"I'm telling you, Mads," says Abby, "it's fine the way it is." She pushes open the front door to Maedlyn's apartment and steps out into the open air of the upper landing.
"Well, sure it is, Abby, but that doesn't mean you couldn't experiment. Oh, have you ever tried? Look at me. I know a thing or two about braids."
"My hair's too thin for how you do it," Abby argues.
"Not so! I'm sure I could do a Winnifred, or a crescent-do…"
"Maedlyn," says Abby, "please."
"Oh, fine. Will you be back tomorrow?"
"Without a doubt," says Abby. "And I can bring some food, Lev and I have been—"
"Oh, stop it," says Maedlyn, "I told you, cooking has been taking my mind off things. In fact, I'm almost inclined to bring you food, I've been cooking so much. I gave old Taylor a whole roast this week, I'd have never finished it. Oh he was tickled, all fallin' over himself. I told him it was nothing. I'm ever thankful for letting us put the girls up on his roof." She coos down at Lucy in her arms. The rotund, blonde bird clucks appreciatively.
Maedlyn's looking kempt enough, and she's wearing her green dress today. She's been doing better, but Abby knows she's still going through it. Ellie would never have let Maedlyn bring a bird into the house, even Lucy. But Maedlyn's been doing it during the day, for company and comfort, while she's alone, at least.
"Alright, then," says Abby. "Maybe I'll stop by again and relieve you of some of that extra meat, if you've got so much to spare."
"Ooh, enough, I imagine!" Maedlyn says cheerily. She frowns. "You're off, then?"
Abby nods.
"Where to?"
"Just gonna take a ride."
"Mm. Didn't you patrol since dawn? Aren't you tired of riding?"
Abby shrugs.
Maedlyn bounces Lucy gently in her arms. She's wearing a casual look, but she's measuring Abby. "Where you ridin' abouts?"
Abby sniffs, glancing off. She's been playing a kind of game with Maedlyn. They've talked at length about all manner of things, up to and including Ellie. But Abby hasn't been totally honest with her, not in as much as it's seemed unhelpful. "Just about. Thinking of riding up towards Hawthorne Pass and heading back."
"Mm, alone?"
"Yeah. It's okay, it's a safe route. And I'm careful, you know that."
"I do." Maedlyn continues to eye her as she strokes the plumage on Lucy's neck. "Hawthorne Pass, that way's not far from Mission Ridge."
Abby tenses inside. Time was, Maedlyn was pretty clueless about regional geography outside the names of the peaks visible from town. After she'd moved back into her place from her mom's house, Abby'd noticed a map appear on her kitchen table between visits.
"Yeah, so so. Probably an hour's ride at least—"
"You still looking for 'em?" Maedlyn interrupts. She squints in the sun, but otherwise reveals little.
Abby hesitates.
"The lights?" Maedlyn finishes.
Abby takes a breath, and releases it.
"Been some time," Maedlyn continues, "but I know Lito Benitez says he saw something like that a couple of weeks ago up in the pines below Cortez peak, and that's not far from Mission Ridge, either."
This is exactly what's been eating away at Dina, but Abby also knows that she can't control Maedlyn, either. "I heard that, too."
"So what's your plan?"
"No plan. Just want to see if it's true." Abby sniffs. Her eyes drift to the side for a second. "Because if it is, Ellie might not be the last one, and I don't care for that too much."
Wrinkles form on Maedlyn's face. She looks down at Lucy and purses her lips to hide her pain. "Yeah, me either."
"Look, I'd better—"
"Can I come?" Maedlyn asks.
Abby hesitates. It's about the last thing Maedlyn would want under normal circumstances, and it settles pretty quickly as a bad idea. "No," she ends up saying.
Maedlyn frowns a bit but doesn't get argumentative. "Will you tell me if you see anything?"
"I will, but you know that doesn't mean it will be good news."
Maedlyn sags a little, but nods her head. "You ride safe, then."
"Always do," says Abby. She turn and starts climbing down the steps, then stops. She climbs back up, meet's Maedlyn's eyes, reaches up and squeezes her upper arm. The girl smiles warmly.
With that, she hops down the steps and heads for the stables again.
