(Trust me. Trust you.) Shiloh recognized the voice now. It was Gabriel’s.
Everything had led to this. Looking up to see a dragon in Meridian. Following the shining ultraviolet stream in the sky. Meeting people whose faces xie knew, but not from the waking world. Dreaming of a tree with lights like stars.
Shiloh closed xir eyes. Please, let it all not be for nothing. Let it be enough.
(Let go.)
“Okay.”
Xir fists opened and the lights went out. All of them. The night, once overpowered by blinding light and energy, plunged into darkness. The beacon was dark. Everything was still; both the FireRunner and Turret’s ship’s engines had fallen silent, and the wind had died. Sharpe’s searchlights were extinguished. And the barrier was gone.
One silent second passed. Two. Then Shiloh’s knees buckled. Gentle arms caught xir on both sides and helped lower xir to the crow’s nest floor. They huddled together against the wall and waited.
“Shiloh,” came Indra’s frightened voice in the dark. “What did you just do?”
“The right thing?” Xie tried to reassure him, but it just came out sounding scared. “I hope.”
The night was dark and still and, for several more seconds, nothing seemed to happen at all. Then, something appeared beside the dark beacon, just visible against the near-night sky. Something big, with a serpentine neck and huge black wings.
“Oh no,” someone whispered. Shiloh couldn’t tell who; maybe xie’d said it.
Hovering level with the crow’s nest, staring directly at them, was the dragon. Its dark eyes were the same as in Meridian, the same as when they’d looked out of Garrett Cole’s face. The rhythmic, regular wingbeats seemed too slow to keep the gigantic shape aloft. The frantic pounding of Shiloh’s heart was much, much faster.
Annie’s clenched fists were drained as white as her face and she looked like she might vomit or scream or both. Beside her, Indra gasped for breath, trying to speak, move, or do anything, and failing at all attempts.
But Shiloh couldn’t see them anymore. Xie couldn’t even see the dragon.
All xie saw was the figure riding on the dragon’s back.
It wasn’t Gabriel.
But it was someone Shiloh knew.
“Mom!” Shiloh yelled, half-delirious with exhaustion, confusion, relief, and joy. Astride the dragon, holding into its thick neck with gloved hands and staring them down, was Maureen.
Aliyah was saying something from below but xie didn’t hear the words. Annie and Indra were speaking too, but Shiloh heard nothing, saw nothing except xir mother’s face. Xie couldn’t believe it, this was too good to be true—
(Icarus.)
Shiloh’s heart sank as xie realized. It really had been too good to be true. Maureen’s form was stark black and white, a monochrome facsimile of a person. Her faded jeans, work gloves, boots, T-shirt were all here, but they weren’t real. She wasn’t real. When Shiloh looked into her eyes—black, inhuman, un-shining—xie didn’t know what looked back, but it wasn’t xir mother.
“Why?” xie whispered, staring at the ghost with the too-familiar, too-alien face. “Why are you doing this? Why would you show her to me? This isn’t real!”
No reply. The dragon-ghost simply kept hovering in place, huge wings moving much too slowly to actually keep it aloft. And both of them continued to stare at Shiloh, mute and unwavering.
“Didn’t I do everything right?” xie said, fighting back more tears. “Why isn’t this real? Why aren’t you here?”
BANG!
A gunshot ripped through the stillness before either ghost could answer, loud and sharp. Annie screamed and fell to the crow’s nest floor again and, this time, Shiloh and Indra both followed. No searchlights illuminated their position anymore, but the shot still sounded like a very near miss.
“Stay down! Keep still!” On the deck below, Aliyah shouted into the P.A. speaker despite her sore voice, wings flaring. “Kari, are Stefanos and Jay back yet?
“We made it,” Stefanos’s voice answered instead. “And I have the bridge.”
“Then get us out of here!”
The FireRunner’s engines roared in reply and the ship slowly began to move away from the dormant beacon. The ghost with Maureen’s face, and her dragon, stayed hovering in place, impassively watching the inky dark shape of Turret’s ship grow larger.
“I did everything you wanted,” Shiloh whispered, not caring if the ghost heard, or anyone heard. But both of them, the dragon and the image of xir mother turned their heads to stare again. “I turned out the lights.”
