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Our friends wander over to us, and they can clearly tell Gabriel and I have been engaged in a serious discussion. I can see it in their expressions.
"What's going on?" Allison asks.
I turn toward Gabriel, and he rubs his thumb over my chin. He wants me to share my revelation, and that makes me realize I should.
"We still have Echo powers," I say. "I just realized that a few minutes ago. No one else has them, just the six of us. Are you guys okay with that?"
Our four friends exchange glances and shrugs. Then Allison says, "It actually makes sense that we would keep our powers. Each of us played a vital role in the apocalypse and its reversal. We must be quantum entangled—with each other, at least."
"With the universe," I say. "That's what my intuition tells me."
"And we believe you. But this is one revelation that should never be shared with anyone outside our group."
"Does that mean we have to drive all the way back to Sanctuary?"
Erin grins. "Oh, yeah. But we'll do it in style."
When we leave the library, we find out what Erin meant. She had spotted a big RV in the parking lot across the street, and now she hot-wires it so we can travel in comfort. Jarek will follow on foot.
Our journey takes the better part of two days. The whole time, we debate whether anyone will be waiting for us in Sanctuary and whether that camp still exists. We have to leave our RV and travel the last bit on foot. But when we reach Sanctuary, it still looks like it had before the Brain destroyed it, and our friends are thrilled to see us. Willow races up to give all of us big hugs.
After our homecoming, we begin to take small groups of our Sanctuary friends on little excursions out into the wider world so they can see that the destruction brought on by the alchemy of worlds has indeed been reversed.
I wish we didn't have to tell everyone that their loved ones who died will never come back. I wish we'd been able to save them. But our friends understand.
A week after we reversed the apocalypse, I ask Gabriel to come with me on a private excursion. I've been having dreams about the day the alchemy of worlds began, and I have a hunch I can find more answers about my past by following the clues in my dreams. To make the journey faster, we teleport to Olympia, Washington, being as careful as we can to make sure no one sees us using magic.
We find the house where I'd lived, but nobody is home. Though I'd shared this home with a roommate, my intuition tells me she didn't survive the first wave of the apocalypse.
As we're walking out of the house, three men amble up the driveway.
Gabriel pulls out the revolver he had holstered under his jacket and aims it at the men. "Stop right there. Who are you and what do you want?"
One man holds up his hands. "Take it easy. We've been coming here every week for the past six months, hoping to find Sarah."
"Why?"
"To make sure she's okay. She took off so fast that we never had the chance to explain."
I sidle up to Gabriel but look at the stranger. "I saw you in my dreams. How do we know each other?"
"From the hospital." The man lowers his hands but does not try to approach us. "I was a doctor, and these guys were nurses. We took care of you during your coma."
"My what?"
"Six weeks before the apocalypse, you were in a car accident with your parents and your brother. Only you survived, but you were comatose. Until the day the world went crazy. Then you woke up and ran."
"I remember running. Creatures were chasing me." I inch toward the man but halt a couple of yards away. "You do seem familiar."
Gabriel grasps my arm. "Are you sure you recognize these men?"
"Yes." I freeze as I realize what the doctor said. "My parents and brother are dead?"
The man nods. "I'm sorry. We tried to find any other relatives you might have, but there wasn't anyone. We managed to catch you and protect you from the creatures, but you fell into another coma. Then two months later, you vanished."
I hug myself, suddenly feeling cold. Tears sting my eyes. My family is gone. A force I might never understand must have sent me to Sanctuary, so Gabriel and I could save the worlds. I will grieve for my family, but I have a new home now and friends who mean everything to me.
Gabriel places a protective arm around me. "Thanks for letting us know about Sarah and her family. But I need to take her home right now."
"Of course. Good luck. It's a new world out there."
We return to Sanctuary, and life goes on. What else can we do? This new world presents many challenges, and we need to focus on the future. Over the next few weeks, we start to improve our camp—erecting permanent structures and bringing in generators to give us some electricity. It will be a long time until the power grid gets up and running again.
We travel around in our RV to meet other survivors and find out what's going on elsewhere, making friends along the way. It helps us feel less isolated and more like the world is gradually returning to normal.
Then the big day arrives. Allison goes into labor. Forty-six hours later, she gives birth to a beautiful baby boy. And three days after that, the camp hosts a double wedding—Erin and Grant, and me and Gabriel, with Willow as our flower girl. Life might not be exactly what it was before the apocalypse, but this new beginning gives everyone hope for the future.
To survivors of the alchemy of worlds, hope means everything.
