Parker fired only three shots. One into the heart of Lt. Khan, and one into each of the guards standing by him. The sound carried up through the abnormally high ceiling of the West Wing as the other members of the Elmcroft organization stood silently in shock. I had known Parker had a gun, but I was just as caught off guard as they were by the whole situation.  They had trained us on how to safely operate guns back at SouthPoint, and it was customary that we all take one when we left The Hyperion in case we encountered something dangerous. I can still remember changing the inventory checklist from three guns to two after Parker took one out and never returned. Yet none of us had ever had to actually use one in all of our time spent on Triton, so watching Parker open fire on Khan and his men came as quite a shock.

Parker turned the gun to a woman in a lab coat and demanded that she take us to The Luminescence. With Lt. Khan dead, I could see the people of Elmcroft were now completely defeated. I was quite certain that all of them had maintained Khan's same ideals about their obligation to save The Luminescence, but almost half of their team had just been killed so I was also certain that they didn't want anyone else to die. Parker had made it obvious that he would not hesitate to kill anyone who stood between him and The Luminescence, so they simply complied with his demands as to avoid any more death. Although they shared Khan’s ideals, they did lack his level of dedication.

As we approached the room labeled PRI-09, I realized almost seven years had passed since we left Triton. I found myself wondering how things with Luma would have changed and what her perception of the situation would be. What had they told her about why we were here? Would she want to go back to Earth? What was I even going to say to her? All these questions that were bouncing around in my head, and as the door opened I saw Luma looking up from sitting at a table in the middle of the room.

“Abram!” She exclaimed as she got up from the table to run towards us. She hadn’t aged at all over the seven-year journey.  “The Hyperion crashed! A group of men boarded the ship and took me into this room. I asked them to let me see you, but they didn’t listen to me. Are we on Earth?” She asked. Her voice was trembling with fear and I could tell she was glad to see me again.

Gently, I smiled, wiping away the tears that were beginning to form in her eyes. It was obvious that they hadn’t told her what happened nor what their plans had been. “It’s okay Luma,” I said. “We crashed here on Mars, but we’re going to Earth soon. And when we get there I’m going to take you to the ocean.”

She smiled and we turned down the hall to leave. Parker went to the East Wing to find a ship we could use to get home. I didn’t figure that he would have much trouble convincing them to let us take one after killing Khan and his two guards, but I stayed behind with Luma just to be sure she didn’t see anything I didn’t want her to. She was unaware of the entire situation, and I chose to keep it that way in an effort to protect her. Why involve her in the messiness of it all if she didn’t have to be?

Pretty soon Parker returned and we boarded a ship similar to The Hyperion. Although The Hyperion was an Earthly vessel, it’s blueprints and design were given to us by the people of Mars, so Parker and I had no problem operating the ship and setting our course for Earth. My head was still spinning with the events that just unfolded as I prepared my hibernation chamber once again. We would only have to sleep for a few months this time, and when we awoke I knew we would be greeted as heroes by the people of Earth and by The Order. However, I also knew that I would personally still have to reconcile what we had just done. On one hand, I should've been glad to see it happen, and it shouldn't have bothered me the way that it was. I had only known Lt. Khan for a number of hours, and in that short span of time he had pointed a gun to my head with the intention of killing me. Yet something inside me was disturbed seeing his body lay lifeless on the floor back in the West Wing. Seeing anyone killed before your eyes is cause enough for a disturbance, but what I felt was deeper than that.

Khan hadn't seen Luma as just a tool for us to use. He had opened my eyes to the idea that she was more, and the belief that she needed to be protected from the people who didn't understand that. Ultimately, that idea had gotten him killed, and I had unknowingly taken up that belief in some sort of un-consensual passing of the torch. I didn't want to feel this way. I wanted to be happy that we had completed our mission and were going home once again, but I couldn't.  I had taken up the duty to be Luma's protector, yet here I was delivering her to death. We were taking her to a group of people who were going to use and exploit her without thinking of the moral consequence.

I felt my thoughts growing cloudy as the hibernation period began. I also began to feel that same eeriness I had felt the last time I went to sleep, as well as every other time I passed through the door to The Hyperion. But this time was different. This time I knew my answer. I would rather die than live alone for the rest of my existence. But further than that, I would rather die for what I believe in than live going against what I felt to be the truth. I knew what I had to do when I awoke. It would be hard and I doubted many people would understand me or feel what I was feeling, but I had made my decision. I was going to protect Luma, even if it killed me.