The Enemy Within

He had betrayed her. They all had. It didn't matter what she'd done. They had left her, had abandoned her on this forsaken world. Alonzo's face was deeply creased in a tormented scowl as he distractedly directed the A.T.V. With each turn of the vehicle's wheels his heart wrenched, and his sense of betrayal grew greater. Betraying the betrayor, he thought. That's gotta be a new one.

But his usually glib wit failed in the face of this soul-consuming grief .... and guilt. Alonzo Solace was guilty. He wondered momentarily if he should be. After all, it was Julia who had betrayed them. Julia who had lied to him, to all of them. Julia who had come to his tent, and then left. But it was he who felt the guilt. Because he'd left her. Because he loved her. And he hadn't even tried to stop them when the others left her.

It was ridiculous. She was a Council spy. Much as he might long to wish that otherwise, it was the truth. But he needed her, wanted her. Alonzo sighed, and stopped the A.T.V. His soul was being torn apart, imagining her ... out there... alone. Lost, afraid. He knew her in a way the rest of this group couldn't possibly imagine. Or was that just his wistful imagination? Alonzo shook his head as he desperately tried to think this through. He understood Julia. What she had done... she'd been used. It was the only logical explaination. She was not a traitor, nor a cold-hearted Council worker by nature. She lacked that ruthlessness. Alonzo knew this. Thinking over the past few weeks, with knowledge of what she'd done - been forced to do, one part of his mind told him - he realized that she had tried to protect them, to keep Uly safe. Someone had been playing her against them, and she'd snapped. She would not go to the Council. She could not stay with Eden advance. Unless he went back for her....

Devon, who had been walking a few metres behind the A.T.V, frowned when she saw Alonzo halt the vehicle. She drew up alongside him, eying him obliquely. The man hadn't said a single thing last night in the argument over what to do with Julia. He hadn't spoken for, or against her and had abstained from voting. But this morning he had been so obviously sunk in a depression that Devon was beginning to worry. When she spoke, she kept her voice carefully casual.
"Lonzo? Its a long road ahead, we gotta keep moving, okay?"
He didn't speak. For a moment, Devon wondered if he'd even heard her. Then she heard something, a few words muttered so softly they barely reached her ears. "I'm not going anywhere."
Devon sighed, and looked away, to the horizon they were heading for. "I know its hard, but we're going to stop in a couple of hours," the woman assured him.
Alonzo looked up at her and from his eyes shone such suffering, such a wealth of pain and guilt and remorse that Devon was momentarily stunned into silence. "We shouldn't have left Julia," he told her quietly but with conviction.
The woman looked away; didn't he realize they were all guilty? She may have been a Council operative, but she was still a human and this was still a deadly planet! "Alonzo, personal feelings aside, she was a spy. Just by being here she was lying to us," Devon kept her voice gently persuasive, trying to make him understand. And, perhaps, in some strange way, to vindicate to herself what they'd done. "We didn't have a choice," she reminded him.
"Well I have a choice. And I'm not going on without Julia," Alonzo informed her in no uncertain terms. His eyes, when she looked into them, were still hurting, but there was an equal amount of determination.
Dammit, she thought. "Lets talk about it tonight, okay, when we set up camp?" She had to stop him from doing anything rash or stupid.
The pilot glared up at her from the vehicle. "We just left her with a tent, barely any rations!"
A knife in her heart. She knew that, they all did. But ... "She knows how to analyse indiginous vegetation, she will survive. She's probably in contact right now with whoever it was she was working for, arranging a way to join them. She will be okay," Devon reassured him, trying to keep her voice cool, but embarrassed to hear the pleading tone in it. What did she want, for Alonzo to forgive her what she had done? What she had let the others do to Julia? Even ignoring personal feelings, there was still the fact that she had been their only doctor. Without her they were in a lot of trouble. So it was with honest, and heart-rending regret, that Devon murmurred quietly, "I'm sorry."
She started to turn away, and missed the expression on Alonzo's face. It was as though he finally pulled himself out of the dreamlike trance he'd been in all day. But his voice called after her, making her freeze in her tracks. "I'm sorry too. But I'm going back for her. I've decided."
Adair whirled around, astonished surprise etched into her features. "Alonzo, you're part of the group, and the group has made a decision."
A look of incredible disbelief passed over the man's face. "I don't care! There is no group anymore! I mean, Julia was a part of the group too, right, and we left her. Now I'm going back for her and the rest of you can do whatever you wanna do." He shot her an angry glare and reversed the vehicle, turning it around. Facing it back the way they had come, towards Julia.
In alarm, Devon stepped towards the turning A.T.V. "Alonzo!"
He didn't even bother to look back at her. "Save it!"

