Extraterrestrial Moors

7

She hates me. I saw it in her eyes before I released her restraints. They were there for her protection, but she could only see it as us treating her as a prisoner. She's never been a prisoner, but how could we convince her of that now? What little trust she had in us is gone. I told them it was a mistake to not tell her, but I was told to not tell her and now look how well that worked out.

I couldn't help myself I had to touch her hair. She's so scared and hurt, we did that to her. I did that to her. She flinches back from my touch so violently that she falls to the floor but not without hitting her head on the way down. 

She's bleeding, so much blood. I call for help then do my best to staunch the blood without moving her head. There's every possibility that she hurt her neck when she fell.

The doctor and nurse race into the room and start demanding answers even as they check Maha out. 

Once they are assured that Maha hasn't hurt her neck they ask me to help return her to the medical bed. They replace the restraints and then proceed to fix the wound on Maha's head.

"You should leave Lt. She's knocked herself out and won't be waking for some time. You knew these restraints were for her protection, why did you feel it necessary to take them off?" The doctor demands.

"She saw them as meaning that she is a prisoner." The doctor blanches at my words and looks at the nurse with fear.

"We can't afford to have her hurt herself like this again, but she mustn't see herself as a prisoner," the doctor mutters to himself.

"Why not? We've already treated her worse," my bitterness comes out. Our lies have brought this about. My lies. 

"We need her help. We need her trust," the doctor says urgently.

My bitter laugh fills the echoing room, "We lost that the moment we let that idiot in charge of her and I lost it when I was ordered to lie to her. I was the only one she trusted and now she hates me, so good luck with that." 

I walk out the door and my Commander is waiting for me in the corridor. "You know her best Lt. where do we go from here?"

Perhaps it's career suicide but I can't help it, my bitterness is too acute and full to keep out of my speech with my co. "Too late sir. I have told you and everyone else how to handle her and it seems that you did the exact opposite. Now she won't even let me near her or even look at me and quite frankly that is far better than when she does. I've never seen anyone look at someone with so much hatred as she did me."

"I'm sorry Lt. even I have to follow orders and my orders were to have the brainiacs have first go at her and there are protocols we have to follow."

"Yes, sir. But you see she doesn't care. All she knows is that she's been treated like an animal and a prisoner. She's been treated worse than a criminal and lied to constantly. That I was able to keep her trust for as long as I did is nothing short of a miracle. Hope you can find someone that she will trust or," I shrug, "whatever it is you want to use her for you won't be able to." I give her a salute and go back to my room just long enough to change into my gym clothes. I have to work off my anger or I'll land myself in the brig.

"She's coming around," the annoying voice says. At least that's what I think it says through the pounding, no stabbing pain in my head. What happened?

Oh, yeah. Rafe tried to tell me that the whole lie I'd been living called my life wasn't what I thought it was. He did undo the restraints though. I fell off the bed and hit something on the way down. That's right, that's why my head feels like something is stabbing it.

"Maha," a voice I didn't recognize starts speaking to me. Rafe lied to me. He said he was ordered to do so. So then whoever is talking to me now won't be telling me the truth either. No reason to open my eyes and with my head throbbing in time with my blood pumping I have every reason not too.

"Rafe says that we messed things up too much. He says that we haven't done much right. We did things according to protocols though Maha. But what those fools that first had you in their care did was unforgivable. So if you want to be angry about that you have every reason to be.

"You should know that Rafe has ever been fighting for you. He put his career on the line in standing up to those idiots and again when he told me that to my face that I was no better than those idiots. He wanted to tell you the truth the entire time Maha. I had to threaten him with a courtmartial and forbidding him from seeing you to get him to agree to keeping certain things a secret. Don't hold it against him Maha, it wasn't his fault." Her voice is coaxing me to accept her words but, how can I believe her when I feel those damn restraints back on me.

"If I remove the restraints you must be careful, that last fall gave you a head wound that required ten stitches and a small concussion. You need to take better care of yourself." The voice is amused but I find nothing amusing about my situation, I do however feel the restraints being removed. I still refuse to open my eyes.

"Lt. Rafe won't be back unless you request him, he said that he causes you too much pain." Her voice is no longer amused.

I carefully turn my body away from the voice without opening my eyes. When I feel the light turn off I open my eyes and find that I'm truly alone. It's too much, I start crying like I haven't done since they took that idiot from being in charge of me. I'm more alone now than I was when Rafe found me on Earth.