15. Revnan

"Why are you doing this?" I ask as she uses the stitcher to close my wounds. It stings, but that's nothing compared to the plasma that shot through my chest. "Why help the enemy? Are you stupid?"

"We're not enemies," the girl retorts as she ties off the last of the stitches.

And she's right. I don't know how or why, but I know she's not my enemy. It's something that I feel deep in my soul, as deep as my faith in Ataxia.

But if I tell her that, she might take advantage of me. Instead, I scoff. "So, stupid it is, then."

With swift hands and deft fingers, she wraps the first of the plasma bullet wounds in clean gauze. Unfortunately, there are plenty more wounds where that came from.

"Well, maybe," she retorts, pulling out the disinfectant spray. "But who do you think is stupider? The person with enough ammunition to kill you before you can think to insult me again or the person who insults someone trying to save his life?"

I can see it in her eyes. It's the gaze of every soldier haunted by the suffering and death around them. She has killed before. With her penchant for mercy, I have to guess that it's only ever been in self-defense, but I see in those world-weary eyes that she understands the weight that killing places on your soul.

And her gaze is so familiar. Seeing her is like running into a best friend from your early childhood. Painfully familiar but also so different from the person you expect to see. And why would I expect to see her, anyway? I've never met this woman before in my life.

"I still think it's the person who wastes vital medical supplies on an enemy combatant," I slur. The blood loss must really be getting to me. My eyelids are drooping, and I might pass out again.

"Hey." She smacks my cheek. "Stay awake."

Before I passed out the first time, I remember thinking that it was Ataxia's will for me to die a hero on the battlefield. Being alive is something of a shock, but if Ataxia doesn't want me dead yet, what does she want?

Maybe all this – the war, the battle, the getting shot, the almost dying – was her trying to nudge me into the right place at the right time. Maybe my destiny was never to die in a fight, but rather to live and be with the girl currently treating my wounds.

The idea feels right, but I don't know why. A war is no place for love to bloom. Then again, Ataxia has always been poetic in that sense. Amid all the hatred and destruction, something beautiful is born.

But still, this girl has no reason to help me. I'm the enemy, and any sane person would have shot me in the face as soon as they saw that I was still alive. A feeling of guilt forms like a rock in my stomach. It's my people's fault that her people are suffering, but still, she stops to help me.

Maybe she too can feel this impossible, inexorable connection.

This revelation changes everything. I've had my doubts about this stupid war and the suffering it has unleashed, but I justified it by saying that my purpose is to be a soldier. Could I have been wrong the whole time?

The girl is rambling, talking about earth animals called scorpions and frogs and how scorpions cannot be trusted. If I'm being honest, I've tuned out most of it, mainly because I'm struggling to stay awake.

She moves to slap me again, and on reflex, I grab her hand, nearly crushing it with my grip. With a pained hiss, she tries to pull free, but I'm too strong. "Let go, you dingleberry!" she snaps.

Surprised, I snort out a laugh as I release her. If anyone else called me that, I would have broken every bone in their body, but I find myself somewhat amused by her use of the classic insult. Very few humans are bold enough to insult an Odex to his face.

She shakes out her hand. "What is wrong with you?"

"I don't like getting slapped," I reply. "Next time you try that, the hand gets broken."

"And how do you expect me to help you if I have a broken hand? Do you want me to leave you to die?" She rubs at the bruised hand, and I feel another twinge of guilt.

"Maybe you shouldn't help me. I'll only cause you pain."

She rolls her eyes and pours antiseptic into the open wound. "Yeah, well, you're not the only one who can inflict pain."

I bite back a cry at the sting, but she ignores me, instead focusing on stitching my wounds closed. "I thought we established that I'm not very smart, so just shut up and let me help you," she says.

She always was a feisty one.

Wait, always? Where did that come from? I've never seen this woman before in my life.

It must be another nudge from Ataxia, a sign that I should just put aside my pride and guilt and let this girl help me.

"Look," she says, manually tying off the stitches, "I don't know why I'm doing this either. I bet you would've killed me without hesitation if you could. It's what the Coalition does. It tortures and kills and destroys."

"Not true," I protest. "You're a noncombatant. I would never murder an innocent civilian, and my brothers are just following orders."

She scoffs at that, rolling her eyes. "Tell that to Joe Rush, Felicia Pexers, Mandy Wex, and Evan Klint. Those are just the last four civilians I can name in the past month. Tell me, does ‘just following orders' give any comfort to the loved ones they leave behind? Will those empty words dry the tears of their children and spouses?"

I find myself at a loss for words. Because she's right. She's completely right. I can parrot propaganda back to her as much as I want, but it doesn't change the reality of the life she's lived and the suffering she's endured. I've seen it all firsthand, and it would be an insult to even try.

"Sorry," I grumble. I'm not entirely sure what I'm sorry for. Maybe it's for the suffering the Coalition has put her and her people through. Maybe it's for my own stupidity and insensitivity.

Does it really matter when an apology will never even make a dent in the wrongs committed against her by the group that I'm a part of?

She huffs through her nose but doesn't otherwise respond. Fair enough.

"So, you got a name, nurse?"

I want to say it's Alana. For some reason, she looks like an Alana to me.

"Maya," she replies, tying off the gauze. "What about you, Coalition scum?" Though she insults me, it comes across as a formality rather than anything with real heat to it.

"Revnan." With a groan, I sit up and immediately regret it. The world tilts, and it takes her propping me up on one side to keep me from falling over again. The wounds and blood loss really did a number on me.

"Let me help you get to your feet," she says, standing up and offering a hand. "I know a safe place that isn't too far from here. But we'll have to walk. I can't carry you."

I look her up and down. Though she has a strong, wiry frame from surviving in a war zone, she is short and definitely not strong enough to take even half my weight to help me get wherever she wants to go. This is gonna hurt like hell.

With her help, I get to my feet, staggering slightly as the pain threatens to knock me over again. I curse under my breath, and we make our slow, careful trek through the rubble of her town.

Her town. How can I be sure that this isn't a trap?

The truth is that I cannot be certain. Maya may have treated my wounds, but she has every reason to want to kill me. And I don't blame her. If our positions were reversed, I'd feel the same way.

Maybe I should kill her, or at least knock her out. I'll probably be safer if I struck out on my own to look for my missing unit.

She certainly would be safer without me around. If other humans find out that she's harboring the enemy, they'll probably kill her.

If I incapacitated her now, she'd have plausible deniability. If I killed her, then we would have one less enemy to worry about.

But then images flash in my mind. I see her bleeding out in my arms, but not here on Armstrong. The landscape, wherever it is, is a place I"ve never seen, but the image is so vivid it feels real. The sheer agony of these intrusive thoughts shakes me out of any desire to hurt her.

"You okay?" she asks, apparently sensing that I've been overcome with pain of some kind. "Need a break?"

I shake my head. "Let's just get there."

I'm taking this and whatever happens next on faith, and I pray that I don't regret it.