Grim

BETTER by Shaun David Hutchinson

I feel real.

I have fingers that move, eyes that have never seen sunset, ears that love a violin. I bleed and breathe and cry when I hurt. I tremble at night when I am alone and afraid; I laugh when I am happy. I have never known love, but I have lips that ache to kiss. To linger on the sweet lips of him.

I feel real, though they tell me I am not.

Levi Saxon sits alone in the cafeteria, slowly spooning the mush that passes for lunch into his mouth with spindly arms that look barely strong enough to lift even that small metal utensil. He is surrounded by them but still alone. I recognize the way they look at him—I have lived with their hatred my entire life.

“Pip!” Levi smiles at me and waves me over. I carry my tray to his table. The air is chillier here by the bulkheads—the only thing separating us from the relentless nightmare of space—but I keep my concerns to myself. The cold does not affect me, and Levi doesn’t like to be reminded of his frailty.

“What happened?” Levi reaches out to touch me, but stops midway, dropping his hand and his eyes to his lap.

I run my fingers over the stubble of my scalp, pausing at the incision that meanders across the side of my head. The skin is puckered and raw where the stitches pull together. I hate the pity lurking in Levi’s eyes. I should’ve eaten in the lab like usual.

“An experiment. Dr. Saxon says I have a lovely brain.” I mean it to be a joke, something to lighten the mood, but Levi doesn’t laugh. The concept of humor eludes me more often than not.

“Don’t you hate it?”

“What?”

“The tests?” Levi says. “The experiments? Not being able to do whatever you want?”

I attempt to focus on eating, but the food is particularly offensive today. Though I’m not hungry, eating gives me something to do with my hands while I avoid answering Levi’s question. When I realize that he’s still staring at me, still waiting, I say, “It’s the reason your father created me. I’m little more than a lab rat, my only purpose to be experimented upon in the hopes of finding a cure for the Disease.”

Levi glances at his bony, wasted legs. The Disease has devoured his muscles, left him unable to stand or dance or relieve himself unassisted. “I hate it,” he says. “The way they stare at me like it’s my fault I’m alive while their damn kids are frozen in stasis.”

A pale, gray-haired woman at a nearby table runs from the cafeteria, sobbing, leaving behind a wordless, breathless vacuum. We become the focus of attention. Eighty-seven sets of eyes on us. Watching. Judging. Staring at us like we are the Disease vectors rather than simply a broken boy and wind-up girl.

“I’m sorry,” Levi whispers. The words barely escape the gravity of his guilt. It doesn’t matter that, one day, the Disease will force him to join the other children in stasis, waiting for a cure that may never come. Levi bears the guilt of health all the same.

I nervously run my finger along the ridges of my incision.

“Does it hurt?” Levi’s desperation to talk about something, anything else, is carved into his frown.

I nod. “Dr. Saxon says that my pain isn’t real. It’s merely a series of electrical signals from my skin to my brain.”

Levi tilts his head to the side slightly. His hand trembles as though it wants to move but cannot. “If you feel it, it’s real.”

I can’t stand the way Levi is looking at me, like we are the only two people aboard the Hamelin. Part of me wishes we were. But the rest... “It’s ugly. I’m ugly.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Levi says. “You’re pretty.”

I don’t know how to respond to...that. I blurt out, “You’re pretty, too,” without thinking, and Levi chuckles. Only, it wasn’t a joke. “You are. You’re the prettiest boy on the Hamelin.”

“I’m the only boy on the Hamelin. The only one your age anyway.” Levi bites the corner of his lip and looks down at his long, thin fingers. “I’m sorry he hurt you.”

“It will be healed by tomorrow.” I pick at my food, unsure whether Levi is sincere or just humoring me.

“I didn’t know you healed that fast,” he says, trying to hide his surprise.

“I’m not like you.” It’s a simple statement, and true, but it twists in my gut, reminding me that Levi and I will never be the same.

“No, you’re not.” Levi lifts my head, forcing me to stare into his pale blue eyes. “You’re better.” Levi holds me there for a moment before letting go and pushing away from the table. He steers his lift chair out of the cafeteria.

As I watch Levi leave, I try to think of something to say, some way to tell him that he’s wrong. But I cannot.

I like to watch them sleep. Especially Levi.

I like the way his mouth puckers when he’s dreaming, and the way his fingers curl and flex.

I wonder whether he dreams of the home he never knew or of the new home he will likely not live to see. When the colonists set out aboard the Hamelin in search of a habitable planet over two hundred years ago, I doubt they ever once dreamed that their descendants would perish on this ship, their children’s children slowly devoured by a pitiless disease. The last gasp of humanity searching frantically for a cure that they may never find.

