Argonaut - The Apprentice (Part II)

Epilogue - The Fallen

Epilogue – The Fallen

4th May 8:44 AM

Serena lay on the operating table, numb both physically and emotionally. She hadn't spoken a word since Paris. One arm lay beside her the fingers occasionally moving. The other hand was, quite simply, not there. Cut off at the elbow, a patch of bandages covered all that remained.

Cassius walked slowly into the room, observing the smallest member of her team miserably. At this moment, Serena had never felt smaller.

'Have you found her yet?' Serena asked without turning to look at her, trying very hard to keep her voice steady. Athena had disappeared after the battle of Paris, presumably to avoid the wrath her plan would attract from the Argonauts; mainly Cassius and Serena. Tanner, Apollo, and Artemis were also gone, undoubtedly more of Athena's scheming.

"No, but I found this at the door," the captain said gently, gesturing to the two-foot long box she carried, "It's from Athena, to you."

'What is it?' she asked, turning only her head.

Cassius remained silent, opening the lid and showing the contents to Serena. Inside the box lay a black metal arm, completely mechanical. The design was incredible, a work of art actually. A replacement for the one she had lost; for the part of herself she had lost.

'Do we know where she's gone?'

"No, but it came with this. We haven't watched it yet."

Cassius picked up a small computer chip that lay beside the arm, fixing it into her device. Athena's face was instantly projected, playing a recorded message.

"-Argonauts,-" she started trying to stay formal despite the obvious despair in her voice. The background showed that it had been filmed inside her suit of armour. "-I'm so sorry, I never thought anything like this would happen. Serena, you may well choose to wrap these fingers around my throat when we meet again, and if that's what you need to do I won't stop you.-"

'She's right about one thing,' Serena thought, her anger rising.

"-This can't possibly make up for your loss, but I don't know what else to do. I've spent so long making and fixing things that I don't how else to try and make things better. So that's what I'm going to do, I'm going to fix this. AURORA won't find me, but I will come back when I have something that can win this war. I know you all hate me, and there's nothing I could ever do to bring him back.-" She paused for a long moment, tears welling in her eyes, "-I'm so sorry, for everything. I will make things better, one day.-"

The recording flickered and died, leaving the two Argonauts alone once again.

'Why does it have to be us?' Serena demanded, asking the question with a mix of anger and misery, 'Why do we have to be the ones that lose everything? Hell, the world wouldn't even care if we died, but we still have to fight and die for it. How many more of us have to be killed before we can't go on?'

"We sacrifice so that others don't have to," Cassius replied, "It's not fair, it's never fair. I can promise you Serena, he didn't die for nothing. He showed us that the Stygians aren't invincible, he gave us hope. David died believing he just saved the world, we should all be so lucky."

'I'm going to find her Cassie,' the telepath thought miserably, 'I'm going to find Athena and make her pay for what she's done. Absinthe was right all along.'

Cassius rested a hand on Serena's shoulder comfortingly before leaving the room. "It'll be ok, we can come back from this."

Absinthe's words echoed in Serena's head as she stared at the mechanical arm the captain had left. A single object fell from her hand, fluttering to the floor; the object David had given when he said goodbye. The Kinetic smiled in the crumpled photograph, his arms wrapped around a grinning Serena in front of a café somewhere in China. The pouring rain did nothing to dampen either of their moods. It was strange, Serena hardly recognised the girl in the photograph. As she remembered happy day tears began to flow, falling like salty rain onto the picture.

End of Part II : The Apprentice