Firefly

Firefly
    	Lucas came to with the sharp, sweet tang of blood in his nose. It was a normal odor, almost a comforting odor, but for the realization that it was his blood. There was a thick dampness on his upper lip and something over his eyes. Instinctively, Lucas tried to raise his right hand to his face – no good; they were shackled to a chair. His temples throbbed. A chair? After a moment Lucas could feel the metal frame through the rough, thinly worn padding. He grimaced. Somewhere behind him, a door slid open.
    	“Hiya, Luke.”
    	There was only one man still alive who knew how much Lucas hated to be called that.
    	“Hello, Roger.” The crunch of boots on the stone floor echoed, then surged. Soldiers. Two, three, five, seven, ten – “I’ll take it as a compliment that you felt the need to confront a blindfolded and bound cripple with a dozen of Mycroft’s finest.”
    	“Ten, actually. Mycroft didn’t want me to take any chances.” Lucas could hear the smugness in Roger’s voice. “But I’m not here to test your scouting skills. Tell me, how are you feeling?”
    	“You mean besides betrayed?” He let the word dangle between them for a moment. “Humiliated. Furious. Bewildered.”
    	“That’s all very fascinating,” Roger interrupted disdainfully, “but I was inquiring about your bodily condition.”
    	“Ha! Since when did the Council care about the health of his prisoners? Hang on, since when did they keep prisoners?”
    	“Since I convinced them you were more useful alive than as food.”
    	“You? Convince the Council? Roger the Schemer? Roger the Deserter?” chortled Lucas.
    	“If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times. They’ll trust anyone they think weaker than them, which is why they listened to me, and why you’re still alive and not being served on two dozen plates.”
    	“And the rest of the garrison?”
    	Silence.
    	“You didn’t.”
    	“They were of no tactical value to the Council. There was no way I could—“
    	“Look me in the eyes and say that! They saved your miserable life. Say it to my face!” cried Lucas. Footsteps, then rough movements of a pair of hands yanked off the blindfold and undid the manacles. Lucas’s eyes flitted back and forth amongst the soldiers with rifles in front of him, widening as saw the studded ears.
    	“I couldn’t save them all.” Roger quietly spoke as he walked into view. “And of the ones I could, well… there were certain… things asked of them.”
    	“I suppose they’re under your control.”
    	“Naturally.”
    	Lucas shook his head at this and examined the soldiers again, the ten of them in a rough semicircle surrounding him and Roger. An idea started tickling at the base of his brain. “And what exactly did you tell Mycroft and the rest to convince them that I should be allowed to live?”
    	“I told him you were a writer.” Roger slouched a bit. Eight feet away.
    	“A what?”
    	“A writer. Specifically an author of novellas.”
    	“And they spared my life because of that. Did they need new reading material for the loo, or did someone check out all the books from their library?” Lucas deadpanned, as he looked at the soldiers again. They were all breathing at the same rate, blinking at the same time, guns all trained on Lucas.
    	“Mycroft believes that the stories people write say a lot about human nature. So he’s requesting that you write a book.”
    	“A book about what?” Lucas sat a little straighter. The rifles twitched a bit.
    	“Anything, really. A romance, a hard-boiled mystery, children’s fairy tales. I told him about the story about the firefly and the monkeys –
    	At that moment, Lucas lunged at Roger. The sound of ten rifles reverberated in the cell. Then –
    	Silence.