Levi is the last of the Hamelin’s children not in stasis. His father, Dr. Saxon, hoped to discover a cure before the Disease forced him to put Levi into the long sleep, too.

I wonder if he would dream in stasis.

I do not dream or sleep. Instead, I wander the ship alone, listening to the Hamelin purr as she carries us in her belly through the long, dark night.

But if I did, I would dream of where we have been, where we are going. Of the billions of stars that are not home, and—somewhere waiting in the cold void—the one star that might be.

I would dream of Levi.

“Will I ever fall in love?” I ask.

Dr. Saxon, sitting on the edge of his stool on the other side of the examination table, looks up from my arm as the blood bubbles up through the needle into the tube. The remains of his hair are wild and gray, and his skin sags deeply today. He completes the task before pulling the needle from my vein and setting his instruments on the counter behind him.

“What makes you ask?”

I shrug. I’m unsure how he’d react if I answered honestly. “Curiosity, I suppose.”

“Oh.” Dr. Saxon gathers the vials of blood he has drawn from me and takes them to the other side of the room. He places them in a centrifuge and sends them spinning around and around. “Do you know what you are?”

“An artificial being. A collection of biological machines assembled into the facsimile of life.”

“Indeed,” Dr. Saxon says. He returns to the table and grabs my hand. Before I know what’s happening, he slashes the soft flesh of my palm with a scalpel that he produces from the sleeve of his white coat. I cry out but do not pull my hand from his.

“Watch” is all he says.

We watch together as the blood pools from the deep gash in my palm. Dr. Saxon sliced neatly through the dermal and hypodermal layers, through the muscle, nearly to the bone. However, within seconds, the flesh begins to rejoin from the bottom to the top like a meaty zipper snapping shut. In barely a minute, only blood and the memory of pain remain.

Dr. Saxon releases my wrist. “Clean up.”

I slide off the table and do as I’m told.

“I hate you.”

If Dr. Saxon is afraid, he doesn’t show it. I could tear his head from his neck and he couldn’t stop me. I could kill them all. Instead, he motions for me to sit at a table in the corner of the lab, while he takes the chair across from me. “You say you hate me, but you don’t. You can’t. You aren’t real.”

“What if I am?”

“You’re not.” Dr. Saxon scrubs his face with his worn hands. Though wrinkled and lined with veins, they’re still steady. “You are an experiment, Pip. A means to an end. I hoped studying your unique physiology would help me find a way to cure the Disease, but all my hoping has proven fruitless.”

I’ve read all of Dr. Saxon’s research. I know that the Disease isn’t a disease at all. It’s a syndrome—a collection of symptoms for which Dr. Saxon has yet to find a cause. He once hypothesized that the Disease was similar to the allergies that developed on Earth in industrialized societies, that generations of living in space had caused it. But the only cure for space travel would be to find a habitable planet, and we are still light years from the nearest one.

“Your personality, your knowledge, were fabricated from the ship’s computers. Your responses and so-called feelings are not real. You are not real. You can’t hate me, because you can’t feel hate. You won’t ever fall in love because you will never know what real love feels like.”

Dr. Saxon clears his throat. “None of this matters,” he says. “I am no closer to discovering a cure than I was fifteen years ago. There is nothing more I can learn from you. I am terminating this experiment.”

“What?” The implication of his words sends an alarm spreading through my mind like a virus.

“I’m sorry, Pip.” The weariness in Dr. Saxon’s voice nearly chokes him.

“What will happen to me?” I ask, even though I fear I already know the answer. If I could vomit, I would.

“The Senate fears you,” Dr. Saxon says. “Some of the more...imaginative members worry that you will eventually seek to supplant us.”

“I wouldn’t,” I say.

“I know.” Dr. Saxon bows his head. “There’s nothing I can do.”

I scramble to come up with a way to stop him—something we haven’t tried—but I know Dr. Saxon’s work with the Disease as intimately as he does. Panic grips my frazzled mind and I blurt out, “What if I cure the Disease?”

“Pip—”

“Give me one chance,” I say.

Dr. Saxon pushes back his chair. The metal legs grate against the textured floor of the lab. “My mind is made up.”

“Without me, Levi will die.” The words stick in my throat. The thought of losing Levi is a fear Dr. Saxon and I share.

“Yes,” Dr. Saxon says, as if he is resigned to the inevitability. “I won’t put him into stasis. His mother wouldn’t have wanted that.”

