"This is so unfair," Radu said. "Why did this have to happen?"
"Because Jewel is incompetent," Suzee said, her nose in the air.
Harlan shook his head. "It’s not because she didn’t know what she was doing, because obviously she did, or else she wouldn’t have tried to save Miss Davenport. It’s because she didn’t know who Miss Davenport really was. It was just a case of mistaken identity."
"Yeah," Suzee said,"but that ‘mistaken identity’ is causing a lot of problems. Problems we wouldn’t even have if Jewel had not been around to cause them. Don’t you get it? Its all Jewel’s fault, and I don’t even know who the heck she is!"
"Calm down, Suzee," Harlan said. "We’ll get through this."
Boy, I wish I could believe you, Radu said under his breath. Luckily, no one else heard him.
As for Davenport, she was sitting on her bunk crying when Goddard came in. He sat down next to her, despite her embarrassment.
"TJ, please talk to me," Goddard said. "I want to help you."
Davenport hesitated before saying, "No one can help me now."
"That’s not true!" Goddard said. "There are seven people here who care about you, who don’t want to see you get hurt."
"But if they didn’t want to see me get hurt, how come they agreed to this?"
Goddard didn’t know what to say to that. She’s right, he thought to himself. If I hadn’t of agreed to this, none of this would have happened. But TJ would be dead. Of course, he didn’t say that out loud. He didn’t want her to know he wanted to admit he was wrong.
Davenport sighed. "So what happens now?" she asked. "How am I going to cope? And when are you going to get us off of this damn planet?"
Good point, Goddard thought. "I don’t know. As soon as possible, I hope. And don’t say its just your problem, Teej. I mean, you can’t get yourself pregnant. Just remember who fathered your baby. Our baby, Teej. And no matter what you do, it always will be our baby."
"I can’t believe you let her go!"
"I’m sorry, Koby. I had to! She was sick."
Koby turned to face Jewel. "No, Jewel. She wasn’t sick. And no more secrets from me! Don’t think I don’t know what’s going on!"
The look on Jewel’s face said: "If am I going to die, I am going to die now."
However, Koby didn’t notice this. She was too busy looking at the ceiling because her nose was in the air.
Then Jewel said something that Koby never will forget:
"I’d rather be dead than live under your rules!"
Not knowing she had fallen asleep, Davenport woke up. She sat up straight in bed and screamed. She remembered every second, every detail of her dream.
"Seth! The baby! I have to save the baby!"
Davenport ran down the corridors of the Christa with Warlord Shank just behind her.
She screamed. Then she called Goddard again:
"Seth! The baby! Seth…"
Warlord Shank grabbed her. He threw her own the floor. She tried to scream again, but no sound came out. She was having a hard time breathing.
"Your precious Commander can’t save you now," Shank said. "You cannot be saved! You. Are. MINE!"
"NO!!!"
Davenport shook the thoughts away. Then she headed for the command post.
When Goddard saw she was awake and up, he freaked. "Miss Davenport! Why aren’t you laying down?"
"Because I’m awake," she said flatly. "I don’t need to be in bed."
Goddard gave her a look that said, "You’re crazy!"
Davenport’s look to Goddard: "Don’t mess with me!"
Goddard backed off.
Koby slapped Jewel. "Don’t you ever say that to me again!"
Jewel, knowing that Koby was originally from Adrastea, and that the Adrasteans were not good fighters, Jewel got up. She knew that if she tried to protect herself from Koby’s power, the Jovian race would not let her live it down. But if she did break Koby’s spell, she’d live to tell her grandchildren about it. So what should she do?
She did know she had to think fast, because Koby was coming toward her at top speed.
Jewel did the only thing she could do.
She held up her hand, blinded Koby with Jovian light (the one power the Adrasteans didn’t have), and watched her fall to the ground.
"Get the light out of my face!" Koby screamed.
"Why didn’t I do that eight years ago?" Jewel asked herself.
"Please no!" Koby said. "You caused too much trouble!" Jewel yelled. "You’re a-"
"Shut up!" Koby yelled. "I don’t have to take this from you!"
"Then you won’t!" Jewel cried. "I’m going to leave now, despite death sentences and dumb laws. I don’t know how many times I’ve broken that stupid ‘you have to be invisible to talk to aliens’ law. And you know what? I’m not even pregnant!"
"You lied to me!" Koby yelled. "You lied about everything!"
"I did," Jewel said smugly.
"Then get out!"
"I will!" And without another thought, Jewel ran out of the cavern.
She ran right to the Christa, feeling close to Davenport. She ran inside and tripped.
In the command post, Radu heard her. "Who’s here?" he asked. "Somebody’s in our ship!"
Goddard looked at Davenport. He stared right into her deep brown eyes and said, "I’ll be back, Mommy." And then he took off without seeing Davenport’s reaction, which was a smile, almost motherly.
Goddard and Radu went to the corridors. When they saw Jewel, they stopped running. In fact, Goddard looked at her with a look that said, "What’s the matter?"
"I’m ok, I’m ok," Jewel said. "But Koby’s not. I blinded her. She doesn’t know where I am."
"Is that a good thing?" Radu asked.
"Yes, because like I told Theresa, she can’t do anything to me as long as she can’t see me."
"Good," Goddard said, beaming. "Let’s go. We’ll take you with us. You can get out of this place, and you can be our nurse. We might need one. But that’s the only reason." He pointed to the command post.
"You mean Theresa," Jewel said. "About Theresa, I have to tell you something-"
"Can it wait?" Goddard asked. "We have to leave."
"Well-"
"Let’s go back to the command post." And without waiting for an answer, he ran off. Radu followed him.
"Great," Jewel said under her breath.
When Jewel got back to the command post, Harlan noticed something. "Hey, look!" he said. "There’s an old ship! Whose is that, Jewel?"
"Nobody’s, but-"
"If we blow that up, we can get Cat back!"
"Who’s Cat?" Jewel asked.
"Can we do that?" Goddard asked.
"Yeah, I’m sure we can," Jewel said. "Who is Cat?"
No one answered her.