The ghosts stared at the small humans. Waiting. For what? Suddenly Shiloh remembered another ghost. The one that looked like xir father, Garrett Cole.
“Exchange?”
Neither ghost answered, but Shiloh was sure xie’d caught a flash of Maureen’s smile. The dragon flared its massive wings and they both shot up into the sky with astonishing speed. The dragon-ghost rose hundreds of feet in the air—then fell in a streaking blur directly onto Turret’s ship, like an enormous undead eagle attacking its prey.
“I can’t…” Shiloh whispered, staring at Turret’s ship, where dark shapes gathered like a swarm of angry locusts. More gunshots sounded, but they weren’t aimed at the FireRunner anymore. “I can’t believe it worked!”
“I can’t believe we’re still up here!” Indra gave both Annie and Shiloh’s shoulders a shake, which finally snapped them back to reality and the urgent need to get down to solid ground, or at least a more-solid deck.
Aliyah waited at the bottom of the ladder, steadying them as they reached the deck one by one. Together they all hurried toward the door as the strange gunfight broke out in earnest behind them. Several more gunshots split the air, followed by a louder boom like a cannon. The ghosts shrieked, like tired souls who’d finally found something to fight for.
Aliyah held the door and they all staggered through. The FireRunner rolled on, leaving the noise, the chaos, and the still-dark beacon far behind.
As the door closed, Shiloh realized why the sky was so completely dark. For the first time since they’d seen it, the glittering stream was gone.
Jay rarely went anywhere without his fingerless gloves and their self-designed holographic interface for all his virtual needs. Now he took one off to smooth Rowan's hair back from their face and feel their forehead. "No fever. I dunno what I expected, hasn't had one for days."
"Then why do you keep checking?" Stefanos sighed from where he sat on the next bed and leaned back against the wall, eyes firmly shut. "Let them rest. You should rest. Plenty of beds in the room, take your pick."
"It's either do this, or do nothing, and I'm not going to do nothing!" Jay shot him a look that was equal parts exasperation and frazzled exhaustion, then turned back to Rowan, as if expecting some change in the time he hadn't been watching. There wasn't one. "I wouldn't blame you, you know."
"For what?" Stefanos hadn't opened his eyes.
"I wasn't talking to you." Jay's tone softened and he leaned forward, resting his elbows on Rowan's bed. "I mean, I get it it if you're just kind of hanging out, taking a break. After all that, I wouldn't really want to wake up either."
"So get some sleep," Stefanos tried again. "Think you've had about two hours of decent rest since we left Parole. Rowan too. They're probably making up for lost time. They'll be okay if you take your eyes off them for a few hours, Jay, I'll watch to tell you if there's any change."
"Your eyes aren't even open," Jay said without turning around.
"Don't have to be. Danae stuck in some X-ray vision at my last tune-up."
"Just go to sleep." Jay gave a little laugh, but it was more work than it was worth and it died away fast. He slowly let his head drop forward and rested his forehead in his hands. "Snap out of it, Rowan. You're always saying we gotta find Regan—well, what's he gonna say when we find him, and you're... like this? You can't miss that. You gotta see him. And he has to see you. And I have to..."
He stopped and nobody picked up where he left off. Rowan didn't answer. Stefanos was as quiet as they were.
"Everybody's falling asleep on me," Jay sighed, sitting back and looking over to where Seven sat, green eyes bright in the low infirmary light. "One more point for you, I guess."
"STABLE," she replied, following Jay's gaze to Rowan, who was apparently the most interesting subject in the room to her health-scan mode, which had been continuously running ever since the storm. "VITALS NON-OPTIMAL BUT WITHIN ACCEPTABLE PARAMETERS. INTERIOR DAMAGE TO TRACHEA, ESOPHAGEAL LIN-"
"Thank you.” Jay rubbed his tired eyes, then continued the massage up his temples. "We know it’s bad. The antitoxin prototype shot didn’t even work on the worst of it—I really thought that was gonna be the answer!” He directed the last part to Stefanos, whose only reply was a silent shrug and head shake. “But no, I guess being touched by a ghost is even worse news than anyone thought. Big freaking handprint scar around their neck, kind of a clue.” The robotic cat turned away, looking about to hop down onto the floor, when he reached out to pet her ears. “Sorry, Seven, I’m not mad at you. This just sucks."