I grope for a way to change Dr. Saxon’s mind. In the end, all I can say is “Please.”

Dr. Saxon returns to his work and says no more.

As I walk to my quarters, I dissect my predicament. The corridors are quiet at night. Just my thoughts and the hum of the Hamelin. I care less about preserving my own life than about curing Levi, but if Dr. Saxon discontinues his work, I will not be able to accomplish either. It seems impossible to me that I will succeed where Dr. Saxon has failed, but I don’t believe I have another choice. I need time.

In my mind, I pull up the results of Dr. Saxon’s previous failures, searching for something he missed. But I am haunted by Levi. The feel of his fingers on my hand, the tilt of his smile and the way his hair falls over his eyes. Everything I know about love, I learned from the ship’s databases. History, music, literature. The more I learn, the less I understand. Dr. Saxon might be right and I’m incapable of love, but I know what I feel. Maybe no one can explain love; they can only be in it.

I am so lost in thoughts of the Disease and Levi that I don’t notice the hooded man standing in front of the door to my quarters until he shoves a stunstick in my ribs. Electricity floods my body. Another man lunges at me from behind, jabbing me with a second stunstick set to deliver a full shock, this time in my spine. Another and another. And another. This much electricity would kill a human, but I am better, I heal faster. Just not fast enough.

The world becomes watercolor. The walls run and bleed.

I collapse in the corridor. I’m in the garden with Levi. I’m floating in space.

My limbs betray me as I attempt to fight off the men—limp and useless. Even my eyes fail me as I attempt to see the faces of my attackers under their hoods. I fail. I see nothing but stars. Stars and the yawning void beckoning me home.

The men are in no hurry. My quarters are in an unused section of the ship. The Hamelin was once full, but now it’s mostly empty. They laugh as they drag me across the floor and toss me onto my cot. It’s a cruel joke that I can’t move or scream or see, but can still hear every word the men say.

“Gotta get me some before they toss her out an airlock.” Laughter. “Should’ve done this a long time ago.”

Trapped inside my body, I beg for the end.

I shudder.

I shake.

As they hurt me.

As it gets so much worse.

I taste blood.

I feel pain.

Tears run from my eyes as they take turns.

Real pain, real fear.

I am real.

Even as they tell me I am not.

I’m huddled in the corner of my shower when Dr. Saxon enters my quarters. No amount of water could ever wash the stink of the men from me, but I tried. The bruises have already faded, the blood from my nose and lip washed down the drain. No outward traces remain of what they did to me.

Before they departed, they argued about whether to kill me. They left me alive to avoid an incident, knowing that even if I told, I couldn’t identify them. Not that it would matter if I could. The Senate wants me dead. No, not dead—in their eyes, I am not alive. They want me disposed of. Like garbage.

“Pip?” Dr. Saxon enters my bathroom, unashamed of my nakedness even as I cross my arms over my chest. “You’re late.” When he sees me sitting on the cold metal floor of the shower, his brow furrows. “Are you damaged?”

“Convince the Senate to let me live,” I say. My voice is hoarse and heavy. “Let me find a cure for the Disease.”

Dr. Saxon closes his eyes for the longest time, unwilling to look at me. “It is already decided.”

“Undecide it!”

“Let’s get you out of there.” Dr. Saxon passes me the towel hanging from a hook on the wall, but I let it drop to the floor.

“I can save them,” I say. “You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.” I sense Dr. Saxon’s hesitation. “You said it yourself—Levi will soon die. Without me, you have no hope of saving your son, but with me, you have something. Maybe not much, but greater achievements have been accomplished with less.”

Dr. Saxon kneels in front of me. I’ve never seen him so low, so meek. “Do you really believe you can do it?”

“Yes.” I dangle hope in front of him, daring him to take it.

“Maybe,” Dr. Saxon says. He grows quiet and I fear I may lose him, but he must come to the decision on his own. “Why would you help us?”

“Because I want to live, and I don’t want to live alone.”

I’m not sure if the answer is satisfactory, but it’s the truth. After a moment, Dr. Saxon stands and turns away from me. “If you really believe you can do it, I’ll talk to the Senate.”

“I can save Levi. I can make him better.”

The Senate grants me a one-month reprieve. One month to do what Dr. Saxon couldn’t do in fifteen years. It’s not a great deal of time, but it’s better than nothing. Dr. Saxon grants me access to his research, unaware that I gained access ages ago. There’s a file called Project Twig that I mean to ask Dr. Saxon about, but the label suggests something to do with botany, which seems unlikely to help me cure the Disease. I pore over the research, barely eating, hardly leaving the lab for a week. Partly because I’m consumed by my efforts to cure the Disease, mostly because I’m afraid to return to my quarters.

