It's a Love Thing (28 page)

“
I’d die of guilt alone if
I let you go through with this,” Sera challenged.

Dex punched the wall next to the door.
Sera jumped at the thunderous sound; watched the cracks web and
splinter outward, white dust clouding around Dex.

“
Don’t I deserve a chance
to be happy again?” he thundered.

“
Yes! Be happy, Dex!” Sera
knew she was losing track of who Dex saw when he looked at her. She
didn’t care. “And if that means there has to be another girl, fine,
but not
that
kind
of girl.” She threw her arm toward the stairs, not caring that
tears coursed down her cheeks, but surprised that she meant what
she said. She’d cried the first time she saw an image on the
computer of Dex kissing another girl.

“
You think I’m going to
find another girl like Sera?” He surprised Sera by grabbing her
thin arm and dragging her to a mirror in the hall. “So I can watch
another one die? Wake up, Elspeth! There’s a virus killing everyone
out there. Everyone but me.”

Sera turned away from Elspeth’s
sickening image. “Don’t go up there, Dex. You’ll never find what
you really want.”

Dex’s face slid into a hard mask.
“Goodnight, Elspeth.” He turned away from her and headed for the
stairs.

His figure swam in front of Sera,
tilting. She stumbled, gripping the edge of a chair. “Please,
babe,” she whispered, swaying. She fell to the floor. The room
around her blurred out of sight. Blackness and pain swept over
her.

“
Elspeth!” Dex’s voice
sounded muffled, as though something clogged her ears.

“
Please,” she whispered
again, wanting to reach for him. “Please.”

*****

It surprised Sera that she
regained consciousness, but her body felt numb.
They’re coming soon.
She didn’t even
have the will to open her eyes. Elspeth’s body was spent. Surely
The Guides would not allow Sera to do anymore damage.

I’ll go willingly.
But as she thought of her mission and how she
failed, emotion burned her chest. She tried to tell herself she did
her best. But what had she really said? She’d planned so many
discourses in her head to change him but couldn’t get to them. The
disappointment choked her. Tears slipped from under her eyelids and
traced a cold path across her feverish cheeks.

“
Are you in pain?” The
voice, accompanied by the familiar touch on her cheek, made Sera
fight to open her eyes.

“
Dex?” It was barely
audible.

“
Of course.”

Sera paused, waiting for another voice
to join his. “Where’s her . . . mom?” It was so hard to breathe.
She couldn’t get one deep enough.

Dex wiped a gentle hand across her
forehead. “Honestly? I don’t know. She said she needed air. I think
she just couldn’t stand to watch her daughter die a second time.”
His voice cracked. He cleared his throat.

“
Listen, Dex.” Sera fought
for the strength for one last plea. “There’s something you . . .
have to promise me. My dying wish . . . okay?”

Dex reached out and took her hands,
clutching them inside his own. “You’ve already tried that one on
me.”

She stared at him, trying to remember
if something came up in their earlier conversations.

“
You’re Sera,” he stated,
ending her mental search. She gaped. “I don’t know how or why. I
don’t understand at all but somehow you are.”

“
How could . . . you know?”
Would The Guides punish her for this? She didn’t care.

He laughed softly, the first true
laugh since Sera returned to Earth. “You know too much and there’s
something about your eyes.” He paused, the moment filled with
emotion. “How could you do this to me, honey? How could you make me
lose you all over again?”

Guilt burned over her, mingling with
the fever that raged in her body. “I couldn’t just . . . sit around
and watch you . . . throw your soul away.”

Remorse filled his eyes. He looked
down in an attempt to hide it. “You’ve been watching me . . . from
heaven.”

“
Something like that.” Sera
struggled to lift her hand and touch his face, his hair, trace his
lips with her finger. He took it in his and kissed it. “They’ll
come . . . soon, Dex. . . . Please listen to

. . . me.”

“
Who?”

Sera wanted to shake her head at him,
tell him there wasn’t time to explain. Explanations weren’t
important. That she didn’t have the strength. “It’s complicated.
Call . . . them angels . . . but I’m not . . . not exactly dead.
Some people who . . . care about saving the population . . . took
my body before I died. They need to . . . take Elspeth’s before . .
. it’s too late.”

Dex’s eyes lit up. “Then you’re better
. . . or your body is . . . wherever it is?”

“
Yeah, kind of . . .
but—”

“
Then you could come back.
As Sera.”

She shook her head once, all that she
had strength to do.

“
But I could come with
you.”

Tears clouded Sera’s
vision, which seemed fuzzy anyway.
Oh,
please. Not yet.
“They think . . . your
body,” she struggled to breathe.
No!
But she knew it wasn’t The Guides
rushing to take her—a confusing thought in and of itself—but
Elspeth’s body was going quicker than anyone expected.

Dex seemed to understand. “Because of
the drugs and stuff.” He covered his mouth with his hand. “I’m
sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Sera knew that only the first was
addressed to her. She closed her eyes, unable to hold them open any
longer. “Just don’t . . . waste . . . this.”

His hands slipped under
Elspeth’s frail body. “No . . . Sera, babe. Please. Stay here with
me.” He cradled her close to his chest. He choked on the words.
“Please.
Please, God.
”

*****

“
Please. I . . . I can’t do
this alone. Not twice.”

Elspeth’s chest rose shallowly, but
Dex knew she wouldn’t open her eyes again.

“
We have to take her now
before it’s too late.”

Dex looked up. A neat looking young
woman, deep brown hair swept cleanly off her shoulders, stood at
the end of the bed. “You can cure her,” he said. Actually, begged.
Something made him reach up with one hand to wipe at the tears on
his cheeks.

