As she turned to walk down the hall, Cress caught Iko looking at her with a worried look in her eyes.
She set off down the hallway, poking her head into each door to check where Thorne was. She didn't know whether Mia Martinez had let him sleep in a bed or if he was tied up somewhere in the belly of the ship, just in case he woke up and tried to run.
On the third door she tried, the door to the third crew cabin, Cress found Thorne sleeping with his hands tied to the post of the bed. Cress rushed in the room, her hands hovering over his body, looking for signs of harm or injury. Her stomach churned when she got closer to him, her mind full of images of what Mia might have done to him while he was sleeping tied up like this. She shook her head, trying to rid herself of those awful thoughts. Instead she turned her attention to Thorne's face.
He looked so peaceful when he slept. Cress had always thought so; any worries and strife from the day always vanished once he fell asleep. Sometimes if Cress couldn't sleep, thinking about her family on Luna or the other shell children in the tunnels, she would simply look at Thorne while he slept. His calm handsome face was always enough to lull her into a deep sleep, and often it would be filled with dreams of pleasant memories of the time spent with her friends during and after the revolution, or the long hours she spent tucked away in her satellite staring at his picture, fantasizing over his winking mugshot.
Cress breathed out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, and moved to where his hands were tied. Working at the knots, she nearly jumped out of her skin when he moved, shifting slightly onto his side and giving her a view of his back. That can't be comfortable, she thought as she observed the way his arms were twisted awkwardly above his head.
She continued to pull at the knots, loosening each knot slowly but surely. She jumped again when he moved a second time, then went back to yanking on the knots. Cress almost had them all undone when he spoke.
"Cress?" His voice sounded unsure, like someone who had learned not to believe their own eyes for fear of being tricked again.
Cress gasped and looked down at him. His eyes were staring directly at hers, hopeful and pleading, but also reserved and afraid.
She pulled the last knot loose and slipped the cords off his wrists, and he let his arms fall back to his sides. She moved around to where she could touch him without the bars of the ladder in the way and wrapped her arms around him. His arms felt uncertain but hugged her nonetheless.
"Cress. Is it really you?" He asked.
She pulled back to look him in the eyes. Distrust was written all over his face.
Cress nodded, stroking the side of his unshaven face with her fingers. "Yes. Yes, Thorne, it's me." When he still didn't seem to believe her, she added. "Twenty-two girls, Thorne. And you only meant it for me."
Thorne and Cress' laughter and tears mingled together and they sat on the bed and hugged each other, both of them grateful beyond belief.