Titans

[40] Atara

Unknown Temporal Region [387:25]
Location: The Hermes Starship

The controls fall out of my hands, become uncontrollable. The ship plummets forwards, backwards, sideways, up or down; I can't tell. All directions are the same. The only way I know we're moving is by the flipping of my stomach, as if we're falling.

Everything is silent.

Merc pulls out of his chair and draws up beside me, leaning forward to get a better look out the window. "There's no stars," he says. "It's just black."

"Do you think we made it out of the rift?" Lilith asks.

Merc looks back at her and swallows. He doesn't nod.

"Cal," I say, eyeing the abyss. Fear is working its way up my throat. Soon I won't be able to breathe. "What do we do?"

To my horror – and to everyone else's as well – there's no immediate reply. Cal always has an answer. Even if it's not the answer, it's a promise of one. He knows what to do when no one else does. But now he's rendered silent.

"I – I can – check the books. Or the files we found. There might be something there – something I've missed."

But he doesn't leave his seat.

Merc turns around and folds his arms. "Cal," he says sternly. "The files."

Whatever terror was holding Cal captive breaks. "Right." He nods and jumps from his seat, walking hurriedly for the door.

"I'll help," Lilith says and disappears after him.

Merc is silent for a while, and I focus on controlling the rapid pace of my heart. We've been here for all of five minutes and already I feel fear taking possession of my body, crawling through my veins. If I don't control it, I could lose myself to it. I could act out again. And I promised Cal I wouldn't.

Nothing changes; the black void remains constant, like staring at the back of your eyelids when your eyes have been sewn shut. It's beyond frightening. How are we meant to differentiate the passage of time, between fantasy and reality, when the only substance the universe is producing is an unchanging darkness?

Eventually the fear grows too hard to deal with in silence. I let it spill into my voice as I turn to Merc, still standing by the window, looking impossibly composed. "Maybe this is just it," I say, shaking. The sound quivers on the still air. "Maybe this is home."

He takes a while to reply. "That can't be true," he murmurs eventually, more to himself than to me. Then, louder, "We have memories of where we came from. Of Earth. We know it exists. We know what the stars look like from there. This isn't home."

"The memories could be fake," I say softly. "They could have been engineered."

"By who?"

"By us."

He's looking at me and he's not blinking. He's not moving. He's barely breathing. And I realise I've just confronted his worst fear – that there's nothing to return to. That it's only us. That it was only ever just us.

"I can't believe that," he says finally, still looking at me.

"We could have erased our own memories, engineered new ones, created a false backstory for ourselves so we could pretend we weren't alone. Ignorance is bliss, right?" I can't believe that I'm saying what I'm saying. The words don't seem to come from me. They come from some other person, some smarter, wiser and more composed version of Atara. I don't know her. But I think I might have been her, before it all.

Merc frowns at me. "Surely you don't believe that?"

I look away, breaking eye contact. No. I don't believe that. I believe in home. But sometimes it's easier to hope for what you deserve than to hope for what you want.

"Say we really are just caught in this space-time rift. What then? What happens if we can't get out?"

His face is set. "Cal will figure this out. He'll figure it out and we'll go home and it will all be fine."

"And if he doesn't? We'll starve to death in this place. Or suffocate. Or freeze. Whichever happens first."

"You're being morbid."

"Am I?"

The muscles in Merc's back pull taut. His hands tighten into fists. I wait for him to walk out of the room. Leave me behind. Leave me alone. By accident or by design, I've always been the outsider in this group. And I can sense his mounting impulse to keep it that way.

Just when I think for sure he's going to turn and go, he does the opposite. He steps towards me and lowers into a crouch so we're at eye level. At once, all I can see are his soft blue eyes. His strong, defined face, crowned by dark hair and painted gold by his own unique brand of tenacity. He is like some statue of an old ruler, one who ruled by benevolence and strength of will. He is like a modern-day titan, conquering all he touches. The only difference is, he doesn't know it.

"I want you to know," he says, "that I'm not afraid of you. I'm not afraid of who you are or what you can do. And honestly, I don't care. You're Atara – and that's all that matters."

I look away. "You don't know me, Merc."

"Yes, I do."

I'm focusing on the void, trying to make something out of it with my eyes. Maybe if I just look hard enough –

"Atara, look at me." Reluctantly, I do as he says. "I know you. I know you in a way I can't understand. I know you heart first, brain second. I knew you the instant I stumbled across you in the dark. And I knew you before that, too. I know I did. It's the only explanation that makes sense."

"You're speaking nonsense," I say and look back at the darkness.

"Atara..."

"Why do you care about me, Merc?" I snap. "Why is it that you don't treat me like Cal and Lilith do? Why don't you hate me?"

"I told you. It's because I know you."

"That's bullshit."

He looks taken-aback. "Excuse me?"

"Cal and Lilith know me too. We were all on this ship together before we lost our memories, and we've all spent the same amount of time together after that. They know me just as well as you do. You don't care for me because you know me, Merc, otherwise it'd be smiles and hugs all round. You care for me because some part of your brain refuses to acknowledge the fact that I'm dangerous, and that you should be scared of me."

It takes him a while to respond. "You're not dangerous, Atara. You're just...a mystery."

I cross my arms and stare at the blackness beyond the window. It probably goes on forever – a quiet, dark, emptiness that just extends, extends, extends, nothing changing, nothing happening. A void missing both substance and time. Even with Merc here, it makes me feel extraordinarily alone.

Thoughts start buzzing in my mind, trying to fill the silence. Eventually I can't contain them anymore. I blurt, "Lilith hated me before we lost our memories you know. I saw it in a dream, only I know it was real. She had me pinned against a wall. She was so angry. I think she was accusing me of doing something. She said everyone was completely unaware of what I was, like I had them all fooled. Perhaps I'm fooling you. I could be fooling you right now and that's why you think you can trust me. That's why you think you care for me."

He doesn't say a word. I continue, turning to him. "I don't know. She hated me then. She hates me now. I suppose I just think that maybe there's a reason. Maybe hate is like a muscle: once you hate something, it becomes an instinct to hate it again. It's muscle memory. Hate, fear, fooling someone into caring for you, caring for someone because you've been fooled. It's all muscle memory."

Merc stares at me for a long time, enigmatic. At last he says, "It all had to start somewhere, though, didn't it? At one point it wasn't an instinct. It was just a decision." And he reaches out, takes my hand. One touch.

Without realising it, he conquers all.