Abby bobs easily on Wendy's back, the dirt trail passing underhoof on soft, regular plods. She'd rode Jasper earlier today, and Wendy doesn't seem to mind the exercise. She's become Abby's preferred horse by far. Wendy's pretty reserved, among the horses, but as far as Abby can tell, the feeling is mutual.
"Good weather today, huh girl?" Abby asks, giving her neck a little stroke. They're protected from the Summer afternoon sun by the shade of the trees that line the trail.
Wendy raises her head and looks back at her, tossing it and snorting. Abby takes it for a yes. She keeps stroking her neck for a while.
The two peaks surrounding Hawthorne Pass rise high above her, but the pass is only a mile or so out. She should reach it within the hour, at which point she'll turn around, so she can be back home by dinner. She told Lev she wouldn't be late tonight.
She hasn't been going out every day. She hadn't even gone in search of the lights at all for over a week after Ellie's disappearance, she was too fucked up and on edge to consider it. She'd revisited Mission Ridge a few days later, a strange compulsion over her. She hadn't seen anything. She'd even gone down to that bush, confirming that a piece of it had been ripped out by some force, the raw wood still fibrous and exposed.
If any conceivable force could convey Ellie back home, she'd find her way there herself, Abby is sure of it. But what if… what if she was hurt, somewhere, and couldn't get back? What if she'd gotten lost? Seems unlikely… And of course, there's always the worst possibility. But even then, recovering the remains would—
Abby winces and cuts off the train of thought. Back in Seattle, one of the guards had gone missing during an outing. They never found his body. Some people figured he'd deserted.
His wife, back at Lumen Field, had just about lost her mind over it. Abby had pitied her, but she hadn't understood it. They lost people all the time, what difference did it make that she couldn't see his body? Did she really want to? If she did, would she regret it?
Now in her own hellish limbo of unknowing, it's making more and more sense to Abby.
Abby hadn't explained—and hadn't been asked to—why it mattered so much to her.
The people she knows, and now holds close in Jackson, they seemed to accept, to the extent they could. That she and Ellie worked now, after everything. None of them really got it, of course, not like Abby had come to. Not even Dina, who was closest of all. Not even Lev.
None of them understood what it had meant for her and Ellie to forgive each other. To give Ellie her forgiveness, Abby had to be pushed the last few steps, by Grayson. She'd had no idea, of course, how much relief it would ultimately bring her.
And when Ellie reciprocated, on that beach, under the moon. That's something that will never be put into words, by Abby or anyone. It didn't need to. Those moments are etched onto her soul.
It hadn't been easy, even after that. Currents of resentment, entwined with all the other stuff already coursing through her, scarcely acknowledged, fully not understood. It wouldn't become clear until far later. After weeks of being trapped in that hospital with Ellie. Months on a dangerous road. And more months of digesting a queer new life in Jackson, the peace of which still feels like an impossibility sometimes, in the bleak times into which they'd been born.
Abby had always rolled her eyes inwardly at the phrase 'time heals all wounds.' She respects it more now, but she might put it differently. 'Time sifts out the dirt and silt, so you can see what glitters underneath it.'
And when enough had been sifted away, and they'd been forced into each other's company long enough, something became clear to Abby. And she's pretty damn sure Ellie can feel it, too, even if neither one of them ever said it out loud. It didn't need to be.
The thing that the two of them share, that no one else would ever understand.
There's a clatter and Abby snaps into focus. Her eyes dart to the side of the trail. After a moment, she realizes it was likely a dry stick falling from a branch.
She'd lost herself to reverie. She's normally better than that out here. She could have been jumped, or something. She chastises herself mutely. Still, starting to seem like today would end up a—
She hears it, and the hairs on her arm stand on end. A faint, distant zapping, like small lightning.
Her heart rate quickens. She looks around. It's too difficult to tell where it came from. Wendy's ears flick about. She heard it too and she doesn't like it. Abby wonders if she remembers that day, with Ellie. And how she hadn't come home with them.
"Come on," growls Abby. Wendy hesitates. "Come on, girl. I'll take care of you." She whips the reins and Wendy picks up into a canter. "I have to see this for myself."
Wendy's hooves pound the dirt trail for a while. The slope is easy, the turns wide. Easy riding. The forest is quiet. Either Wendy's hoof falls or the unnatural sounds deeper in the forest have spooked the wildlife.
