Cinder hit her head against the controls of the ship. "Selene, you're going to break the control panel."
She could barely here Jacin as he nagged like an old woman. "How would you feel if two of your friends crashed to Earth in a satellite, one of them was kidnapped by a crazy Lunar, and your aunt was trying to marry your fiance?" she asked.
Jacin leaned against the co-pilot's chair and rubbed the back of his neck. His face was still the solid slab of rock she was used to seeing everyday. Yet, he still managed to concoct a smudge of humor. "I'd feel a little weird about it. And I'd then have to go and stop drinking whatever was in my hand."
Normally, she would have laughed. But this was way too much. Is this what being queen would feel like? Juggling handfuls of complex situations that – if not handled correctly and at the right time – would blow up in your face?
Yet another thing to add to the long list of reasons why she didn't want to be queen. Still, becoming queen and dealing with all of these things was better than letting Levana rule. That witch had to be stopped. And this wasn't out of jealousy, but Cinder would not let her marry Kai. She vowed it, for his protection of course. Not because she wanted Kai all to herself or since they were betrothed. Levana would kill him the second she got what she wanted from him, which was ....
"Oh dear stars!" Cinder screamed. She jumped up from the seat and ran to the bathroom. Just the thought of Levana doing anything to Kai .... to get .. an .... heir. Stars, it was far to disgusting.
The second she closed the door, she threw up. Sadly, her cyborg wouldn't forget the thoughts in her head anytime soon.
"Princess, are you alright?" Jacin called through the door, concerned.
"Yeah," she replied when her yakking seized. "Just thinking about how my aunt wants to steal my fiance."
"How would that ... ohhhh." Jacin seemed to get the message. "Why would you start thinking about that? That's awfully inappropriate for a princess to be thinking of."
"She's going to try to do it! We both know that! She needs and heir."
"So you think your fiance, the prince of the Eastern Commonwealth, would cheat on you with your own aunt like that? How much faith do you have in him?"
Cinder groaned as she got to her feet. Jacin was being such a pain – as always. "I can't let Levana start using her glamour on him." She opened the door and saw Jacin waiting just outside for her.
"We won't," he assured her. "We'll save your precious fiance and the world. Levana won't hurt either of them." Cinder knew Jacin was only going to help save Kai so he could interrogate him later on. He always said she was like a little sister to him, and that he would protect her at all costs. She also knew that there was no way Kai would be able to avoid having a "chat" with Jacin once this was all over.
"Okay. I'm gonna go check on Wolf and fix his bandages." She left the room and Jacin went back to the cock-pit to navigate the ship. All Cinder could do was help the best she could, and pray that her friends were okay.
.................
(Three days ago)
Cress woke up with a throbbing headache. Her hair was tangled and wound around various items. And that's when she saw it. A hole in the side of the satellite. Sand leaking onto the floor. And worst of all, there was no sign of Thorne.
"Thorne?" she called groggily. No response. "Thorne?" she repeated, more nervous. "Thorne, where are you?"
A groan erupted from the other side of the satellite. Struggling – and tripping over her own hair -, she rose to her feet and trudged to the origin of the sound. On the way, she saw more sand. And ...
The most beautiful thing she'd ever seen.
Hills and valleys of sand against a pale blue sky. The sun beat down on the tiny grains of rock, making them shimmer and radiate with heat. She was in a desert. And it was more than enough to take her breath away.
She's only seen pictures of Earth through satellite photos and images from the media. They were enough to fuel her imagination, but not enough to quench her thirst for the new scenery, the wide plains, the glorious plants, and a little human interaction.
Now, she was finally here. The one place she always wanted to go. Earth. She was free.
"Uhhhhhhhhh," Thorne groaned. "Creeeeesssssss. Where are you?" he whined.
She knew her adoration for the world would have to wait. Deserts deprived people of water and even caused people to go into states of hysteria and delusion. They needed to take what they could and get out of there.
Cress looked around and saw Thorne's foot sticking out from under one of her enormous screens. She gripped it with both hands and heaved and pulled it to the best of her ability. So yeah, it barely moved.
"Can you help get it off?" she grunted.
"Oh, I think so." He only had to push it once, and it slid off him like it weighed nothing. As if Cress didn't feel weak around him already. When he got to his feet, the wooziness in his head made him stumble. Cress ran to catch him. "Oh, thank you, Crescent. I guess seeing you was too much for me," he joked. A crooked smile played on his lips, making him look almost drunk.
