Laura Nolen - The Fall

A pair of officers walked past, giving me ample space on the carpet lining the center of the floor. I let my gaze drift idly to the chandeliers overhead. They’d sustained a fair amount of damage during the loss of gravity following An’s torpedo, but someone had taken the time to rehang them, untangling their delicate strings of crystals. They were repaired as well as could be expected. I shifted my focus away. It wasn’t like you could replace something like that up here. There were no craftworkers in Central Command, anyway. The officers passed, and I paused, listening for more footsteps, then took off running again.

It wasn’t until I got all the way to the door that I realized that I had nowhere to go. Subconsciously, I’d been heading for the stairwell and the cargo space beneath the main part of the ship. But it no longer existed, and whatever was left of it wasn’t pressurized. The next thought that hit me was worse: the Remnant was gone, too.

I owe you for that one, An. I haven’t forgotten.

I endured a crippling moment of panic before I finally understood that I had no real options. My only hope was to delay my return to Adam as long as could be believable, and hope I came up with some kind of a plan before he caught on. Which wouldn’t be long.

A weapon would be a good start. Something I could hide in my sleeve.

Eren seemed pretty tight with Adam. Did Adam trust him enough to let him carry a gun? I hadn’t seen one on him, so I decided to search his room. If I got caught, I could always act like I’d wandered in out of habit. After all, it was my room, too, apparently.

The room smelled good in spite of the sterility of space and the crumpled pile of clothes near the door. Peppermint and toasted bread. I shrugged it off and got to work.

A cursory search revealed no gun in his desk, or under the bed, or anywhere in the wardrobe. I grunted and sat back on my heels to think. I was a thief, after all. This shouldn’t be too difficult. I turned up a standard-issue sewing kit, which yielded four needles and a tiny, blunt pair of scissors, and a toolbox, which was functionally worthless. Screwdrivers were nice and all, but Eren’s was long and weighted. Too hard to hide. I rolled the scissors up in my sleeve, securing it with two of the needles.

When the couch turned up fistfuls of crumbs and fuzz, I had to revise my image of Eren yet again. Maybe he wasn’t the soldier I’d thought he was. Maybe time and despair had changed him into someone else. As hard as it sounded, maybe he really was a stranger.

I glanced around the room. There wouldn’t be anything on the screen facing the couch. Too conspicuous, especially if it were repaired. Or monitored. I searched the kitchen, shoving a loaf of bread aside in the process, and found nothing.

I was face-first in the freezer and wrist-deep in the icemaker when the door sucked open, causing me to jump squarely out of my skin.

“Eren.”

“This isn’t much of a hiding place,” he said, his voice gruff. Something in his face made me set my jaw a little tighter. Not regret, exactly. Disappointment, more like. “I don’t know what I expected.”

No way he didn’t have a gun in here somewhere. No way. “Yeah? Give me a minute. I might surprise you.”

I slid the door of the icer open and stuck my hand in, never letting my gaze shift from his face. There was something cagey in the way he moved toward me, as though he were anticipating my next move, and I frowned, confused. It was like he was planning something. Preparing for something.

A fight, maybe.

But his face was tired, so tired. His blue eyes met mine at last, and I saw only resignation. I must have imagined his disappointment.

“Are you hungry? I’ll make you a sandwich. Grilled cheese.” His voice was weary, too.

I backed up. “You stay away from me.”

“S’just food, Char.”

He came close, and I stepped aside. His face swung near as he reached past my shoulder and lifted a hunk of cheese, then the butter, in the same hand.

The icer door popped shut, and Eren deliberately turned his back to me, setting me off-guard. He wouldn’t show me his back if we weren’t on the same side. Obviously we weren’t going to fight. This was Eren, after all. My Eren. I was being ridiculous. Paranoid. Occupational hazard, I supposed.

The nape of his neck had grown pale in the years since we’d left Earth and sunlight, but his haircut hadn’t changed—short and blond, no nonsense—and I caught myself staring. Maybe there was a part of me that had missed him for the last five years, even though my mind hadn’t.

He whistled tunelessly, setting up a pan and flipping on the burner, but the notes sharpened when he reached for the loaf of bread, causing the hair on my arms to lift up.

The bread.

The bread, the bread.

It was wrapped in a chunky, reusable foil case far too big for a single loaf that crinkled beneath his grip as he pulled it from the shelf.

And it made a dense, muted thunk when he laid it on the counter.

When his hand dipped into the package, I swallowed. “Why don’t you let me do th—”

Too late. Too late for anything. The gun was suddenly between us, heavy and cold, and my breath froze in my chest.

“Eren.”

“You’re wanted at headquarters,” he said, flicking the stove off.

I’m not sure I understood until that moment what Eren had been to me. How I’d come to think of him, how my mind had relaxed instinctively in his presence. How I’d trusted him. No one had ever made me feel truly secure, like I could believe, cynical as I was, that I would one day be safe for good. Except Eren.

I really was a terrible judge of character.

I wanted to lift my hands in surrender out of habit, but I couldn’t make myself do it. It was like admitting that everything was broken, that nothing good would ever last. Which should have been obvious, especially to me, who’d lived through the death of Earth. And my mother.

“I’ll never forgive you for this,” I said quietly. “In a hundred years, I will not forgive you.” I stared at his face, looking for some sign of regret, some indication that my only possible blow had landed true, but the only thing I found was exhaustion. His brow creased for an instant, then everything was smooth. Easy. Done.

“There’s nothing for it, Char,” he said, almost gently, and any remaining protest died on my lips. “Let’s go.”

I went. What else could I do?

The hallway stretched before me, gaudy and bright. Maybe Adam would let me wake up in Eirenea, but I doubted it. Maybe, years from now, his horrible drug would become illegal, or he’d die, and I’d be rescued. I’d wake up old, in an old woman’s body, with all the experience of a seventeen-year-old failure.

Maybe my family would come for me.

Maybe the years would pass, and my captor would grow lonely, and I’d wake up with children. For ten minutes a year, I’d drink in their faces and worry over the lives they led.

Or maybe he would let me die.

I found my voice halfway to headquarters. “How could you.”

“It’s for the best,” he said evenly. “You don’t understand. He’s too strong.”

“He must be, Eren. With you on his side.”

“It’s not just me. There isn’t anyone, on any ship, that wants us all to go to war. That’s what he’s saving us from.”

We were a fragile race. We must have always been. Only now, we knew it.

Adam was smug. He had every right to be. I stood before him in the cold room, and he gestured for me to sit. I squared my shoulders and lifted my chin. I wasn’t about to spend my last seconds of freedom doing as I was told.

Eventually, his smile grew serious, and my darling husband pressed down on my shoulders until my back hit the chair. The Lieutenant was slouched in a black leather chair nearby. She made no move to assist. Maybe she was drugged, too.