Abby hears it again. It's not so far away.
There's a rocky cliff face atop dense trees. The trail switches back sharply and rises steeply to ascend on top of it. It affords a view.
At this altitude, it's all pines. There are scarcely any breaks in the forest. In the distance is Lower Slide Lake, a flat brown bar over the tree line. More peaks beyond that. There's nothing out here. Nothing but—
Another zap, accompanied by a light. Her eyes snap to it. She can only see the light play off the upper branches, but she has keen eyes at a distance. It was no more than a half mile down the slope.
Abby immediately guides Wendy to the side of the path and climbs off. She ties her to a branch sticking off a fallen log. Abby never ties a horse to something it couldn't break free from if it had to.
"Okay, girl, gonna be gone a short while, okay?" She says, stroking Wendy's neck. Her eyes lol at Abby, unconvinced. "Then we can get out of here."
Abby turns and starts stepping down the steep decline down into the trees.
Wendy neighs anxiously, prancing as much as she can afford to. Abby looks back at her with sympathy, then keeps moving.
The trees are dense in this part of the forest, and despite it being mid-afternoon, the light is dim between patches of sunlight pouring through the branches. She has to push through bushes and circle around boulders here and there, but travel on foot is not so difficult.
More than once, she hears the zapping. There's some kind of pattern. Every thirty seconds or so, it seems like. It will come from different directions, always distant. She hasn't seen the light with her own eyes since the ridge.
She knows she's not safe. She's spent a lot of time thinking about it since that day.
She recognizes that in this pattern, there's some kind of invisible perimeter where it happens. Up on Mission Ridge, they'd felt safe, but they were within that perimeter, unawares. And Abby recognizes that the same thing that happened to Ellie could happen to her.
She thinks of Maedlyn and feels a shooting pain of guilt. She can't let that happen.
But she has to know. She has to bring something back. God—whoever he is these days, in humanity's midnight hours—he's always had a reason, or if not that, a methodology to fate. It can't just be… it can't just be something random, without meaning. She intends to find out what that is.
Then, the event occurs not far from Abby. She sees reflections of light on tree trunks, in the distance. She hears the telltale sound. It sends a chill through her. It takes her right back to that day. She's gotten close enough, and she knows it.
"Alright, you bastard," she says, licking her lips, light on her feet. She creeps forward. "Alright, you fucking monster. Where are you?"
The forest doesn't answer.
"What are you?" She creeps forward on careful feet.
It's only now that she realizes just how silent the forest has become. She's not alone out here. There are creatures around, she knows it. But not even the birds are calling. It's the sound of the forest when the mountain cat prowls, lips parted, fangs exposed, tongue tasting the air, nostrils flared in search of the scent of prey.
Abby breathes quickly but quietly. "Where are you?" she whispers.
The forest's breath hangs. A surge of anger swells into Abby's chest.
"What the fuck are you!" she cries.
Her infringement of the silence goes unanswered. She pants. Then there's a flapping sound. And instead of the monster answering her, a bluebird does. It alights on a low, thin branch ten feet in front of her, the limb bobbing under its weight. It eyes her curiously.
Then, wisps of color appear in front of her. Abby's eyes go wide, her knees tremble under her. There's a blinding flash, and an unnatural sound tears through the air. She cries out, and feels the forest floor impact her forearms and forehead.
She pants into the loam, and whimpers once. Her fingers ball into a fist of dust and discarded bark. She pushes herself upward, stumbling to her feet.
The light is gone. Everything is the same, save for the branch that had held the bluebird. It bobs back and forth now, as if by a sudden gust of wind, but the bird is gone.
Abby stands there, breathing deeply, taking it in. When no further answers to her cries are made, the feeling wells again and the geyser bursts.
She reaches down and grabs a fist-sized rock. She hurls it with all her strength into the forest.
"What the fuck are you!" she screams.
She grabs another rock and flings it so hard a shooting pain hits her shoulder.
"What the fuck are you!"
She grabs a rock, catching her fingernail painfully on another, probably drawing blood. She flings that, too.
"What the fuck are you! What the fuck are you! What the fuck are you!"
She throws rocks at everything and nothing until she doesn't want to any more, and she stops shouting into the void shortly after that.