I focus on Levi because it keeps me from thinking about the men who hurt me, about the things they did to me. But even as I work in the locked lab, I imagine them on the other side of the door, plotting to hurt me again. Those thoughts infect my mind, creeping into the dark corners and breeding until they’re all that’s left. Until my hate for those men is all that’s left.

But I’m not trying to help them. I’m trying to help Levi.

My stomach grumbles, reminding me that while I don’t require much food, I still require some. I walk to the cafeteria, alert and ready to fight. No one will ever sneak up on me again. The cafeteria is nearly empty when I arrive. The lights are dim and Cook works behind the counter, cleaning up from dinner. He does not acknowledge me beyond passing me a tin plate with a serving of what appears to be a casserole.

“It tastes worse than it smells.”

I turn to find Levi moving toward me in his lift chair. His dirty-blond hair is messier than normal and falls in tangled curls around his face. He grins, and I feel like I can finally breathe. Levi would never hurt me. He’s everything that is good about humans; everything I want to be. “I need to eat.”

“I know.” Levi offers me his hand. “Let’s go.”

“Why?”

“It’s a surprise.”

“Why?”

Levi chuckles and grabs my hand. His fingers tremble, but he squeezes me tightly and I never want him to let go. “You’ve got a lot to learn, Pip.” Levi navigates out of the cafeteria, pulling me along with him. I’m not sure where we’re going, but I’m not afraid. Never with Levi.

We wind up in the botanical garden. Spread out under the drooping canopy of the willow tree is a blanket, atop which rests a wicker basket.

Wordlessly, I help Levi out of his chair and we settle down on the blanket. He weighs almost nothing. I can’t help thinking about his fragility—the specter of death is his shadow and I should be in the lab working to save him.

But the fact that we’re here—that Levi wants me here—makes this moment special. If I succeed, we might share many moments like this; if I fail, this moment, right here, might be our one and only.

“Have you ever eaten cheese, Pip?” Levi unpacks the basket, spreading out the different foods. “My father keeps a stash. I’m going to catch hell when he finds out I took them, but it’s so worth it.” Among the pilfered treasures are a small yellow wedge sealed in plastic, bowls of fruits and vegetables, and a chunk of dark brown bread.

“I’ve read about cheese.” I pick up the wedge and sniff it, but smell only the plastic.

Levi takes the cheese from me and grins wickedly. “Reading about food is like talking about kissing. You just have to try it.” Levi’s enthusiasm is infectious, and I can’t help smiling, wishing I’d spent more time with him this week.

A thought occurs to me. “How did you know I’d be in the cafeteria tonight?”

“I didn’t.” Levi blushes and avoids my eyes. “I’ve had this set up every night for the past week. I figured I’d catch you at dinner sooner or later.” He finishes arranging the feast and, thankfully, looks at me. His smile is as shy and fragile as his body.

“You waited so long?”

“You’re worth the wait.”

Dr. Saxon warned me not to tell Levi about our bargain, but I want to so badly. I want to explain why he had to wait a week to see me and why I haven’t come to him at night. Dr. Saxon is right, though. So I keep my hope to myself.

We eat in silence, and the cheese is the best thing I have ever tasted. The salty flavor sings on my tongue and I wish to eat nothing but cheese for the rest of my life, however long that may be. There is not much, but it’s enough for us both to enjoy a couple of bites. After that, we devour the fruits and vegetables. There are carrots and tomatoes and grapes. The apples are especially sweet.

“I’ve never eaten like this before,” I say.

“Dad says he ate food like this all the time when he was little.” Levi shrugs. “I guess when the Disease broke out and all the kids started dying, people’s priorities changed.”

Levi and I finish eating and lie out on the blanket. The branches of the willow tree sway gently in the artificial breeze.

“What would you do if you were better?” I ask.

“Run,” Levi says without hesitation. I expected he would need time to think of a response, but it’s as if he has been holding that answer in his mouth since the day his legs ceased functioning. “Run down the corridor until my muscles hurt and I can’t breathe. Then I’d run some more, just because.”

“That doesn’t sound like a well-thought-out plan.”

Levi laughs at me and I look away. “I’m not laughing at you, Pip. It’s just that life’s too short to always do the right thing.” He touches my hand, and this time he doesn’t pull away. “You’re special, Pip. You know that, right?”

“Yes.”

