GREEN [complete]

Mars squirmed and whimpered in his sleep. Sekam sat next to him, one leg stretched out to block him from rolling into the fire. Again. Ash and soot marked his scales, but he hadn't been bothered to wake up. His dreams held him fast, through the long hours of the morning.

Sekam watched him drag himself out of sleep, and she wondered. She wondered how such an abomination, a thing designed to be a ruthless weapon, could be so utterly pathetic. Mars was nothing like the mongrels she was familiar with. He was all soft expressions and nervous smiles. She almost let herself think he was different, but she knew it had to be a lie.

All mongrels were the same. Created to fulfill their purpose, and nothing more; they didn't have the capacity for curiosity or kindness. Mars might have had Dylan fooled with the gentle mask he wore, but Sekam could see right through it. She could see the monster—the mongrel.

"Can you stop looking at him like you're going to eat him?" Dylan said. "You're making me nervous."

Sekam scowled. "I would rather starve."

"I ... uh, I guess that's comforting?" They clambered to their feet and stretched, popping the tightness out of their back in a series of motions and noises that made Sekam wish she could be in the company of anyone else. "How long have we been here?"

"Six hours, give or take." Sekam glanced at the fire. "Seven," she amended.
She rocked back, squinting into the criss-crossing branches that blotted out the sky. The forever bright grey prevailed, casting gloom into the forest. Ahl waited for her under the same sky, not fifty miles away. He expected her to return victorious, having destroyed the green. But the green was not destroyed and she was not victorious.

She'd managed to free a mongrel from captivity—hardly an accomplishment.
Dylan knelt next to Mars and grabbed his shoulder, giving him a gentle shake. He groaned. They tried again, and he rolled over, nearly dousing himself in another coat of ash. Instead, he bumped into Sekam's leg and startled awake. He sat up abruptly, eyes flying wide open and lips parted to take full advantage of his eager hyperventilation.

"Woah, hey! Hey, hey, you're okay, you're okay." Dylan touched his neck
Sekam watched the act play out as Mars made a show of regaining his composure and gave Dylan the satisfaction of thinking they were actually helping him—as if the whole thing wasn't an act. He wasn't as helpless as he pretended to be. He couldn't be.

"Are you feeling any better?" Sekam asked.

Mars stared at her for a few seconds, forked tongue flicking out to taste the air. He closed his hand into a fist and flicked his wrist once, twice. Sekam watched silently, trying to interpret what he was trying to tell her. A few more seconds ticked by before color burnt his cheeks and he jerked a nod, then abruptly turned his face away.

"Yes?" she asked.

This time, he didn't try talking with his hands. He gave her another quick nod and braved a glance. He was good, he was very good. He knew all the right mannerisms and manipulated his heart rate accordingly. Sekam would have been impressed if he wasn't trying so hard—too hard. Why? He'd already proven himself helpless, he didn't need to keep pushing.

"Good." An easy smile slid onto her face. Practiced.

Dylan gave her a strange look, but didn't address it. Instead, they said, "Bek is waiting for us."

Sekam nodded her understanding. They were impatient. Now, when it would do them no good. She bit down her irritation, teeth cutting into her tongue. Mars would be no safer with Bek and Ahl, Sekam knew the forest better than anyone. It was the green that was a danger to him now.

Before she could unclamp her teeth and spit something vile at Dylan, she started into the brush. The deer were long dead, but their trails remained. They wound around the trees and through the brush, etching comfortable paths for her feet to follow. Dylan trekked along behind her, and Mars behind him. Sekam hadn't been aware that a single creature—and one who couldn't talk, at that—could make so much noise, but somehow, he managed it.

An hour later, she stopped to let Dylan and Mars rest. Both their hearts fluttered so desperately they might have been caged hummingbirds, and Mars's already-pale skin was white as the fish bellies in the marshlands. Each breath rasped in his throat, and his eyes didn't quite focus on anything. They never did, but it was worse now.

"Stay here," Sekam said, although she doubted they needed to be told.
Dylan nodded a breathless nod.

She barely made it twenty feet.

"Sekam! Sekam, help me!" Dylan cried, their voice raw around the edges.
Mars spasmed on the ground, eyes rolled back in his head and foam bubbling out his mouth. He grasped at nothing, hands formed into tense claws. Dylan was trying and failing to hold him in place as they muttered assurances that it was going to be okay over and over.

"What do you want me to do?" Sekam asked, wavering over them.
"Keep him on his side. You need to keep him on his side."

Sekam swung her leg over Mars and sat on him, grabbing his shoulder and bracing herself against a tree. "What's wrong with him?" she demanded. He kept thrashing, nearly flinging her off more than once, but she managed to keep him in place.

"He's dying." Dylan spoke like it was a fact they all knew.

She stared back as she processed what they said. He's dying. How was that possible? Thanuk told her she needed to keep him alive—he couldn't be dying. It was her duty to keep him alive. Dylan had to be wrong. He couldn't be dying. All Sekam managed was: "What?"

"His cells are programmed to destroy the green—a sort of immunity." Their grip on his back had loosened, more comforting than forceful now that Sekam had him steady. "But there's a bit of a glitch. They kind of metabolize ... well, him."

"What?"

"He regularly needs new organs. Bek said she knew a guy who could get us organs. That's why it's so important we get back to her. Soon." As they spoke, they rubbed circles in Mars's lower back; calm circles, slow circles, circles that didn't at all match the tension in their voice.

"He's going to die," Sekam said.

Mars went limp and Sekam rolled off of him, falling into the dirt. As Dylan comforted Mars, Sekam gagged on her tears. He was going to die. He was the only way she could fix the world, he was the only way she could get her fur back, and he was going to die.