She hunches over her knees, wheezing, her breathing irregular, until it finally makes the transition from panting to dry, shuddering sobs.
"No…" she wills. She came here for answers, not torture. "No…" she presses her palms into her eyes, but tears come anyway. She feels blood from under her fingernail dab her forehead.
"No…" she says, this time because she doesn't want to cry.
But Abby learned long ago that she doesn't always get what she wants. She goes down on her knees and gives in to the cold feeling in her chest.
The sound would not return that day.
"Ah!" Ellie gasps. The arrowhead she'd been playing with had jabbed her under the fingernail. She looks at it. Blood oozes slowly from the smart. "Damn it…" she sucks on the wound.
She looks down at the black flint arrowhead in her palm. She'd pulled it out idly, now the memory of the day she got it drifts back to her mind.
She and Abby had been patrol partners that day. They drew the lottery like everyone else, but they ended up together probably once every three weeks or so. If you asked Ellie, she didn't mind it at all, those days. If she were honest, she looked forward to it.
Abby acts straight edge, but she tolerated Ellie's goofy side better than most patrollers. And Ellie didn't have to worry about her goofing off or making mistakes, in turn. When things got boring, they talked. Sometimes it got philosophical.
"I'm just saying," said Ellie, "it's good to be ready, but if you're always prepared for the worst, when do you make time for the best?"
She and Abby had been on patrol that day, on foot heading up a narrow trail through the trees.
Abby shook her head. "Knifes are made for cutting," said Abby in response.
"Huh? You mean 'knives?'"
"Yeah, yeah. It's an Isaac-ism."
"Isaac, dude?" Ellie had never known him, but he was the cruel leader of the WLF in Seattle, with a lake of blood on his hands.
"Look, Ellie, Isaac may have been a world class bastard, but he knew a thing or two about life. Especially when it came to fighting. The bloody stuff, that most people can't make space to think about. He was a knife, too. Damn twisted one…"
"What's a knife, then?"
Abby screwed up her lips. "Put it like this. Most people are like sheep. You know…" Abby's analogy seemed to fail her at the get-go. "Uh… soft, and fluffy. Good, you could say. But unthreatening. And that's fine, that's who Isaac worked to protect up in Seattle. Thing is, in order to protect those sheep, you need someone different. Someone who's not soft, not fluffy."
"Not good?" Ellie said.
Abby gave her a stern look. "Hard. With an edge. A knife." Abby took a deep breath, pushing a branch out of the way to peer down the trail. "I was one of Isaac's knifes. Knives."
"Seems kind of…" Ellie ducked under the branch Abby had been holding. "Reductive."
Abby snorted softly. "Suppose. Point is, the sheep don't get by without knives. And it's better that a knife know she's a knife." Abby kicked a big stone off the path. "And to be clear, you can be both, but you need to remember when to be which."
"I feel like your analogy is falling apart."
"Well-" Abby almost lost her patience. "Bear with me, alright? I've gone in plenty of times, and I've managed to come out each time. You know what I'm talking about. Not everyone does, though. Sometimes, it can't be helped. But a lot of times, it's because the knife got caught thinking like a sheep."
"You calling me a sheep, now? That what this is about?"
"You think that's what I'm saying? Just listen."
Abby stopped then, forcing Ellie to pull up, too. Her back was still to Ellie. She glanced about the forest around them in thought.
Ellie shifted her feet. Honestly, the topic was starting to make her uncomfortable, but she had no intention of admitting it.
"Something I struggled with for a long time, is being okay with that. I know you feel it, too, from what you said earlier. But it is. It really is, I'm at peace with that."
"What is?"
"It's okay, to be a knife," said Abby over her shoulder. It was one of those moments Ellie couldn't quite penetrate Abby's bright blue eyes. She didn't like those moments. "It has to be okay. Otherwise you just hate yourself."
"What did you say?" said Ellie, her tone surprising herself.
Ellie tensed up. But Abby didn't get defensive, almost like she expected it. Her look lingered for a moment longer, then she just carried on down the path.
Ellie's fun evaporated after that. She didn't like getting stuck in that feeling, not even with Abby. She clammed up, and followed Abby without saying anything. Why did she have to get heavy like that? What was the point?
