Disclaimer: Okay, here's Part 34! Wahoo! Okay, guys, I know this is going to be a shock, but … (tense silence) this is the second to last chapter! Aah! The next chapter is … (sob) the last one! And then this story is going to be over. Wow. I still can't really grasp that concept, but … hmm. It's definitely been an interesting time writing this. I'll save the mushy stuff for the last chapter, so anyway, the song belongs to Anna Nalick. Um, yeah. That's pretty much it. As always, review when you're done!

Taintedpromises: Geez, what would I do without my most loyal reviewer? I honestly don't know. I agree that it stinks that Tru Calling was cancelled, but then the people at FOX aren't very smart. By the way, I never got that e-mail that you said you sent me. My e-mail is really random and sometimes blocks messages that it's not supposed to. Could you send it again? Pleeeease? Lol, well, I'd better get to the others, but thank you for constantly being there and reviewing my story! Me wuvs you :D

MIDNIGHT-PIXIE: Welcome back … um … a long time ago. But anyway, hope you had fun in Oregon. I went there a few summers ago and I had a great time b/c it was sooo nice in the summer. Here's your update! Read my next story when I post it, okay? Promise? ;) Lol, review again and tell me what you think!

unique-deflection: Thanks for the review! Sky is one of my favorite characters too … she seems to suffer a lot, doesn't she? Oh, well. Comes with the job, I guess. Review when you finish :P

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Part XXXIV: Farewell to the Old Me

2 a.m. and she calls me
Because I'm still awake
Can you help me unravel my latest mistake?
I don't love him and winter just wasn't my season
We walk through the doors
So accusing their eyes
Like they have any right at all to criticize
Hypocrites
You're all here for the very same reason

I realized after I had entered the hospital parking lot that I hadn't driven Das Boot here; Bree had brought me to the hospital, and she was still in the hospital room with the others. Judging by the states that Hunter and Raven were in, I was pretty sure that she, Robbie, and Alisa would be staying for a while to offer emotional support.

"Morgan?" Bree's voice startled me, and I turned around to look at her, surprised.

"Hey," I said. "I thought you'd be staying in there."

She nodded. "I'm going to. None of us are really in the school mood right now." She sounded so tired. "Robbie and Alisa want to stay, and I wanted to ask you, too."

I bit my lip. It was a lot to ask, but I couldn't stay there any longer. Already I felt like a huge weight of horrible guilt was pressing on my chest, constricting my breathing; my eyes stung from the salt of my tears, and I was sure my hair was a mess. "Actually, if it's not too much trouble …"

"Could I take you home?" Bree asked wryly, a small smile on her lips. "Sure. Will your parents flip out?"

"No, they'll have left for work already." I sighed, running an anxious hand through my hair. "I just … I can't stay here. I can't explain it, but I just feel like … being here … I'm doing more harm than good."

Bree pursed her lips. "Are you sure? I mean, I'm sure having you there would really help Hunter and –"

I cut her off before she could say Raven's name. "Bree, please. If you don't want to take me home, I'll get a taxi or something."

"No, I'll take you," she said after a moment. I could see the conflict in her dark eyes. "Are you sure?"

I didn't answer her, already walking towards her BMW, my mind whirling with thoughts. What was I going to do when I got home? The house would be abandoned, that's for sure. I was facing the possibility of having an entire day to do nothing but wallow in my own guilt when an idea struck me. I paused—literally. I stopped in my tracks and Bree walked past me, asking, "Well, aren't you coming?"

I nodded slightly and followed her, but my mind was already working on the details. My parents wouldn't be home, so there was no chance of getting caught. It wasn't dangerous. I had done it dozens of other times. Well, maybe not dozens, but at least enough to know what I was doing. Scrying was simple. It wasn't dangerous like trying to open up a bith dearc, which I knew could go wrong at any time. It wasn't like shooting witch fire at someone, which was intended to hurt them in any case.

These thoughts, reassurances, and worries occupied my mind until Bree pulled back into the driveway at 35 Copperknoll Place. I noted that my parents' cars were not in the driveway and glanced at my watch. It was 8:35. School had started half an hour ago, so Mary K must be gone, too. I didn't say anything to Bree when I got out of the car, not even thanking her for bringing me home. She didn't say anything, just backed out of the driveway silently and drove off back down the street in the direction we had just come. I stood on the front porch for a long time, just breathing.