The A.T.V moved out, a cloud of dust rising from the spinning tires as Alonzo quickly coaxed it to full speed. Devon winced, her shoulders slumping. She gave a sigh, flicking the delicate mouthpiece of her Gear unit around in front of her lips. "Danziger, halt the vehicles," she spoke into it. "We're camping here." She didn't have the time or energy to listen to John's demands for an explaination, so she signed off instantly. He'd see Alonzo's disappearing dust trail as soon as he turned to find her and realize what had happened.

It was past sunset when he reached their previous campsite. The moon's were just rising and it was dark enough that Alonzo didn't realize she wasn't there until he pulled the A.T.V. to a halt outside the single tent. It looked so small and pitiful sitting there, alone in the clearing. Concern and remorse washed through his soul, and he bit his lip. Where was she? He climbed out of the vehicle, and looked around the clearing.
"Julia? Julia?" No answer. He frowned nervously... She should be here. Unless Devon had been right... Had she contacted the Council? Had they taken her away somewhere? No... Something in his soul told him that she would not - could not - go to them. And yet... To be on the safe side, he stepped back over to the A.T.V and pulled out the mag-pro he'd taken with him. He activated it and a low whine filled the clearing as Alonzo walked to the tent and lifted the flap. No, it was empty. Solace looked around. "Where are you?" he whispered, looking for all the world like a lost little boy. He was afraid, he realized suddenly. Terrified really. Had something happened to her? Had the Council found her, perhaps exacted punishment on her for failing her mission?
"Julia!" he yelled, his voice piercing the night. The echo came back to him, desolate. But no answer. "Where are you?"
Nothing.

No... Wait... Alonzo looked over at a clump of bushes... Movement? The mag-pro still in his hands, held loose at his side, the pilot walked slowly, cautiously over. Light from the A.T.V's headlights shone on the bush and it moved. He caught sight of pale, human flesh. Julia? Yes! Solace found himself moving towards her, unable to help himself. Caught in the power of her terrified, lonely gaze, he crouched before her, his lips soundlessly shaping her name. Oh god... She looked like she'd been through hell. Dirty, tear-streaked face, her beautiful, fragile face that was covered in scrapes and nasty gashes. And her eyes... God, her eyes... One look into those eyes, and Alonzo was convinced of all he had thought about her. She was a good person, innocent of the horrific claims made against her. What she had done, she'd been forced to do, manipulated so she thought it was the right thing to do. How confused, how frightened must she have been these past weeks? And he too self-centred to notice. At that moment, Alonzo was convinced that he was deserving of the worst punishment the gods could devise for the pain he imagined he'd inflicted upon her by not noticing her pain. All he could do to approach redemption was to open his arms out invitingly to her.

Julia peered out from the shadows, all wide, frightened eyes and tousled hair. She watched in terror as Alonzo approached her with a Mag-pro. She knew it was irrational, knew it was supid, but all she could do was think "oh god, they sent him back to kill me." The next moment, of course, she realized it couldn't be true. Eden Group were not the Council, and they did not use such measures. Their worst punishment had already been inflicted upon her; banishment. Abandonment. Never had Julia been more frightened in her life than the moment when she awoke this morning and realized she was alone on a hostile planet. All she had wanted was Alonzo. Perhaps that should have struck her as odd, but all she could think of was how she'd wronged him. Encouraged him subconsciously, then turned him down. Approached him, then forgotten. Betrayed the trust he'd placed in her.

The day had passed slower than any before it. Filled with long, guilt-stricken, terror-filled hours. Jumping at every noise. Trying to think, but constantly being distracted by memories of pleasant days with Eden Advance, with Alonzo Solace. God, why had she done it? Why had she betrayed him, betrayed them all like that? The Council did not deserve her loyalty, had done nothing to earn it as these heroic people had. As Alonzo had. All she could think of was him.

And then he'd appeared. And he opened his arms to her, strong arms that offered safety and protection and forgiveness. He'd come back for her! Oh god, he'd come back for her! Biting back a sob of desperate relief, holding back all she wanted to say to him until later, Julia stepped forward and fell into those arms. They closed around her, holding her securely to him, and he stroked her hair, and whispered to her that she would be okay. He'd look after her, he'd take her back. She wouldn't be left alone again.

