Luna's Past

As those reassuring words came out of Sohel's voice Luna couldn't believe her ears. Noticing this Sohel again says, "You can rest easy now, Luna. We've destroyed the chip on your neck. The one's controlling you can't hurt you anymore." Luna started crying out of joy. The other four members also come to the briefing room and see Luna crying while grabbing Sohel's uniform coat. Jacob was going to crack a joke but stopped as Annabelle, who was still standing behind Luna, glared at him. After almost 15 minutes Luna calmed down. She let go of Sohel's coat and sat straight up. Mitali handed her a glass of water. She took it and gulped down the water at once. After she totally calmed down, Sohel asked, "OK, Luna. Can you tell us What happened to you? And How did you end up in this situation?" Luna nodded. She said, "From the time I remember I was raised in an orphanage. I didn't have parents but three friends I had held dear. Then one day a year ago, Mr. Stone came to our orphanage and adopted us. He told us that we would be living like princesses from now on. We were really happy. He took us to an orphanage in Washington. At first, everything was great. They gave us better food than what we got in our previous home, the rooms were great too. But two months later one day Mr. Stone suddenly came to us and said, "From tomorrow, I'll train you four to be fighters." We asked why. He said that it was to help us for our future. We agreed. The next day, he took us to the basement of the orphanage and our training started. Every day he and his men would teach us how to fight, how to shoot weapons etc. At one point a doctor came and conducted surgery on all four of us. Mr. Stone said it was to remove something bad that was growing in our throats. The training kept getting harder as the days went by. At one point It was too hard for us to continue. We begged Mr. Stone to stop the training but he didn't listen to us. One by one, my friends started getting sick. Once one of them got sick one of Mr. Stone's men would take her away and we wouldn't ever see her again. When we asked Mr. Stone about her whereabouts, he said that he had freed her. And one by one, he would free us too if we completed the training and did some work for him. Those words gave us hope and we kept on training. But my other two friends were gone by the next few months. I was still looking forward to meeting them once he freed me. I still believed him. But one day last month......"

28th November 2031

07:14

Anacostia Park, Washington D.C

Mr. Stone and Luna were sitting in a car just outside the main gate of Anacostia Park. Mr. Stone was sitting in the driving seat and Luna was beside him. A few moments later an Asian man in his early 40s wearing a light blue tracksuit gets in the park. Showing the man Stone says, "You see that man, Luna? His name is Kim Min-Jae. You have to kill him." Luna sharply turns at Stone with disbelief in her looks. She says, "WHAT? I...I have to kill him?"

"That's why I had you training for the last 11 months. Now you'll kill some people for me. Once you do, I promise I'll send you to your friends and you'll be free. Don't you want to meet your friends again?"

"I... I do. But I don't want to kill anybody."

"But you have to. If you don't kill then I have to. And the ones I'll be killing won't be them. It will be your friends and you."

Luna's eyes dilated as She felt pure horror. Stone hands him a small butterfly knife and says, "I'm sure you don't want that. Now take this and complete the job." Luna takes the knife with shaky hands. Stone says, "Oh, yeah. Don't try anything funny. I've implanted a chip in your vocal cord that'll let me know everything you say. The moment you say something about us, I'll have no other choice but to kill your friends." Luna nodded and got out of the car while thinking, "How did I end up here?"

06th January 2032

06:30

Artemis Briefing Room

All of them were speechless hearing Luna's story. Sohel assures Luna, "Don't worry Luna. You won't have to kill anymore. From now on, I promise, We'll protect you."

Luna's eyes spark with hope as she hears those words. Naomi says, "Now, we've got definite proof against Stone. Should I get ready to move out to apprehend him?"

"Yeah. Do so."

ARIA says, "Captain, I completed the face simulations while you were asleep. I think you should take a look."

Sohel gets irritated and says, "That isn't important anymore. remove them."

"Understood." A second later something ticks Sohel and Sohel hurriedly orders, "ARIA, wait. Relay the faces on Monitor-b2."

"Yes, captain."

Three computer-generated faces show up on the monitor of the briefing room. Sohel asks Luna, "Luna, can you take a look at them? Do you recognize any of them?" Luna looks at the monitor and her eyes widen. Luna yells, "I KNOW THEM. THEY'RE MY FRIENDS." Hearing this Sohel's face turns black. Luna sees this and asks, "Mr. Ghost? Why aren't you saying anything? Where are they?"

Sohel slowly crouches down in front of Luna and slowly says, "Umm. Luna. I'm really sorry. Your friends...….they're dead." Hearing this Luna freezes. She couldn't believe her ears. She uncomfortably smiles and says, "You…..you're joking, right? They're hiding somewhere on this ship. Right? They'll jump out any moment now and laugh at me, right? Right?" As she sees Sohel's facial expressions remaining the same, she realizes Sohel wasn't joking. She again held both sides of Sohel's coat, buried her face in Sohel's chest, and burst out in tears. For the next 30 minutes, everyone just stood there silently as Luna screamed and cried on Sohel's chest. Sohel patted Luna's head to console her as he determined that He wouldn't forgive Stone. He will capture him and see it through that he gets punished for his crimes, whatever it takes. Luna passes out while crying. Sohel picks her up and lays her down on a bed. As he gets back Aiden asks, "So what do we do now?"

Sohel was going to say something but stopped as Aidens phone had started ringing.