V. The Only Thing Left (Rachel)
Post #50: The Ultimate.

"Please!" The voice was pathetic, terrified, desperate. "No, no, NO, NOOOO!"

"NOOOO!"

I shot upright in bed, heaving and wheezing.

A quick look around saw my mom and sisters sound asleep in the cramp quarters of our cabin. I hadn't screamed as loudly as I thought I had. Feeling queasy in the stomach, I got out of bed, grabbed a torchlight, and stumbled out of the cabin in clothes that I had worn throughout the day. Usually, I'd have changed, but I was just too tired last night after our trip to the children's hospital that I couldn't be bothered.

Yes, I did bring half my wardrobe to the valley, but that's not the point.

I made my way to the forest, torchlight in hand. Tobias would be mad at me for waking him up at this hour, but I needed to hear his voice. To wipe out the helpless one screaming in my head.

"Rachel?"

I whipped my head around, swinging the torchlight towards – "Oh, Cassie, you scared me!"

"Sorry," she said, ruefully. "What are you doing out here at night?"

"Can't sleep," I muttered. "Guess you're the same."

"Are you going to look for Tobias? If you are, then..."

"It's okay," I said. I hadn't talked to Cassie for quite a while. "River?"

In a moment, we were both seated by the river in the middle of the valley, which was dimly lit by the moon. I picked listlessly at the grass and waited for Cassie to say something. Cassie has been my best friend since – I don't know when, but lately, we've just kinda grown apart. She's always been our voice of reason, the one to draw the boundaries between us and the Yeerks, but these days, she's getting all soppy and moralistic that it just hurts to listen to her. I'm tired of having to draw lines when at the zenith of rage, you just want to slice up every one of those worms and toss them into an incinerator.

I'm tired of thinking too much about what to do and what not to do, and every moment wasted thinking is every moment Yeerks are winning. And we can't let that happen.

"I had a nightmare," said Cassie, softly. "I dreamt that we were captured one by one and turned into Controllers."

"We all have that nightmare," I said, a little harshly. "Just different variations of it. Maybe it's prophetic."

"Do you think we'll win?"

I looked at Cassie, who was staring spacily into the distance.

"I'd like to think so."

"What was your nightmare?"

"I didn't even say I had a nightmare."

"Rachel." Cassie's voice was pained. "I daresay even though we haven't been talking much of late, that I can still tell when you're trying to hide something."

"Now you're psychic," I grumbled.

"David?"

I froze.

"I – I don't want to know what happened, Rach, I just–"

"You don't want to know, or that you already know?" I gritted my teeth.

"I was responsible for the first time, remember?"

"Well, this time, I made sure there won't be a third time."

Even saying that made my insides clench. I was having trouble breathing. Every detail of the nightmare was coming back to me again. I shouldn't have stopped to talk to Cassie; I should have gone straight to Tobias and let him babble about rats and voles and rabbits to take my mind off...

"You made your decision, Rachel. It's time to move on. We've all done things we're not proud of, but we've got to move on to –"

"You know what? I think the Z monster has come attacking and I'm not going to put up any more resistance." I got up, brushing my track pants. "Good night, Cassie."

She didn't say a word, not until I had walked a few steps away.

"You know," I stopped in my tracks at her voice, "it's the only thing we have left in this war. At least it's still intact, Rachel, otherwise you wouldn't be feeling so tormented."

I let out a bitter laugh. "Yeah, and my conscience totally told me to do the right thing to David."

I quickened my pace, heading back to my cabin, back to sleep, and back to the nightmare that would torment me till the very end.