She shook her head. “We
have discovered a treatment, but for reasons unknown to us, we
cannot use it on Earth. We can slow the rate of destruction
exponentially, until we
are
able to cure it. That is many years down the road,
which is why we must salvage what we can in order to repopulate
Earth when the time comes.”

“
I need her. I can’t save
myself without Sera,” he pleaded.

She smiled. “I don’t believe that
anymore, Dex.”

“
Don’t take
her.”

Sadness crept onto the woman’s face.
She frowned, as though it came without her permission. “That body
is dying. It has mere hours left before everything shuts down and
we cannot save Elspeth Ronan. Sera did not wish that sacrifice to
be made.”

“
Then let Sera come back.
You said you can slow the virus.”

She shook her head. “Something in this
atmosphere negates the treatment we’ve affected. Sera’s body would
also die within days of coming back.”

Dex closed his eyes. He struggled for
composure. “There’s nothing?”

“
I am very
sorry.”

He nodded, still unable to look at
her. “Then . . . tell Elspeth thank you when you talk to
her.”

“
I will.”

Dex clutched the body for several more
moments before laying it gently on the bed. He turned to the woman,
who’d moved to the other side of Elspeth. “And tell Sera I won’t
waste it.”

She smiled warmly at him. “Good
idea.”

He left the side of the bed, glancing
back only once before walking out.

*****

“
Here on your right is the
Transition Center, where clerks and overseers work to make your
conversion to the Haven Base lifestyle as easy as possible.” Sera
held her hand out toward the room, feeling wistful. She couldn’t
help but wish for a peek at the computers, one moment to see how
Dex was doing. But the guides forbade her from accessing Earth
files. No exceptions. “Any questions?” she asked the small group
crowded around her and the door.

The new arrivals looked bewildered.
She didn’t blame them. Most of them had only woken from the
“transition trance” as they dubbed it, a day or two before. Talks
with their overseer could hardly prepare them for the tour Sera led
them on of the massive Haven Base. When none of them spoke, she
turned to move on.

“
Sera? One
moment?”

Sera looked up. Emily stood at the
door. She smiled.

“
Of course,” Sera
said.

“
He’s fine, Sera. I told
you he would be,” Emily admonished.

Sera managed a weak smile. “I know.
How is Elspeth?”

“
She’ll need a few more
days to recover, but she will be absolutely fine.” Emily patted
Sera’s shoulder.

“
I didn’t mean to push her
so far—”

“
As you have told me at
least a hundred times since you got back. She is fine.” Emily
laughed. “I need to see you after you get done with this round. Do
you mind meeting me back at my office?”

“
Of course. What is
it?”

Emily just smiled and returned to the
Transition Center.

She smiled. So hopefully
it’s not bad,
Sera thought. She strode
ahead to lead the tour onward.
Maybe I’m
getting reassigned . . . I wish.

After handing over the
group to their Transitions Overseer, Sera hurried through the
pristine hallways to Emily’s private office. She could hardly
concentrate the rest of the tour, racking her brain for what Emily
might need to see her for. Possibly just another warning about
trying to access Dex’s file. Sera hadn’t tried, but Emily might
think she was getting desperate to know something. “He’s fine” felt
so generic.
Maybe she wants to show me an
image or something to reassure me.
Sera
tried not to get her hopes up.

She tapped lightly on Emily’s closed
door. It opened immediately. “Hello, Sera.” Emily smiled again, and
stepped out into the hall with Sera. “Come with me.”

“
Where are we
going?”

“
You’ll see.” Emily winked.
“Why don’t I give you an update on Dex since you’re dying to know
more than you’ve been told.” She turned to Sera, looking stern
despite the casualness of her voice. “Thank you for obeying the
orders not to try and see him, Sera.”

It sounded much more like a warning
than praise. Sera sighed. “You’re welcome.”

Emily laughed. “Perhaps I should have
told you earlier why you were allowed to use Elspeth’s body so
long, though I thought you would have guessed by now. We monitored
your interaction with Dex Porter closely. To our surprise, we saw
signs of change early on. By the final days, we were sure your
efforts touched him, which made the slight sacrifice to Elspeth’s
body worth it.”

“
And now?”

“
Just as we suspected. Dex
has striven to completely change his path.”

Sera smiled. “Really?”

Emily raised her eyebrows. “Really,
Sera. Here we are.” She held open a door.

Sera looked up, surprised to find they
were at the Arrivals Center. “Arrivals?”

Emily followed in behind her. “There’s
someone scheduled to come up on the thirteen-ten shuttle. I thought
it might brighten your day.”

Sera frowned. “Who?” Her
mind ran through a list of choices as she watched the shuttle
unload on the bay on the other side of the glass. Gurneys rolled
out, their occupants each in varying stages of health, most looking
better than Elspeth, even after a day in Recovery.
Mom, Dad? . . . Never, they’re too old.
She thought of her friends, not sure whether to be
glad or scared that they were now here on Haven Base.

Then a tall, dark-haired young man
ducked his head and exited the shuttle on his own two legs. Sera
pressed her hand against the glass. She gasped.
“Impossible.”

He didn’t see her yet. A woman walked
out behind him, took his arm and led him through the Arrival
doors.

Sera stared in astonishment. She
turned to Emily. “How?”

“
I took the liberty of
taking a blood sample before I left with Elspeth. I had a hunch. He
has a certain level of immunity to the virus. It’s possible that it
may eventually lead to a cure or a treatment workable within
Earth’s atmosphere. The Guides felt it was an opportunity we must
take advantage of.”

“
But you said . . . his
body is damaged.” As Sera watched him go through the normal vitals
checks and scans before they released him, she struggled to keep
tears at bay. It seemed so unreal, too good to be true.