"Shh, it'll be okay," Alonzo whispered in her ear, holding her close against him, needing to reassure both of them with their physical closeness. "I promise," he whispered. Julia couldn't stop the tears that sprung from her eyes.
"You can't," she told him softly, her voice muffled against his chest. "I know you want everything to be okay, Alonzo, but you can't promise it will be."
She felt him sigh, felt his chest rise and fall beneath her. Felt his arms loosen around her and something in her froze. Had she just made some fatal miscalculation? Had she destroyed the precious, tenuous bond between them? There was so much she didn't know about emotional interactions. But Julia knew they had to discuss this now, here. Where they were always reminded of what had happened, of what she had done. Because Julia could not go back without his forgiveness, his support.
"I know," he whispered, and his voice melted the frozen spot of terror within her. It was regretful, full of remorse, but promising something. "Ohh, Julia," he murmurred, releasing her completely. He pulled back to peer down at her in the darkness, and she saw something in his eyes that frightened her. Those dark orbs reached out through the loneliness and despair of her soul and wrapped her up in his warm, tender emotions.
"Why did you come back for me, Alonzo?" she whispered, her own eyes seeking in his face the answer to her question.
He drew away from her, half-turning to hide his face. "I - I don't know... I just... I kept thinking about you, alone, out here..." He swung a hand wide to indicate the wilderness in general, and his shoulders slumped in confused defeat. "I couldn't just leave you out here!" Abruptly, Alonzo swung back around, facing her. His face and eyes blazed with some undefinable emotion, some great need for her to know what he was about to say. His firm grip on her shoulders forbade cowardly evasion. "Julia, please, you must believe me," he told her in his husky voice, eyes flaring with pain. "I didn't vote! I abstained, I couldn't take part in what they were doing... I - yes, I was angry, I felt betrayed... But, I couldn't abandon you out here..." Soul-searing guilt consumed his expression and he turned away again, his voice floating back to her in the silence of the night. "But I didn't stop them either.... Gods, I'm so sorry... I wish I'd tried, but I couldn't ... I was so angry at you, Julia..."

The sound of a soft whimper made Alonzo turn and he was astonished and frightened to see Julia crying. Tears illuminated by moonlight shone on her cheeks, lashes cast down over tortured eyes. Gods, what had he been thinking? In an instantaneous and unequivocal response, Alonzo had closed the gap between them and pulled her back into his embrace, holding her close and safe. "I'm sorry," he whispered, his own eyes clenched shut, lips drawn into a thin line as he tried to hold back his rage at his own ineptness. "Oh damn, Julia.... "

"Are you still angry?" came a tiny, quiet voice. Alonzo stared down at her in disbelief.
"What? No! No, Julia, of course not..." He took a deep breath, looking down at her with his black gaze. "I know you didn't want to... Someone made you, Julia... Who?" This was important to him. He wanted to know, to understand everything that had happened to her, all she'd been through. But she had to want to tell him.

Alonzo could see her hesitating. She looked suddenly fae and elusive in the moonlight, like an illusion of smoke that might vanish if he tried to capture her. And perhaps, he mused as she considered, that was a metaphor for Julia Heller. The harder he tried to hold her, the faster she slipped through his fingers. She had to come to him, of her own volition. Eventually, she did so. Turned towards him, still nervously biting her lower lip.
"We can't get moving until the morning, Alonzo. C'mon," and, taking his much larger hand in her own, she led him into the tent. The pilot followed silently, seated himself and watched expectantly as she fidgeted nervously with the blanket on the bed. After a few moments of gathering her thoughts, she began speaking.

Julia found it was difficult to determine where to begin. When she first began contacting Reilly? Or earlier, when she was commissioned to spy on Eden Project? Or, even earlier, the subversive familial conditioning that led her to this point? Julia sighed, and decided to begin, as was so often stated, at the beginning.