He half-expected Seven to give her regular reply in the ‘AFFIRMATIVE' as she rubbed her head against his hand. She didn't, but her mechanical feline face, though impassive as always, seemed to agree anyway. It was good to have her back.
"THE TIME IS THREE A.M."
"Runtime." Jay nodded, head dropping down to rest on the mattress.
"THE TIME IS THREE A.M. AND FIVE SECONDS."
"Jay," Stefanos called sleepily. "How about you find out what your cat wants? She's going to wake Rowan."
"And that's a bad thing?" Jay grumbled. "Seven, shut u- I'm sorry. I mean what is it? What do you want? Don't tell me what time it is again, I know what time it is, it's Runtime, but we can't, we're not in Parole. So then wh... oh." Jay slowly straightened his back. Hunching over a bed was a lot like hunching over a keyboard and both had their perils. "That other message. The audio one. Forgot. Go ahead and play that."
Seven didn't move or do anything, just sat very still and kept staring at Jay, as if expecting something more.
He gently bumped his forehead with one fist. "God, I'm rusty with my own cat. Engage."
She complied at once.
"Good night, dream sweet..." The voice that played from Seven's small speakers was quiet, tentative, and clearly did not belong to a trained or practiced singer. It was dry and slightly hoarse, as if this were the first time he'd sung or even spoken in some time. Or maybe his throat was sore, more given to a raspy cough than a song. Maybe he just needed water. And maybe Jay needed to stop analyzing for five seconds and focus on the song. Regan still sang it with feeling. That was the important part. "In the morning, I'll be here..."
"I wish," Jay murmured. "Gotta say. I really do."
A ragged gasp made him turn and let out a quiet one of his own. Rowan's eyes were open.
"Don't move," Jay said as they struggled to sit up. "And don't try to talk yet—yeah, I bet your throat hurts, let it rest." Rowan was clearly trying to speak and having no success, but they didn't need words to make that much clear. Jay shook his head and tried not to stare at the dark handprint scar around their neck. "Actually I bet everything hurts. But your whole neck-region got the worst, uh, we think. You're gonna be okay—but you had a hell of a—not quite a week, but close. We all did! Probably a good thing you missed-"
"There was a storm," Stefanos filled in, a little more slowly and a lot more calmly. "And a ghost. They're both gone. Everyone made it, they're fine. Aliyah's fine." Rowan seemed to follow, because they fell back, panting, relief clear on their face. But though they were too weak to move again, they kept looking around as if desperately expecting to see someone else in the room aside from the two of them.
"It was a recording," Jay said a little reluctantly, holding out his hand for Seven to head-bump. "He's not actually here. I thought maybe if you heard Regan's voice... and I guess it worked. But I wasn't trying to mess with your head, I'm sorry."
Rowan held still for a moment and they did look crushed. But then they reached out a hand toward Jay, which he moved to take, relieved—until Rowan stopped, seeing the same black-vein pattern and burned, paper-like texture that had spread up Indra's arm when he'd come on board. Except Rowan's scarring started at their hand in the shape of a grasping handprint. Like the one around their neck, this one had four fingers.
“Yeah,” Jay said, sounding about as exhausted as Rowan. “The ghost looked like him, but that’s all. It, uh… didn’t get the personality down very well.”
Rowan’s undamaged hand curled into a fist around the clean sheets. Their shoulders began to shake, black eyes filling with tears. Contrary to what Jay had imagined, they were clear as anyone else’s. Somehow that was even worse.
“You were braver than I would have been, you know.” Jay tried to keep his tone as light as possible but it didn’t work any better than his last attempted joke. “You tried to talk to it. Find out what it was. And yeah, we know they do actually talk now. Sort of. So, really, it might have worked.”
Rowan’s face didn’t change from its mask of grief. The dark circles under their eyes were deep, but they clung both to wakefulness and Stefanos’s wrist. He raised a large synthetic hand, wiping the tears from Rowan’s cheek with one huge finger, gentle and warm as flesh and blood.
“Except that Tartarus lies,” Jay continued. “It gets its fingers inside your head and shows you what you want to see. Or what you’re scared to see. But it’s not true. That wasn’t Ash. This isn’t a punishment, Rowan.”