The house was warm with morning sun shining through the windows. It was a beautiful day outside, but I couldn't shake the feeling of gloom inside me. I trudged up the stairs and kicked my shoes off on the landing. After collecting my supplies—five candles and a few matches, to be exact—I dropped them on the floor and sighed deeply. I arranged the candles in a circle around me and used the matches to light them; I was going to need all of my strength for what I was about to attempt.

As I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, sitting cross-legged in the middle of a circle of candles, I forced any thoughts of Sky, Hunter, Raven, Bree, anyone out of my mind. I focused on my breathing. In, out. In, out. Just breathe. I was overcome by a feeling of peace as I sank deeper and deeper into a calm meditation. The knots inside my chest seemed to be loosening, and I could visualize them unwinding and disappearing. I felt the incredible feeling of just being—not sitting on the ground, not feeling anything, just lost inside myself. I breathed deeply, imagining clean white light pouring into me with every breath and the black light burdening me seeping out with every exhale. I was at one with myself and my surroundings, which had fallen away without so much as a sound. Still feeling light-headed and separated from my body, I opened my eyes and looked into the flame of the candle I held in my hands.

I need to know, I whispered in my mind, a grim determination filling me. I need to see.

Are you sure you're ready? a small voice asked in my ear.

I didn't need to give an answer. I wasn't sitting in my room anymore, my familiar room in my familiar house in the all-too-familiar Widow's Vale. I didn't know where I was going; I kept my eyes wrenched tightly shut, but I could feel the ground shifting and quaking before me. I shivered suddenly and violently as my stomach gave a lurch. It was very cold suddenly; I opened my eyes just a slit, and all I saw was a whirl of color, blacks and whites and reds and greens and blues. It was as if I were speeding at about five million miles per hour down the road and everything in front of me was just a motion blur. I shut my eyes quickly as I fell deeper into the mass of color and blurry sound

Oh, Goddess, I thought, my mind racing. Oh, Goddess. Nothing like this had ever happened to me.

And suddenly I was gone. The ground below me was still and solid, and my eyes snapped open immediately. My breathing was coming in harsh, shallow gasps, and my stomach felt queasy with what had just happened. I stifled a mix between a gasp and a cry when my mind managed to register what I was seeing in front of me.

I was sitting on a sidewalk next to a street, in the same position I had been sitting in back in my room. I looked around me in fearful apprehension, my heart racing; the night surrounding me was silent, and when I looked up at the starless, cloudy sky, I realized that it was so cold because it was snowing. Small flakes of white were slowly falling from the deep black sky, and I caught a small one in my hand. I shivered as it melted into a cold droplet of water on my palm. I stood on shaky legs, slowly taking in more of my immediate surroundings. Where was I?

Then, though, I began to notice things. The street looked oddly familiar, in its curvature and the way it disappeared around the corner of a red brick building. Squinting, I read the sign hanging in front of the nearest building's door. Its worn and weathered wood read Gottfried's Meats. I twisted my head around to look at the other side of the street, shaking off the thin layer of cold snow that had collected on my shoulders. The sign in the dusty, grimy window of a small shop read Widow's Vale Pharmacy. I gasped and looked around at my surroundings with new horror. Oh, Goddess. I was in Widow's Vale.

But where was everyone? Main Street had never been this empty before. I didn't hear the sounds of any cars approaching, no one was on the sidewalks, and all of the lights in the shops and the apartments above the shops were dark. The only source of light was the moon, full and shining over my head, its light dancing in odd and mesmerizing patterns through the bare branches of the trees lining the sidewalk and the falling snow around me.

I was truly on the verge of panicking. The street was so empty, and I didn't sense any other life forms around me. There was just … nothing. I couldn't feel anything around me, and I shivered violently, the cold beginning to pierce my skin through the thin top I was wearing.

I turned around, not because I sensed something, but because I wanted to see if Double Dave's, my favorite pizza joint, was still next to the bank. When my brown eyes met steel gray—the steel gray of someone very familiar—I couldn't do anything but stare.

"Father …" I whispered.