All Cress did was role her eyes and lay his arm across her shoulders. She guided her dizzy friend to sit on her mattress – that was now upside-down on the wrong side of the satellite. "Thank you, Crescent," Thorne hummed. He looked so blissful and childish. It creep Cress out that a guy could have a bleeding wound on his forehead and look like everything was fine.
There was nothing around the satellite that she could use to bind his wound ... That is, in exception to her dresses. You can get new ones when this is all over.
She picked up a shard of jagged metal and ripped one of her other dresses out from under a monitor. In one swipe, she made a large enough strip for Thorne's huge head.
"Don't rip you dress," Thorne protested. Too late for that now. She stood in front of him and wound that cloth around to cover his injury. "You didn't have to do that."
"I couldn't just let you bleed out," she mumbled. Why was she acting so quiet and mousy around Thorne?
Oh yeah, because she felt like she owed him for getting him trapped on the satellite. That she was responsible for what was going on. That this was all her fault. Those thoughts escalated when Thorne spoke up again.
"Why are all of the lights out? And why is it so dark?" he inquired.
"What are you talking about? It's so bright out side that it could-" She paused. After she tied the knot, she crouched in front of him and examined his eyes. "Blind someone," she finished in a murmur. His pupils were nearly the size of his irises. The whites of his eyes a bit red with defined red lines. She placed the back of her hand to his head. He was warm, very warm.
"What's wrong?" He was so clueless it was almost painful.
"Well," Cress began, trying not to scare him. "You seem to have lost your vision, contracted a concussion, and possibly have an abnormal core temperature."
His eyes widened and his held his head with one hand. "English woman."
Sighing, she repeated, "You're blind, hit your head, and have a fever."
"Thank you. That I can understand."
Rolling her eyes, Cress searched for items they could take with them. They'd have to travel across the desert to get help for Thorne and get back to the Rampion. She picked up a few things in her arms. Water bottles, freeze-dried foods, more dresses she could use for their cloth.
"Cress?" he called out. She saw his hands reaching around and grabbing at nothing. "Cress, are you here?"
She tore off more of the cloth from the last dress and wrapped it around her feet. Once she was done with this revolution, she was going to have to get herself a pair of shoes.
"Cress?" he said again, more concerned. He stood up from the mattress – at first, about to lose his balance – and felt around only to catch nothing. "Are you still here?"
"I'm over here," she answered. "I'm just getting some stuff to take with us. We're going to have to find civilization if we want to get back to the Rampion."
Shock rushed over her as Thorne's hands gripped her shoulders. He made a little content noise and her enveloped her in a hug from behind. He held her tight and rocked back and forth ever so slightly. Cress wasn't sure if she was going to have a panic attack or scream at him with fury.
So for the moment, all she could manage was to stand frozen in place and let Thorne ... cuddle her? To be honest, she was much more confused than scared. Thorne was blind, sick, and mentally disoriented. All she had to do to get him off her was flick him over his bandage and he'd crumble.
"You're warm," he cooed. Yeah, cuddly Thorne was not something she was used to.
Fighting off the blush that was forming in her cheeks, she stated, "We should start heading out and looking for people. We have to get out of here."
He nudged the side of her head with his nose. "Good idea, Crescent." He tried to lean against her again, but she slid from his grasp. He pouted in his upset state.
As she broke from his touch, she felt a tight pain on her head. Was she stepping on her hair again?
One look to the ground denied her original thought. Her hair was stuck in a hundred different places and cut in so many places as well. It was mess. One that she didn't have time to clean up or fix. She knew she would regret this, and that she'd feel like a piece of her was missing for a while. But desperate times called for desperate measures.
"Thorne," she said. "I- ... I need you to cut my hair."
He tilted his head and squinted. "Why would you want a blind guy to do you hair? Isn't it really bad for anyone to touch a girl's hair?"
It was lightly amusing, and Cress could have laughed. "It's only going to slow us down, and we need to get out of here as soon as possible."
She sat him down on the mattress again and picked up the same metal shard she had before. He placed in his hand and sat in front of him. "Cut it as high as you can." She weld her eyes shut and bit her lip. She'd never had a haircut before. Especially from someone who couldn't see. But, there was always a first time for everything.
He curled his fingers around her hair and brushed the back of her neck with the hands of a ghost. Something in her head was lulling her, calming her nerves. He tugged on her hair for a moment. Then, all of the weight that she'd been used to on her head was gone, and the ends of her hair now brushed her neck.
"You look beautiful," he smiled. He dropped the metal on the ground and slid remnants of hair off her shoulders and clothes.
"But .. you can't see me. You're blind," she replied, confused.
He leaned closer to her and whispered into her ear, "I know."