THE LAST BORN

B E F O R E

B E F O R E

"CAPTAIN!"

The door of his office burst open, Jackie comes in with a horror look on her face, "It's Toby," She says out of breath.

Fuck!

He stands up immediately and fasts walking to one of his best fighter's quarters. Not again, not again, he keeps chanting inside his head refusing the worst, which is stupid because he knew it happened already. Men, women, and even a few children are crowding in front of Toby's door with a horror look on their faces.

"Everybody move!" Jackie shouts, she might be small but she surely is loud. Some people heard her and immediately moved away to let him and Jackie pass, some are just too horrified to even hear them. He has to push a few people until he stands right in front of Toby's quarter. His room is messy and bright, a broken chair on the corner of his room next to his unmade bed, the mattress is torn in a few places and all of his clothes are thrown outside of his cupboard.

And right in the middle of the room, hanging from the ceiling with a cord around his neck is Tobias.

He rushes inside and holds his legs up, his body is cold and stiff, he has been dead for a while.

Fucking hell.

"Put him down!" He hears Jackie shout and a few men come rushing forward to get rid of the cord around Toby's neck. He lays Toby's cold, pale body down on the floor and looks at the lifeless eyes.

This isn't him, he wasn't like this. Toby was a goofy fighter, couldn't be serious even if his life depends on it. He was one of the best, with explosive, and hand combat as his specialties. He was very young, he wasn't even forty yet, he had his life ahead of him, but now he is dead.

He reaches for his face and closes the empty eyes with his palm.

"Jake, Xenna, and now Toby," He hears Jackie saying next to him. "You have to do something... we cannot keep... losing our people."

His jaw is locked tight, Jackie is right, of course, she is right. Jackie is as smart as she is fearless. Not many people can talk to him, hold a conversation as she can, he knows she respects him, and she knows she is safe under his protection.

"Tell Messiah about Toby, put him in the freezer until his brother tells us what he'd like to do with his body," He tells Jackie looking at the lifeless body on the floor. How long has he known him? A very long time that is for sure, the man he knew was strong, was fearless, Toby would kill his problem before he'd kill himself, and yet he is wrong.

He sees Jackie nod from the corner of his eyes and she quickly stands up to send a message to Toby's brother. Messiah is currently on a scavenging mission, they are not expecting him back until a few weeks.

He lost three of his people because of a single female alien.

Jake, Xenna, and now Toby, were his best people. It was Jake who told him that it was wrong for him to keep the alien in the cell, saying nonsense about she is not a prisoner.

"Fuck, Captain, I can't... I can't even tell you! I know all the evidence saying otherwise but that black chick is not with them, she is... FUCK! I don't know, we made a big mistake bringing her with us here, fucking hell we should have left her floating in space."

He remembered the day Jake came to him and shouted like a madman. Then, the day after he found him with a gun in his hand and his head blown up.

"I can't take it anymore, the guilt, fuck Malcolm I can't. Those fucking big black eyes, they haunt me even when I sleep, I can't!"