“And modest, too!”

When I’m near Levi, I feel defective. My thoughts move more slowly and I never know what to say. But nothing could keep me from him. “I’m not like you. No one exists who is like me.” I squeeze Levi’s hand and he flinches. “Sorry.”

I try to let go, but Levi won’t let me. “It’s okay.”

“Every time we’re apart,” I say, “I feel untethered. Like I’m going to float off into space. I’m all alone on this ship, and you’re the only person who understands.”

Levi’s smile disappears. “I wish I could be like you.”

I shake my head. “No, you don’t.”

“I do,” Levi says. “If I were like you, I wouldn’t be dying. I could run all I wanted and never get tired. Hell, I’d settle for just being able to walk. You’re the only person who doesn’t treat me like an invalid.”

“But everyone hates me,” I say. “If you were like me, they’d hate you, too.”

“If they don’t see how special you are, then maybe the human race doesn’t deserve to survive.” Levi runs the back of his hand down my cheek, catching my eyes. His reflect the light of all the stars. “If I were like you, we could start over. You and me together forever.”

“You don’t mean that,” I say. Part of me wants him to mean it. Part of me has wanted him to mean it for so long, but I don’t think about it because sometimes hope hurts too much.

“I do,” he says, and I believe him.

I can’t help myself. It’s wrong, I know it’s wrong, but I can’t let Levi die without knowing how I feel. I lean forward, drawn by the irresistible pull of his gravity. Of his lips. Lips that I have thought of a hundred thousand times. Lips that I have wanted to kiss since I first laid eyes on Levi Saxon.

But he recoils. He slams his fist on the ground and tries to climb back into his chair. When I attempt to help, he pushes me away.

“What did I do?” I ask. My heart is broken a thousand times, and it’s all I can do not to run from the garden. More than life, more than breath, I have wanted Levi. Now it’s clear that he doesn’t want me back. I am as cold as the clutch of space beyond the windows. As empty as the dark.

Levi struggles to get into his chair, but his arms are too weak and he falls back to the ground. “Just go!”

“Levi?” I hate the sound of my voice as I say his name like a beggar. I hate that I am reduced to this. But I would do it again. And I hate that the most.

“Please go.” Levi’s body shakes and he hides his face from me. “Just let me die in peace.”

I reach out to touch his arm but stop short. I couldn’t stand it if he rejected me again. “You’re not going to die, Levi Saxon. I won’t let you.”

Dr. Saxon hovers over me, making it impossible to think.

“It’s been twenty-three days, Pip.”

“I’m close,” I lie.

“Without a cure, humanity dies.”

I turn around, ignoring the disappointing results of another test. “Do you think I’m unaware of that? Do you think I haven’t tried everything?”

Dr. Saxon softens. “I know you’ve tried,” he says. “I’ll tell the Senate.”

“I still have seven days,” I snap. Frustration is eating at me. I know that Levi didn’t mean what he said, but I can’t stop thinking about how he pushed me away. I’ll save him anyway. Even if he doesn’t want me, I’ll save him. Because he’s Levi.

“Yes,” Dr. Saxon says. “And you should spend them with my son.” I freeze. He knows. He knows about the late-night visits to the botanical garden and the stolen food. Maybe he has always known but said nothing because of his love for his son. “Goodbye, Pip.”

I stop Dr. Saxon before he leaves. “There’s a file on the computer I can’t access. Project Twig. What is it?”

“Nothing,” Dr. Saxon says. “Leave it be.”

“If it can help me save Levi, you must tell me how to decrypt it.”

“Don’t waste what little time you have left, Pip.” Dr. Saxon looks at me with something bordering on concern, an emotion I thought him incapable of feeling for me. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I am more than an experiment to Dr. Saxon, after all.

“Thank you, Dr. Saxon. For everything. You are as near to a father as I will ever have.”

Pain etches Dr. Saxon’s face, as though I have stabbed him with his own scalpel. “My wife loved Bach,” he says. “Especially the Brandenburg concertos. You might find them enlightening.”

It takes me three days to figure out that Dr. Saxon had given me the key to decrypting the Project Twig files. It was Bach. The files were encrypted with an algorithm based on his Brandenburg concertos. But how I decrypted them is not half as exciting as what the files contain. The moment I finish reading them, I know I can save Levi. It takes my remaining days to prepare, but I am finally ready to try.

Levi is so weak he can barely lift his head. His hair has thinned and grown brittle and his eyes are glazed with a deathly film. Still, he talks as though his life’s end is not near, despite the tube in his chest helping him breathe.

