Orphaned Stars (original title Humanity)

Chapter 16

Held in a glass cell with no privacy as prying eyes of station guards peered in now and again at the new specimen that was rumoured to give them the ability to breathe the outside air. The Vega soldiers couldn't wait to breathe the air they have been denied for so long.

Sitting on the concrete slab, handcuffed, Shahnaz leaned her head against the glass wall. She had only but time to think, but she didn't want to. All that had happened – all that she had lost.

Is this to be the end of me? Used, chopped up and then discarded.

Awaken from her forlorn memories, Captain Isaac Collins stepped in, pressed the side button to blacken out the walls. The central light flicked on, contrasting the harsh shadows. He didn't say anything, just stared at her until she looked back at him.

"I really thought you were dead this time around."

Shahnaz, as much as she wanted to embrace her once friend, could only offer her cold glare, for he wasn't the same boy she treated like a brother.

"What do you mean this time around?"

He pulled up a chair, a few feet from her. "Who do you think got you in a cave far from here?"

"That doesn't make sense," she said blinking, shaking her dirty head. "The ground split open and I fell in."

"That's true," he commented, nodding slowly. "You did fall through, but shortly after a couple of aid workers were looking for survivors. They found you. You're a miracle really because you shouldn't have survived, but you had a weak pulse."

"What happened to me?" she asked, sitting on the edge of the slab.

Isaac tore his gaze away. "You were transported here, just like the rest of us. We never knew because there were a lot people. Within that year the air became toxic and soon we were split up."

"The old and disabled didn't make it. I know, Junayd told me so."

Smirking his distorted lips he continued. "After they disposed the unwanted, the survivors joined – sorry were forced into the army. After a year or so we heard rumours of a girl – well a woman who had this rare lung tissue that could help us breathe the air. Curiosity got the best of me and I sneaked around, with Junayd and found you."

"Why didn't you wake me?"

"Doctors said you were in a coma, or something like that." he shrugged, offhandedly, as if that piece of information wasn't important.

"What happened then?"

"Junayd and I were young and not very bright. We managed to sneak you out and hide you a couple of miles away. I tried everything to wake you up, but you wouldn't. Then in 2021 you were found again, brought back to the lab."

"I remember," she whispered. "Junayd put his jacket around me."

"Yeah, and I shot a woman's face off," he said proudly. "Anyway this time around we got you far away, put you in a cave. I guess you woke up there."

She leaned back, eyes not leaving his. "Why didn't you just kill me? I mean, you spent so much time hiding me, then hiding me again. Wouldn't it be easier to –"

"I couldn't – kill you," he spoke softly, a slight hurt in his voice. "I lost you that day – 9th May 2015 and I prayed that somehow you'd make it. Then I saw how fucked up this world became; I prayed that you had found peace instead. But you were alive and I couldn't give you to these monsters."

She shook her head in disbelief. "Oh that's mighty rich of you. What does your General Morton think of it?"

"It's a façade," he commented. "I can't lose his trust."

"You and Junayd have been working together, all this time?"

He nodded. "We don't like it here. Why do you think Junayd ran away? This place tears at your humanity so much that you wish you could just flip that humanity switch off, inside your brain. The horrors – you can't imagine what we've done."

She leaned forward, but her chains restricted her to leave the seat. "Do you ever think of your life before the Explosion?"

Glancing from the floor, he bit his lower lip. "They don't feel like memories anymore – just dreams of a despondent man. The manor, my parents, those hot summer days, your mother, Yasir and Azra and of course – you – making chicken curry. Gosh I missed your cooking and company."

She smiled, agreeing with him. She gazed at him, remembering the yellow covered book. "Do you remember that book you loved to read? It had a yellow cover with red writing"

He thought for a while. "I am Legend?"

"Yes," she said. "What happened to Robert Neville, in the end? You never told me or got me a copy."

Crossing his arms, leaning in his seat, he rubbed his chin with his rough hands. "Let's see – seeing that he was the last human on earth and those vampires's wanted his blood, he killed them. He then meets this woman. Can't remember her name, Rachel I think. She tells him that the ones who are infected are adapting and rebuilding their society. But because Robert killed so many of them, they fear him."

"He dies," she whispered, "doesn't he?"

"Yes, he does, because he's killed so many of them. They sentence him to die and that woman gives him pills to make it easier. Bottom line is, he realises that being the last of his kind and he's now the legend to the new race." He paused, closing his eyes. "I am a new superstition entering the unassailable fortress of forever. I am legend."

She relaxed her shoulders. "So he actually becomes a villain in their eyes." She pointed at her mouth. "How did you get that?"

Sucking his lips inwards he glanced up. "Combat training with Darzi six years ago. My score to settle with him."

Within the talking about the past, the formidable silence occurred, the deepest stare into their eyes they haven't seen, feeling like a lifetime had gone by.

"I'm sorry Isaac," she whispered in a brittle voice. "Everything changed because of my one action, to save someone else I –"

"You left us," he stated, matter of fact, with slight remorse in his deep voice.

"I never got to see you grow up. I don't even know if you ever fell in love or got married or have children."

His once closed in expression opened slightly, an emotion of sorrow filled his now warming blue eyes.

"Once you're a soldier in the Vega Army, you don't have time for those things, yet I did fall in love." He stood up, scraping the chair, heading back.

She couldn't let him leave; not now as she found him. The conversation she craved, the make believing. "What happened to her?"

Hands ready to push the door, he fought back his tears. "She gave up her seat fifteen years ago. She gave up her seat."

Her heart leaped as she called his name, but he left. The transparent walls appeared, his strides long, not once glancing back.

She gave up her seat. She-gave-up-her-seat.

"Why," she asked herself, tears cascading down.

A/N – a little sweet exchange between Shahnaz and Isaac, trying to rekindle the friendship they once had. I didn't know how to end the chapter so give me your suggestions readers. Good, bad, improvements? Comment away and hit the star symbol for a dedication. X