Abby, for her part, didn't seem perturbed by this, and continued on in silence for some time. Grouchily, Ellie wondered if her goal had been to shut her up.
A few minutes later they took a rest break. Ellie stood with her back to Abby for a while, sipping her canteen. Eventually, she heard Abby climbing down into the brush beside the trail.
Curiosity eventually overcame grumpiness, and she turned and followed her.
She found Abby squatting down, looking at something.
"What's up, dude?" Ellie asked. "You find something?"
Abby looked up over her shoulder, eyes still unreadable. She cocked her head, then flicked something in the air at Ellie.
Surprised, Ellie reached out and caught it.
"An edge for the knife," Abby said, walking around her back to the trail.
In Ellie's palm lay an old Native American arrowhead, still partly encrusted with old earth. The jagged edge of the flint was still visible, though. Parts of it were still sharp.
Ellie frowned at her words, but she knew she would never discard the arrowhead. She'd thrown it in her pack and followed Abby back to the trail.
Today on the Chimera, with plenty of time for rumination, Ellie had fished it out of her pack on a whim. She found it weeks later while cleaning out her pack. She decided to clean it up, and now it's back to its sleek, black polished form. All its sharp edges are restored, gleaming in the light.
Everyone gets their turn. Today, she's missing Abby, she admits to herself.
There's a tiny speck of blood on one of the flint arrowhead's sharp ridges. Ellie decides not to clean it off. She leans down and tosses it back into her pack.
She notices movement, then sees Kamala at her door. The young Avenger always brings a smile to her face. Kamala raises her hand to knock, then stops herself. She looks in Ellie's general direction then makes a silly face, sticking out her tongue. Ellie laughs. "Come in," she calls.
Kamala skips into plain view. She's in casual clothes, gray capris with a long sleeve shirt under a black T with her characteristic lightning bolt on it. "Did you see me?"
"Yeah, I saw you," says Ellie, tossing a pillow at her. It goes over her head, but Kamala reaches back with an elongated arm and catches it, hugging it to her chest.
"What are you up to?" she asks.
"Browsing the internet," says Ellie. "You were right, there really are two internets. AIM's internet, and the underground one. I can't believe how many people still buy their bullshit. 'Continued terrorist attacks on National transit by Avengers threatens economic impact.' More like 'threatens AIM's bottom line.'"
"Totally," says Kamala. "I drone that stuff out, mostly. Have you been on those inhuman boards I showed you?"
"Yeah," admits Ellie. It had been weird at first. Technically, it's a group she belongs to now, but she's not sure how to feel about it. She still feels like an outsider. "I made an account and replied to a few posts. I even answered some questions. I don't want anyone to know who I am, though. I can't believe some people share their pictures on here."
"Yeah, most prefer anonymity, especially as inhumans. For safety's sake. Did you read anything cool?"
Ellie's brow knits and she scrolls through the main board. "I mean, there's loads, really… Dude! This one girl says she thought she was recessive—" meaning she didn't change appearance or gain powers, as Ellie had learned, "but then she figured out she could will herself to lose weight until she could just float through the air like a bubble. Wouldn't that be awesome?"
Kamala giggles. "Yeah, it would… but don't get caught up in power envy!"
"I know, I know. How could I forget, everyone's always talking about it… You know, I have to be careful. I admitted to this one person how I use my powers in a fight, and a bunch of people were like 'Who are you fighting? Who are you fighting? Are you with the resistance?'"
Kamala offers a lopsided smile. "I'm not surprised. There are still a lot of inhumans out there in hiding, afraid of AIM, and too scared or attached to their families to join the resistance. They tend to scour the internet for scraps of news about it."
"I don't blame them…" says Ellie. She's still looking at the screen, but she senses Kamala biting her lip. She looks up. "What?"
"Okay," she replies, jumping onto the other end of Ellie's bed—her end, practically—still clutching the pillow. "You might not like this, but it's kind of an occupational hazard."
She waits for Ellie to say something. Ellie sighs in exasperation. "Just show me, dude."
"Okay. Do you remember the breakout we did, outside of Philadelphia?"