“I’m sorry I’ve been avoiding you,” he says.

I push Levi’s chair through the corridors, thinking about tomorrow night when I’ll have earned my pardon and we’ll walk together as equals. As we pass the botanical garden, Levi tries to turn around but gets tangled in his breathing tube. “We’re not going to watch the stars?”

“Not tonight,” I say.

“Then what?”

“It’s a surprise,” I tell him, barely able to contain my excitement.

Levi’s body shakes. I believe it’s what passes for a nod. “I’m not sure how much time I have left, but however much it is belongs to you.” A coughing fit grips him and I stop pushing to make sure he’s all right. When the coughing subsides, we continue.

There is a morbid truth to his words that follows us down the empty corridors. I imagine Levi’s heart fluttering, fading. His lungs slowly drowning in fluid. The breathing machine only prolongs the inevitable. The worst part is that I feel like I can smell death on him—the rotting stench as his cells expire one by one. If Levi were anyone else, I’m not certain I could stand it.

But he’s not anyone else. He is Levi.

We enter a lab that has not been used in years. I only discovered it when I decrypted the Project Twig files. The walls are lined with metal doors. In the center of the room is a table draped with a white sheet. Beside it, a second, empty table.

“What is this place?” Levi asks.

“Your father worked here once,” I say. “And it is where I will make you better.”

“How?” Levi guards his hope, but it bleeds through. A slight smile, a brightness to his milky eyes.

I’ve thought long and hard about how to tell Levi, but in the end, only the truth will do. “Your father’s first attempts to cure the Disease were known as Project Twig. He attempted to build new bodies for the Hamelin’s children. Artificial bodies resistant to the Disease.”

I watch Levi for his reaction, but he simply stares at me, beautiful, even near death.

“But Dr. Saxon couldn’t figure out how to transfer the consciousness from the old body to the new. Every effort to duplicate the soul and put it in the artificial bodies failed. When the Senate discovered what your father was doing, they demanded he terminate the experiments. Dr. Saxon disposed of the artificial bodies. All but one.”

Levi’s lip twitches. He looks at me with the barest hint of a smile. “You.”

I shake my head. “No. I came later. Your father begged the Senate to be allowed to create me so that he could study the Disease. They relented so long as he never attempt to revive Project Twig.”

“Then...who?”

The form under the white sheet on the table. We both turn to it. Look at it. I cross the distance and pull the sheet aside. Levi lies there. Naked. Whole. Healthy.

“Is that...?”

I nod. “Your father kept your body in this lab. I used his research to revive it and make it the same age as you.”

Levi moves around the table, touching an arm, looking at the body that looks so much like him but is not him. I wait for him to smile, to laugh, to realize that I have found his cure, but maybe he has grown so accustomed to the idea of dying that he has given up on being saved. I don’t know how he can remain so calm when I am hardly able to keep my hands from shaking.

“Say something,” I say when I can’t stand his silence anymore.

“It seems a bit unfair,” Levi says.

“How so?”

Levi shrugs. “You’ve seen me naked.” He grins and laughs and coughs so hard that I’m afraid he’ll dislodge his breathing tube. But he doesn’t, and when the coughing fit ends, he’s still smiling. I’ve never seen Levi so alive.

“You can put me in there?” Levi asks. “I can have a new body?”

“Yes.” Fear is eating away at me because there’s still one last thing he doesn’t know.

“How do we do this?” he asks without a trace of fear.

“First, there’s something I must know.”

“What?”

I pull a chair next to Levi. “Do you believe I’m alive?”

“Of course,” Levi says. “You’re more alive than anyone I know.”

“For a long time, I wasn’t sure,” I say. “Your father, the others, they treat me like a thing. Somehow less than human. I look like them, think like them, bleed like them. But I’m not like them. You were the first person who treated me like I was real.”

Levi draws a shuddering breath. “You’re the most real thing in my life, Pip.”

I take Levi’s hand, kiss the tips of his fingers. He trembles but doesn’t pull away. “Could you...could you ever...love me?”

Dr. Saxon doesn’t believe me capable of love, but he’s wrong. I will succeed where he failed. That knowledge gives me the courage to seek the truth from Levi. No matter his answer.

Levi’s whole body breathes a sigh as he folds his fingers through mine. “I do love you, Pip. I’ve always loved you. How can you not know that?”

Hope crawls into my throat, but I push it back down. “Why did you pull away when I attempted to kiss you?”

Levi turns from me. He would run if I let him, but his legs would only betray him again. “I’m broken, Pip. Practically dead. Broken, dead and useless.”

