Page 102 of Strange Lights

“For them,” I agree, stepping forward to clasp her outstretched hand. I grab hold of Adele, body and soul, an uneven tether, and wrench that door open in my mind, as wide as it will go, and throw us both into the void.

43

Calvin: The Descent

Alone. Reggie has left me alone. The tether connecting us slips away from me like greased rope. Nothing remains but the burn in my hands from the fight to hold on. Reggie’s had a grip on my soul since long before I knew such a thing was possible, and the emptiness after she pulls away rips my breath from my lungs, leaving me gasping.

She turns away from me, steps toward Adele, arm outstretched. I know what she’s going to do the moment before she does it. I lunge for her. If she drags me down, so be it, but if there’s even the slimmest chance I can save her, I’m taking it.

Luca barrels into me, knocking me back. I can’t control the transformation now, and it’s instinct to fight back, for a moment not caring if I hurt him.

Reggie shouts something, but I’m too gone to hear it. Luca falters, though, just enough that I pull free and I’m racing toward Reggie. And then Reggie leaps from the cliffside, pulling Adele down with her.

Screams fill the air⁠—my own, Reggie’s sisters’, Eldi’s.

Luca tackles me again just before I reach the edge. His weight, warm and alive and human, pins me down. I shudder back into my human form, and I struggle free, whirling around to face him. “What did you do?” I mean to shout, but it comes out a whisper.

Empty space. All that is left. Empty space and silence, a gaping void. I’m grasping at nothing; Reggie is gone over the edge.

Luca is on his hands and knees next to me, breathing in shaky gasps.

“What did you do?” I snarl.

He doesn’t answer, only curls down into himself.

“What did you do?” I scream.

“Only what I promised her I would.”

Reggie jumped. He let her. The dual betrayal, both of them colluding, cuts me to the bone.

“I love her.” My voice cracks.

Luca moans. He’s shaking, and though I can’t see his face, I know he’s crying too.

“I love her!” I shout. As if somehow that will bring her back. As if the universe will hear me and return what it took.

Luca exhales a broken laugh, pushes up from the ground to look at me.

“You think I don’t know that? Do you really think you’re the only one who loves her?” Luca says.

Eldi is completely silent and still, Orion curled around her, his silent tears trickling into her hair.

Meredith and Zara cling to each other. Meredith, wide eyed and pale, comforts Zara, who keeps shaking her head in disbelief, as if she can keep the truth away.

I meet Luca’s eyes, and I want to hate him, but my anger is abruptly too heavy to carry.

Then Meredith screams and points toward the cliff. A coiling whirl of robotic limbs rises from the drop-off. Doug and Dave appear from below, bringing with them⁠—

Reggie. My entire body goes numb with relief.

But she’s limp and lifeless in their grasp. The robots set her gently on the ground, and I lean over her, listening. Luca, Meredith and Zara, Orion and Eldi, gather in close around us. Even Doug and Dave wait with bated breath. There’s the faintest flutter of air against my face. An exhale.

“She’s breathing,” I manage to say.

“A pulse,” Zara says, Reggie’s wrist in her grasp.

But Reggie is utterly still. I know without knowing how I know. Reggie is gone. This is simply her body; her soul is missing. She is empty.