Ellie frowns. "Of course." It was one of her first outings after the cargo raid at the train station. After her success that day, she'd slowly been gaining more trust from the Avengers. They'd sent her on low level ops, always with at least a couple other Avengers. She'd been trying her absolute hardest—to be careful, smart, decisive. Because these guys are clearly fighting for the right reasons. And because she's afraid of getting cooped up again if she screws up.
That day, she'd gone with Hulk, Steve, and Kamala on a raid to free some inhumans that were being held in fucking cargo containers until AIM could come collect them. They'd busted up some of those creepy synthoids and broken them out of there. She'll probably never forget the fear and relief in the eyes of the pretty brunette and the teenage boy she'd freed from a container herself. "What about it?"
Kamala pulls out her phone and navigates through it for a few seconds. She holds it out to Ellie.
Ellie takes it. It's a video. She hits the play button.
It's disorienting at first. The camera is shaking a lot, and there are loud noises going on. She sees some lights, and hears gunfire and explosions. She narrows her eyes. The person taking the footage is hiding in some bushes. Then she recognizes it.
It's those same cargo containers in that parking lot in front of a diner. She sees Steve hurl his shield, taking out three proto synthoids at the same time.
Then she sees herself. Her brow knits up and she presses her face even closer to the screen. She's blasting off shot after shot from her nine mil. She holsters it, and she remembers she was out of ammo but she had sensed one trying to get the drop on her from behind. And indeed, on screen it comes up on her and swings clumsily. She ducks the wide blow easily and without looking, then swings her straight arm back, hammering it in the jaw with the pistol butt. It staggers, she turns, slugs it again, and when it goes down, she swings her leg into the air and brings her heel down hard into its face, taking it out of commission. It actually looks pretty sick. The video ends.
"Who took this?" Ellie asks Kamala.
Kamala shrugs. "Some bystander. I don't know, the internet is anonymous, remember?"
Ellie freezes. "This is on the internet?"
Kamala giggles. "Look what that video's called."
Ellie backs out of it.
'Either SHIELD leathers up or hot new Avenger? Thoughts?'
Ellie stares.
Kamala giggles nervously.
Ellie keeps reading. "Ten thousand people watched this?" she practically yells.
Kamala grimaces humorously as if to say guess so! "Like I said, occupational hazard. Hey, at least that one's flattering."
Ellie keeps scrolling. There are a lot of comments.
'Daaaaamn bust those zomboids up.' One of many derogatory terms for synthoids.
'She ain't playin'
'No one talking about that sick play from Cap?'
'Damn that I want this chick's suit'
'She's like a little widow'
'Her daughter?'
'Hair…? Height…?'
'Yeah no'
'I don't know but I'm feeling her. Also major GV energy.'
'This is now headcanon'
"What does GV mean?" Ellie asks Kamala.
Kamala blinks. "Like in what context?"
Ellie shows her the comments. Kamala laughs in her throat and screws up her lips as she again fails to suppress a smile. "Um…" she says, blushing a little. "It means Gayvenger."
"Okay, well, just take this," says Ellie, handing her back the phone.
Ellie just sits there for a second, then grasps her head in her hands. "Dude, I don't want anyone to know who I am!"
"They don't!" Kamala reassures her hurriedly. "How could they? To them it's just a crazy video. We get those all the time. And I mean it's good, right?"
"Good?"
"Look," says Kamala, scooching toward her on the bed, "the Avengers get nothing but bad press from AIM, right? Propaganda, really. When people see stuff like this, how what we're really doing is helping people, that helps us!"
Ellie lets out the breath she's holding. She pushes fingers into her forehead. "I mean I guess…" she mutters.
Pressure builds in Kamala until she speaks up again, "I mean, it's like—"
"Kamala, okay, I get it," says Ellie. "I'm not gonna argue with you, I just… I don't want to talk about it right now, I don't think."
"Okay," says Kamala, "okay." She folds up her hands in her lap, looking down at the bedspread politely.
After a couple seconds of that, a chuckle escapes Ellie, drawing Kamala's anticipant gaze.
This girl… Ellie doesn't know how she'd navigate this insane world without her. She eyeballs Kamala.
"Is this what you came in here to show me?" Ellie asks.
Slowly, Kamala breaks out into a big smile. "Actually, no." She leans in conspiratorially. "Since you've read so much about it… do you want to meet the real resistance?"