Efferent

Chapter 27

Clark was brooding, much like Blaise often did, as he pondered Travis' earlier claim. He paced the floor in hurried steps, running his hands rapidly through his hair. Humming slightly to himself before he responded, he slapped his hands done to his sides with a clap before he clutched at the side of his head. "You say that he was asking if Katherine had left any messages through you?"

"To be communicated by me, under her control." Travis clarified, "What he had not accounted for was the magnitude of the effect Ardyn's power would have had on me."

"A miscalculation on his part," I muttered. "How could I have note seen this coming earlier?"

Blaise clutched at the ground, and Amelia grasped his arm as he proclaimed loudly, "He knew." His breathing increased in time with the beating of my heart as panic set in. "He knew, and he sent us here to retrieve the formulation for his own benefit."

"Ate least," Travis drawled as he lay back, "He did not send you to your death."

"We will die!" Blaise exclaimed, causing Amelia to jump. "We will die, if he had sent word to Katherine before hand. They know we are coming."

"We could run away," Clark offered, hope ringing in his voice as he hesitated, "We could run away. Start over, create a new sanctuary, a new home for people like us. Others gifted with Efference."

I felt my chest grow heavy and my heart sink, at the implication of his words. All eyes fell to me. "We can." I whispered, "It would be safer."

"You are wrong," Travis spoke up, "You do not have the stamina to protect yourselves enough yet, and I do not have enough stamina to protect all of you on a constant basis. We need Arydn's Efference to be restored or they will pick us off, one, by one, by one."

His message rang in my ears, and my breathing picked up, its pace increasing with the beat of my heart.

"You do not ha-." I tried to object but was silenced.

"We do," Blaise offered bitterly. "We are not strong enough on our own. Even with out training and refinement you could last days longer than we could."

"We do not even know if the serum will work on me again." I offered, "It is far too much of a risk."

"A risk we must be willing to take." Travis stated in rebuttal, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow.

"Regardless, I-."

"A risk that you would take for us." Amelia spoke tilting her head to the side.

"Besides, why would the doctor lie about the formula working when it is to his benefit that it does?" Blaise added. "I vote for going to the facility, then raising our kicks to get out."

"I second that motion." Clark offered, his concern for me showing. "We need you to have your powers back, and more importantly, you need them too."

I smiled slightly, as Travis wrapped up the debate with a note of finality. "So it is settled. We regain our stamina, and we go after the serum. They do not know that we know."

"We have an advantage." Clark finished.

We dispersed a bit about the clearing, and I confronted Travis, who once again had retreated towards the edge. "You are always standing." I commented dully.

"It gets harder to command my body to listen when I order it to move from a position on the ground to my feet."

My breath caught, as I had almost forgotten his anecdote from the earlier night. "Will the serum work?" I paused, "For you I mean? Your problem sounds similar to mine."

"I believe it would have, had I not been injected with Afference after." He sighed, refusing to meet my eye. "Afference slowed down the process and yet also did not stop it. It remains undetermined, the effect of merging the two together. I would no longer wish to risk it."

"How much longer?" I asked, "How much longer to you think you can stand it before you try? Regardless of the consequences, regardless of the ramifications?" I scoffed, toeing the earth in a circle. "I think you are afraid."

"Afraid?" he scoffed, "I am not afraid, rather, I am wary. I am weary."

"I think that you are afraid," I reiterated, "Of the responsibility that comes with remaining alive if the serum does work."

"What could you possibly mean?" he growled out, "I take responsibility for my actions, I just refuse to regret them."

"Even so," I offered, "Even so you struggle with the weight of what you have done. What you did. What you naturally wish to do." I paced closer towards him, "Power corrupts. I think that you do not want to live with your corruption, but rather die with it."

He inhaled shakily, "Stop." He shook his head, "it is unlikely it will work, with the two combinations. When we find the serum, you will be Efferent once more, and I will live peacefully in the new sanctuary we created until the end of my days."

"You rather what yourself devolve than to try to salvage your own life?" I asked, and Travis remained silent. "Guilt was created for a purpose, Travis." I hesitated and then spoke, "To notify you of what you did wrong."

"I know," He chuckled dryly, "Trust me, I know what I did wrong. And it plagues me everyday, Ardyn. Yet as I said before-."

"You have no regrets." I finished for him. "Wouldn't you regret not knowing, Travis? Not even trying?"

"Why are you doing this?" He asked, "What gave you the idea that this would be acceptable to talk to me about?"

I looked him in the eye. "Because... because you say that the Efferent need me. And I need you. I need you to protect them when I can't." I took a deep breath and looked at Amelia, Clark, and Blaise. "And in doing so, that includes you remaining alive."

"You are trying to convince me to take the serum? Just as you?"

"We can go through the transition together." I reached out to squeeze his upper arm, "I need you."

Travis nodded blandly. "Fine," he offered me his hand to shake firmly. "I will take the serum, but only to serve in protecting this," He gestured to the resting group, finally bringing his open hand around to me.

"Agreed." I smiled softly. "We will leave tomorrow for the facility, and when we recover the formula," I hesitated, pausing for emphasis, "You and I will both take the serum."