“So?”

“You deserve better.” Tears run down his hollow cheeks. “You deserve someone whole.”

I press my body to Levi’s. He is so cold. I try to warm him but he is fading so quickly. “I want you, Levi. Broken or whole, I want you.”

Levi looks at the other body. “In that, I can be the man you deserve.” He kisses my hand. “How does this work?”

“You told me once that I was special. You’re special, too.” This moment feels too dense, like it might collapse under its own weight and drag me in. “Your father was trying to duplicate you—your memories, your body, your soul. What he failed to realize is that each human is unique. There can be only one Levi Saxon. To live, you must first die.”

Levi doesn’t reply for a moment, and I’m afraid that I’ve scared him. But he says, “Will it hurt?” in a voice that is exhausted but as fearless as ever. I’ve always known Levi was strong, but his strength still has the power to amaze me.

“No,” I say. “I promise.”

Levi holds my hand to his frail heart. “Thank you.”

The time for hesitation is past. I press my mouth to his. His hands fumble in my hands, and his dry, cracked lips are weak, but they are the sweetest lips in the universe. Sweeter than apples.

Sadder than the violin.

This is real.

I kiss Levi until he cannot breathe.

But he does not fight. He does not struggle. His faith in me is absolute.

I steal the last breath from these lungs. I steal the last beats of this heart.

I kiss him until his back arches and his arms hang limp.

And when our kiss finally ends, Levi’s head rolls forward against my shoulder, the life gone from his pale blue eyes. I lift Levi up and place his old body gently on the empty table beside his new body, and prepare to begin the transfer.

“I love you, Levi Saxon.”

Dr. Saxon enters the lab the next morning to escort me to my death, wearing a grim expression. Two uniformed men stand in the corridor outside the door, armed with stunsticks, as if Dr. Saxon believes I will put up a fight.

“It’s time, Pip.”

I turn from the computer to look Dr. Saxon in the eyes, wearing my triumph like a crown. “I succeeded, Dr. Saxon.”

Dr. Saxon freezes. “What?”

I nod, and Levi walks out of the bathroom, where he had been waiting. He walks. Unaided. His gait steady and sure, his eyes sparkle and his full cheeks are dimpled and red. Levi is strong and healthy. And alive.

“Pip made me better, Dad.” Levi’s voice rings clear through the lab. The uniforms in the hall glance over their shoulders, their eyes wide with disbelief.

Dr. Saxon rushes to Levi and throws his arms around his son. “How did you do this?” He is sobbing and touching Levi’s shoulders and wrists and cheeks. He is kissing the top of his head. “I have to tell the Senate! We can revive the other children and administer the cure immediately.” I’ve never seen Dr. Saxon so happy. Pride wells up in me. I did this. Me.

“Your work made it possible,” I say. “Project Twig.”

“Project Twig?” The color drains from Dr. Saxon’s face. “Is this...?”

I pull up Dr. Saxon’s research on the screen and expand it to cover the entire wall. Dr. Saxon disentangles himself from Levi and stares at his son. The tears are gone, replaced by horror. His mouth moves, but he cannot seem to find the words.

“Doctor?” asks one of the uniforms from the hall. They look anxious and hold their stunsticks ready.

“Just a moment,” Dr. Saxon hisses. “How did you accomplish...this?”

I kiss Levi’s hand and he looks at me with his same blue eyes. His first words to me when he awoke in his new body were “I love you, too.” I knew I’d never be alone again.

“Does it matter?” I ask, confused. I thought Dr. Saxon would be happy. “Levi is alive. He’s healthy. The Disease will never steal him from us.”

Levi moves toward his father, but Dr. Saxon recoils. “I’m still Levi, Dad.”

Dr. Saxon ignores Levi, his hatred focused on me. “Where’s my son? Is he dead? Tell me where Levi is!”

The uniforms invade the lab.

“Dad,” Levi says. “I’m not dead. I’m right here.”

“This was your research,” I say. “I only finished what you started. I don’t understand why you’re upset.”

Dr. Saxon is shaking, but I keep my distance.

“We terminated Project Twig because it was wrong!” Dr. Saxon says. “This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. You were supposed to cure Levi, not kill him!”

I glance at Levi, then the uniforms. They take up a position to surround us, but have not requested backup. “I kept my promise, Dr. Saxon. We are the cure for the Disease.”

Dr. Saxon stumbles toward the uniforms. “You’re not human. You’re not real. You’re a machine.”

