UNWANTED

CHAPTER 15 - R5.8 - ILYAAS

Lesya was awake, I felt it. She woke up multiple times in the night, but the sedatives that came with the nanites kept me too in between the realms of consciousness and sleep, that I could only want to help her but not actually do the same.

The urge to hold her was strong but not strong enough in that state.

It has always been like this since I met her...on the night I guarded the herd. She fell from the sky like a meteorite. I was afraid and awed in equal measure.

I had to wake up, but I couldn't, and I never felt so useless.

I think I dreamt of her.

That night, when I saw the arc of smoke and fire fall from the sky, I almost ran away. But curiosity got the better of me, and maybe it was better that it did. She was laying on the sand, her clothes smoldering, her runner in scraps. I had to pull her from the dunes and into the village that night.

The settlement only had radio. We didn't even have electricity. In those times, the North African States were in constant flux, and we, the people of the ruins, found a small piece of dessert unengaged in the civil war.

Lesya was without a name until the I named her. Lesya after the white-haired queen. We were afraid for days, of course. Where did she come from? Who was she? Was she Onus? In her deep and long sleep, everyone agreed to be kind and submissive, just in case.

She was too young to be in the military and she had the features of an Onus, so we, in our small hope, wished she was a White Raven - a savior. Little did we know she was only a runaway princess who'd just lost all her family. And little did I know that soon I would lose all of mine.

"LY!" She yelled, shaking me awake.

When my eyes opened, I felt the heat coming from her fake windows, it was no longer early.

"Hmm?" I said, my head groggy. "What time is it? I should be on duty..."

"Oh, it's ten, and no, I got all of you off for the day." She told me. "Let the rest of the Guard do their jobs for once. Pentagon shall have a vacation!"

"But I've been going off duty a lot already-"

"I'm the empress and I command that you be off duty!"

"Oh." I said, feeling like my tongue like a dead mass in my mouth. I sat up, and the whole world spun for a while around me. "So, what shall we do today?"

"I already chose the crown jewels and the dresses I should wear for the coronation. Aside from going to the temple this Friday, I have nothing to do." Lesya said, running to her closet.

Through the agape door I saw her pulling a suitcase out and stuffing every article of clothing in reach into it. "Lesya...?"

"Yes?"

"Are you running away again?"

"You know it just came to me this morning."

"What?"

"I need a vacation."

I didn't hear that right, right? "What?"

"Just for a day!" She defended. "These are my last few days of freedom."

"But you're already empress... the coronation is just a formality."

She slammed the suitcase shut. "Ilyaas Malak, I was blackmailed, I found out I had a hand in a genocide, I endangered the only suitor I liked, and I saw that my brother was deleted from every piece of footage from the day he died!" She screamed a sigh. "I need a vacation!"