"What I'm certain only Devon knows," she said slowly, "is that my mother is Amelia Heller." She lifted her gaze briefly to meet Alonzo's and saw blank incomprehension. Holding back an oddly-timed chuckle, the doctor assumed that Alonzo, sleep-jumper that he was, constantly skipping from decade to decade, would not have kept abreast of local politics. She explained. "Amelia Heller was on the Council's Board of Regents all my life." Ahh, at last. Horrified, sympathetic comprehension. She nodded, and continued. "As you may have guessed, I was therefore exposed to pro-Council dogma and extensive propaganda all my life."
But Alonzo reached even deeper, to before her life. "Thats why you are a chromo-tilt!" he deduced, looking at her. Julia winced.
"Yes. My mother felt her only daughter could best serve the Council in the medical field. As it turned out, she was correct. At least, initially." A wry grin graced her lips momentarily and Julia met the pilot's gaze. "You know Blalock?"
Alonzo arched a brow, then nodded. "Yeah. High, high-up Council operative, I don't remember his official position," and he shrugged, to say he'd never much cared to discover it anyway. "I know he gave Devon a lot of trouble when she was trying to get Eden Project off the ground."
Julia nodded. "Yes. One of his secretaries contacted me shortly after I began my internship with Doctor Vazquez. After he found out I'd added myself to the list of doctors going with Eden Project." One slender shoulder raised, then dropped in an elegant shrug. "I had actually joined to get away from the Stations, away from the Council and my mother as much because I believed in Doctor Vazquez's theory, and Devon's dream. But, the Council distorted my own dream of freedom and forced me to be their agent. Again." The woman sighed heavily, and instantly felt Alonzo's gently supportive hand on hers. She smiled down at the image their touching hands made, finding from that vision the courage to continue. For, though her words were stilted, and somewhat formal, her eyes were tortured as she relived the feelings of betrayal, of confusion, of despair. "They - Blalock, and my mother - insisted it was for Eden Project's best interests. For the children's best interests. They thought Devon was a dreamer with no practical idea of what she was getting herself into. They needed someone with her to make sure she didn't do anything foolish. Someone from the Council. And, like the naive fool I was back then... I believed them." She lowered her head in disgrace, and was grateful for the covering shield of hair that hid her face from Alonzo's probing gaze. He said nothing, merely squeezed her hand and gave her time to compose herself, and continue. "They implanted a communications device in my stomach. It could be retrieved by enforced regurgitation, and would fit with Gear to allow me full-VR contact with a Council operative onplanet." She purposefully kept her voice bland to increase the shock. She was perversely pleased by the expression on her companions face.
"You mean -" he stared at her. "The Council's here?! On the planet?"
She inclined her head in a reluctant nod. "Yes. I don't know where... He never told me and ..." Suddenly, Julia looked up, her blazing eyes meeting his, her voice urgent with need. He could not think... "Alonzo, believe me, I never told him where we were. I never gave him any information on us, never! I would never let him hurt us!"
"Easy, easy, Julia, I believe you..." Alonzo smiled crookedly. "Do you have the communications device?"
"Oh!" Nodding in startlement, Julia stood and moved to a bag. She pulled a tiny object out and placed it in his hand. Alonzo looked at it curiously. It was so small. How could something so small create so much trouble? He sighed, clenching his hand tightly around the device, wanting to crush it but resisting the urge. Julia would have to show the others when they returned. Only then could they begin to trust her again.
"Keep going," Alonzo murmurred.
Julia nodded, marshalling her thoughts. She told him about Reilly, how she had contacted him after their crash. "He wanted me to tell him where we were... What had been happenning... And after he found out about Uly, he thought the boy would be the link. The means for the Council to control this planet, because to do so, they had to control the Terrians." Julia let her lashes fall down over her eyes, concealing her disgust with herself and with Reilly. In a soft voice she told Alonzo how Reilly had manipulated her into doing what he wanted her to do. How he had somehow picked up on her fears and insecurities and played on them to force her into actions she would not have undertaken normally. Then, the culmination of it all. How she had infected herself with Uly's DNA, in an attempt to keep the boy safe. To keep him with his mother. And how that had spiralled out of control, until Julia had no idea what she was doing or why, and could not stop herself.
"That sadistic son of a bitch," Alonzo muttered savagely of Reilly. Julia met his eyes, astonished at his angry words, and the compassion she saw there was her undoing. She found herself crying and could not understand why. But Alonzo didn't ask why, she was to realize later that he never had. He simply pulled her into his arms and rocked her gently, black eyes glaring protective fury. What manipulative, domineering bastard had sent Julia to this situation, had warped and twisted her emotions until she was this un-Julia-like wreck?!

It was her turn to comfort him. With some vestige of awkwardness, Julia held him to her, allowing her tiny, fragile body to reassure him. "Alonzo? What -" He silenced her by lifting his chin and touching their lips. It was both more and less than a kiss, and it reassured both of them. The past had been done, and it had been painful, but there would be a future. Solace pulled back, his hand cupping the side of her tiny, fragile face.
"Shhh, Julia... We'll go back to the group tomorrow... You can tell them all this, and then everything will be alright. I promise," he whispered to her, his eyes luminous with the determination to keep that promise. If he had to go out and fight every one of their enemies, one by one, he would make sure Julia was alright.