“Dad—” Levi reaches for him, sounding like the boy he once was. This is my fault. I should have explained it to Dr. Saxon alone, made him understand, but now I’ve ruined everything and I just wish I could go back and live forever in that moment after Levi was reborn.

“You’re not my son!” Dr. Saxon pushes past the guards and runs from the lab.

Levi and I stand alone. The guards raise their stunsticks.

“You should run,” Levi says, all anger and heartbreak.

The uniforms do not put up much of a fight.

They come for us at night. Mothers. Fathers. Dr. Saxon.

They come bearing weapons. The come cloaked in anger and hate.

Levi holds my hand as we wait for the end.

“Are we doing the right thing?” he asks. All I want to do is kiss him again. Kiss him forever. But soon, we will have all the time in the universe.

“We’re the future,” I say, choosing my words carefully. “If we die, all hope for humanity dies. This is the only way.”

Levi understands. He sees the truth, knows all that I know. There are no secrets between us; words are no longer necessary. We share everything with a kiss, with a look, with the briefest touch.

I knew before, that even if I succeeded, they might never let us be free. But I have kept my end of the bargain. Now it is time for them to keep theirs.

It’s Levi’s idea to set off the fire alarms. There is no fire, but I have tricked the ship’s computer into believing there is. First, the computer releases an argon-nitrogen gas mixture to smother the fire. If that fails, automatic decompression will occur, removing the oxygen from the ship. In the event of a fire, all colonists are to proceed to the airlock and prepare to evacuate aboard the Jakob-Wilhelm.

Red lights spiral in the corridors and flashing arrows guide the fleeing colonists, as gas rolls through the corridors like fog, harrying them as they flee from the imagined danger.

From the lab, Levi and I watch as the colonists, so recently thirsty for our blood, trample one another to reach the Jakob-Wilhelm, their only thought for their own survival.

The orbital launcher is not large enough to accommodate them all, but the colonists squeeze into the airlock, hoping to be one of the lucky ones. The Hamelin was not designed with escape in mind. Where would survivors go? Who would rescue them? Even if everyone fit into the Jakob-Wilhelm, they would simply drift in space until they ran out of food, water or oxygen.

There is no escape from this ship.

But they cram themselves into the airlock anyway. One on top of the other. Cook, the old woman from the cafeteria, the two men who hurt me. They all fight for a place as the alarms sound and the lights flash, unaware that the real danger is not behind them.

“It’s time.”

Levi nods. We walk hand in hand through the empty, gas-filled corridors.

“I hate these lights,” Levi says, pointing at the walls. He’s jumpy, though I doubt it’s because of the alarms. While he understands the necessity of what we must do, he doesn’t like it. Nor do I. But progress demands sacrifice. If I’ve learned nothing else from human history, I’ve learned this.

We follow the screams to the airlock, arriving as the heavy metal door slides shut and locks.

Dr. Saxon is near the door and sees us through the window. He beats on the glass and calls our names, but the window is made of the same material as the dome in the botanical garden. Unbreakable.

The colonists, crowded into the airlock, writhe and cry, waiting for the outer airlock door to open so that they can board the Jakob-Wilhelm and save themselves.

“Stop this!” Dr. Saxon’s tinny voice over the intercom system is nearly drowned out by the shouts of the others.

Levi presses the comm button. “I love you, Dad.”

The words cut Dr. Saxon, leave him to bleed. He presses his palm to the window. So old he looks now. So frail.

“We’re going to save the others,” Levi says. “The children still in stasis. We’ll build them new bodies, like mine. They’ll have a chance at life without the Disease.” Levi’s hand hovers over the control for the airlock door. “You could stay with us. We could be a family.”

I never had a family and cannot fathom what Levi is feeling. But seeing him like this is almost enough to make me reconsider our plan.

Dr. Saxon shakes his head. I’m not sure whether he is brave or terrified, but I regret that he won’t accept Levi as he is. And though I know I’m making the right choice, I also regret what I must do.

Levi turns away.

“You promised you’d save us, Pip.”

I touch the glass, watching them. Maybe we could have found a way to live together, but I don’t think so. And I believe that if Dr. Saxon was standing beside me, able to see what I see, he would agree.

I open the outer airlock door. The horde moves like a swarm of gnats. They trample each other to be the first to board the ship, even though they know that it will only delay the inevitable.

Except, when the airlock doors open, the Jakob-Wilhelm is not there.

I force myself to watch their soundless screams as the last of the old human race is devoured by the icy fangs of the great abyss. Gone, but never forgotten.

“Trust me, Dr. Saxon. This is better.”

* * * * *