They looked up, eyes widening in a look of bemused surprise, and Jay almost smiled.
“Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. You weren’t there when he needed you, you failed him, and anything bad that happens from now on, you deserve—and he basically showed up to confirm that. Am I close?” Rowan shut their eyes again. Jay was still tired of being right. “That’s what I thought. I know, because that’s been my everyday for the past ten years.”
Rowan reached out with their uninjured hand and Jay met them halfway. Stefanos stayed quiet, watching the two of them with golden eyes whose hard metal had never looked so soft and warm.
“And now…” Jay stopped; somehow this was even harder. “You think you’re doing the same thing to Regan and Zilch. Right?”
Their only answer was more slow tears.
“Listen. We can’t always be there. No matter how much they need us. Or how much we want to,” Jay said, voice quiet but so intense, so sure. “It doesn’t mean we’re failing them. It just means… Sometimes I don’t think it means anything. It just happens. A lot of stuff that happens doesn’t mean anything. And that sucks. But it doesn’t make it your fault.”
Rowan stared down at their joined hands and held very still.
“Hey. You’re still here.” As Jay spoke, Rowan slowly looked up to meet his eyes. “And so are we. We’re not going anywhere and neither are you.”
“We?” Stefanos finally asked.
“What?” Jay looked over, raising one eyebrow.
“You said ‘we’ can’t always be there,” Stefanos observed. “You weren’t just talking about Ash, were you?”
Jay didn’t reply immediately. When he did, he didn’t meet either of their eyes. But he sounded just as sure as before. “No. I…” he stopped. Then shook his head and almost laughed. “Screw it. I want to find Regan and Zilch just as much as you do, Rowan. I always did.”
Rowan was staring at him as if unable to believe what they were hearing. So was Stefanos but his face slowly filled with cautious hope. “Are you saying you changed your mind? You believe Regan’s still with us?”
“I don’t believe a lot of things. Or trust them. But… I’m starting to trust this.” He smiled at Rowan, who looked at him with so much hope and joy it was as if they were finally seeing one another after being apart for years. “And I can’t wait to find out if we’re right.”
“You sound pretty sure. Why the change?”
“A lot of things.” Jay gave Rowan’s hand a gentle squeeze; they were already holding on as tightly as they could. “Regan’s message. The one that wasn’t about blood in the water.” He nodded to where Seven had curled up and gone into sleep mode on the other side of Rowan’s bed. “He’s still got my back, or he’s trying. So it’s just fair I hold up my end. We gotta find him. We find that heart, we find our lizard—and then we go home. All together. Whatever the hell that means.”
“Still have to go slow and keep our eyes open,” Stefanos said quietly, seeming reluctant to spoil this fragile happiness but unable to ignore reality. “We might have a happy ending after all. But we have to find them first and it’s a rough road. There are no miracles.”
Jay shot him a grin. “But there are repairs.”
“Yes there are. And we’re good at those.” A slow smile began to spread across Stefanos’s weathered face, golden eyes glinting like evening stars in the soft darkness. Rowan reached for him and he was there in a heartbeat. They sat up again, this time just enough to lean against his broad chest. Stefanos wrapped one arm around them very gently and, with the other one, pulled Jay close.
Rowan let out a long sigh, closing their eyes and resting their head against Stefanos’s reassuring warmth. They hadn’t let go of Jay’s hand and, for the first time, since they’d been awake or since leaving Parole, their face—all of their faces—were free of worry and pain.
Shiloh didn’t know what to do with xirself. Ever since overpowering the beacon and shattering the shield xie had been unable to think of anything else. After destroying it? Temporarily disabling? Xie didn’t know. Now xie just existed in a state of numb apprehension. It was over. Xie’d made the choice and had no idea if it was the right one. Now something had to happen, something had to give—but nothing did.
The night stretched on just like every one before it. Maybe a reunion with xir parents had been too much to hope for, Shiloh thought, but answers surely weren’t. And yet, neither appeared. No resolution, no confirmation xie was on the right path. Even the glittering stream was gone, although Shiloh had long since stopped trusting it. Xie wandered around the ship without seeing anything, feeling like a sleepwalker. But there was no comforting tree in this dream and xie couldn’t wake up.
The Lifeline Signal Page 38
