“Miss Valentine?” The voice pulled her out of her thoughts and she looked up to see a man wearing a suit and big glasses looking down at her. She quickly stood up and frowned, trying to figure out who he was.
“Um…yeah, that’s me.” He nodded, and suddenly, Beka saw Dylan and Trance moving up behind him with grim looks on their faces.
“Yes. Would you please come with me for a talk?” She backed off suspiciously.
“Wait, you’re not a psychiatrist are you? Cause you see, I don’t need one of those.”
“No,” the man said slowly, “I’m not a psychiatrist. This is a little more serious than that, Rebekah.” She glanced over at Dylan and Trance, who were looking anywhere but at her. Actually, Trance looked like she was trying not to cry. Beka felt a knot in her stomach.
“What the hell’s going on?” she asked in a shaky voice. The man looked at her softly and started walking towards her. She backed off to keep the distance between them.
“Maybe we could go somewhere to talk about this…”
“Maybe we couldn’t!” Beka turned around and started walking away. The man sighed.
“Please let’s talk about this calmly…” Beka spun around.
“Fine. Talk. What do you want?”
“I manage a very good establishment where people with your condition can get help…” Beka paled and stumbled backwards, grabbing the wall to steady herself. Wide-eyed, she stared at Dylan and Trance.
“You’re sending me away?” Her shivering voice cracked as she fought to hold the tears back. “Look, I know I haven’t…but I will, please, I’ll try to be better, I’ll do everything you say, please, just don’t…” Trance looked at her and shook her head, tears slippering down her cheeks.
“Beka, I’m so sorry but no. We should have done this straight away…it’s obvious that you need help that we can’t offer. If anything, I’m sorry I haven’t done this before. It was selfish of me to want to keep you here when you could get so much more help somewhere else.”
“Please,” Beka sobbed, “I was doing well, wasn’t I? I can…I can do that again. I will do that again.” The man cleared his throat.
“Miss Valentine, if you could please come with me.” Beka felt dizzy and shook her head, trying frantically to think of something. Maybe she could run away, now, before he could take her away. If she could just be alone on the Maru she could blast through the hangar bay doors and go far, far away, far from Trance and Dylan, far from Rommie…far…from Harper. She swallowed.
“Can’t I at least pack?” she said calmly. He sighed.
“Your friends can pack a bag for you and take it down later today. Now I would like you to come with me.” He reached out to grab her, and she violently pushed him off, getting up to go.
“I’m not coming with you,” she said in a trembling voice, “I’m not.” He tried to take hold of her, but she fought him off. He sighed.
“Fine,” he said in a tired voice, and, before she could react, had attached a small device to her neck. Everything went black.
****
“Harper,” Andromeda said in a gentle voice, “I think you might want to go down to hangar bay three.” He frowned.
“Why?” She gave him a sad look.
“I’m not quite sure how to tell you this but…Beka’s leaving.” He dropped the tools he’d been holding.
“WHAT???”
“Well, she hasn’t been doing too well…and Trance contacted an institute where they are willing to take her in.” He almost fainted right there.
“We’re sending her away? Rommie, we can’t do that!”
“Only until she gets better Harper,” she argued. “But I think it would be good if you’d pack her a bag and bring it down there. She’ll need some of her things.” He quickly wiped away a tear, hoping she hadn’t seen it. “Harper…I know how this must feel for you.”
“I’ll go pack her a bag,” he mumbled. Andromeda gave him a worried look before blinking out.
****
Dylan hesitantly placed an unconscious Beka in the small ship the manager of the institute was piloting.
“Are you sure she’s going to be ok?” he asked for the fiftieth time. He could have sworn the other man would have rolled his eyes, hadn’t he been so proper.
“Yes, Captain Hunt,” he said patiently, “we have a very high success rate, almost every single patient we get in come out, if not completely cured, able to deal with their condition.”
“But not everyone?”
“I won’t lie to you Captain. Some people will struggle with the disease until it kills them. However, we can hope Miss Valentine won’t be one of them.” Dylan nodded.
“We’ll be down later to give her some stuff and make sure she’s all right.”
“I’m sure she’ll settle in quite nicely, but I’ll tell the nurses you’re visiting.”
“Thank you.” Dylan cast one last glance at Beka and left the ship, heavy at heart.
