Anomaly

Ten • Strange

He took a breath. "Tell me the truth..."

"About what?" she said quietly, her voice croaky and sore.

"Back there, was that you?"

"Who else would it have been?"

"Juno. This is serious. I need to know if you meant that; if now that it's over you still... stand by what you did."

"Does it matter? I'm not getting out of here. They're going to take out the stone either way."

"But-"

"You lied to me." Her eyes flickered with light, as if she were holding back her powers. "You said you wanted to take me away, keep me safe. But you didn't mean it. You were distracting me so they could put me in here. So they could kill me."

"No one wants to kill you. But you left us no choice."

"So just do it. What are we waiting for?"

"I'm waiting for you to show me that you're still you. I-if I can prove to them that you're not going to hurt anyone else then maybe I can get them to wait, run more tests, separate you from that thing safely."

"You keep telling them I'm not a threat, yet I keep proving that I am. How can I make you trust me when I don't trust myself?"

"Because I know you."

"No you don't. You said yourself I'm not supposed to be here. I'm not the Juno that you fall in love with, I'm not the Juno that dies on your operating table. I'm something else - something that shouldn't exist."

He rubbed his face with his hand, as if he were trying to disguise the irritation he felt. "Why? After everything you've done to survive, why are you giving up now?"

She paused for a moment, looking over at the screens of data nearby. "Bruce said if the stone stayed inside of me long enough that I'd die." She looked back at him. "He was right, Stephen. I am dying. Just not in the way we thought."

He furrowed his brow, shaking his head in confusion.

"Soon my mind will be gone completely, and all that'll be left is the stone, using my body like a puppet."

"Do you really believe that?"

"I don't want to." She swallowed past a lump in her throat, closing her eyes and breathing slowly. "But I don't think anyone's going to want to take that risk."

"Why did you have to go and do that?" his voice broke. "You escaped death, you had a second chance."

"I guess my life really did end in 2012," she said. "I just don't think I'm viable for this world. I'm like a zombie - you can take it out of the ground and it'll walk around like it's still alive but no matter what, its skin will still rot."

His eyes were red and watery, glaring at her with anger and desperation. "I can't let them back into this room, Juno. I can't let them..."

"Please, Stephen." A tear trailed down her cheek, dripping off her chin onto the metal floor of the machine. "Just... let me do this one redeemable thing. Before the stone takes over again and I start trying to fight my way out."

He stood there, silent and unmoving, searching for words but nothing seemed right.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "You have to let them do this."

He placed a hand on the glass and rested his forehead against it.  "Okay," he finally said, so quiet it was almost inaudible.

*