Because you can't jump the track
We're like cars on a cable
And life's like an hour glass glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button, girl
So just cradle your head in your hands
And breathe
Just breathe
Breathe
Just breathe

I never could have imagined the rush of emotions that surged through me in that instant that seemed to last forever. My father, Ciaran MacEwan, had lost his powers months ago, and I hadn't seen him since that fateful night when Killian had taken his limp body away. Now, he was standing before me, his dark hair peppered with snow and a light layer of snowflakes covering his long black coat. He looked at me calmly, judging my reaction to seeing him for the first time in weeks. I blinked as a strange longing filled me; I couldn't explain it, but … something in me wanted to just run to him and hug him, hug my real father and know, just once, what it would feel like if he had been in my life all along. I had actually taken a step forward before I stopped. I opened my mouth to speak, but no words could come.

"Father," I whispered brokenly again, my voice strained. "I'm so confused." I swallowed the tears I felt rising and forced down the huge lump in my throat.

He nodded, and I reached out my hand to touch his arm. Where I should have felt the wool of his coat I felt nothing. Just air. I gave a small, bitter laugh. So much for a simple father-daughter hug.

"I don't know where I am," I murmured. "Or, well, I do, but I don't know why."

"Isn't that what you're here to find out?" he asked, and I smiled slightly at hearing his voice again after so long. Funny that I would have missed it after never having heard it in my life before last year.

I nodded. "I suppose so." I paused and looked around at the empty street. "So … where do we start? I mean, you know that, right? You're, like, my guide, aren't you?"

Ciaran looked at me curiously and shrugged. "Pick and choose. This will end the same in any case." There was a funny twinkle in his eyes. "And yes, I suppose one could call me that."

I sighed. "You couldn't be more cryptic? All right, all right."

Five minutes later—at least, it seemed like five minutes, I'm not too accustomed to how time travels in astral realms—found Ciaran and I in the middle of an abandoned grocery store. I tugged on the light string, but the fluorescent lights on the ceiling didn't flicker on; this place must have been empty for ages. It was completely deserted and quite a sight to behold in the dark of the night. Food was spilled on the floor and lying haphazardly on the floor, and there was a distinct smell of rotting fruit coming from the organic section near the back. The cash register was broken, its tray lying on the floor behind the counter, and the floor was covered in a thick layer of dust and dirt.

"What are we doing here?" I asked, picking up a bag of blue corn chips and setting it back down with disinterest.

"Just wait and see," was Ciaran's vague reply. All was silent in the shop for a moment, but I jumped a foot in the air when I heard a noise coming from the back of the store. A figure was shuffling around in the darkness, and I jumped when the figure moved into the moonlight reflecting from the door.

"Robbie?" I gasped.

He was dressed in a worn sweatshirt and jeans, and he looked different. Older, somehow. His face was unshaven and his eyes seemed empty as he walked around the aisles of the shop, grabbing random food items off the shelves and stuffing them into a large plastic trash bag. I watched in stunned silence as bags of tortillas, peanut butter jars, loaves of bread, and bottles of juice disappeared inside his bag.

"Robbie?" I asked again, my voice slightly stronger. He didn't look towards me or even give any indication that he had heard me.

"Oh, he can't hear you," Ciaran said simply. "Can't see us, either."

I looked at him curiously. "Is this like in A Christmas Carol where no one can see Scrooge and the ghosts?"

Ciaran laughed bitterly. "We're not ghosts, Morgan." He paused and amended his sentence. "Or, well, I am, but you're not. You're just a shadow in this world."

I blinked, my brain still unable to wrap itself around what was going on. "Where am I?" I asked again.

Ciaran smiled simply, his white teeth bright against the inky blackness of the store around us. "You'll figure it out eventually." I started and looked towards the door as the dinging of a small bell above the door announced that Robbie had left. Ciaran looked towards the door as well. "But, until you do, we should follow him."

May he turned 21 on the base of Fort Bliss
Just today he sat down to the flask in his fist
Hasn't been sober since maybe October of last year
Here in town you can tell he's been down for a while
But, my God, it's so beautiful when the boy smiles
I want to hold him but maybe I'll just sing about it

As Ciaran and I walked a few yards behind Robbie, who was lugging the bag of food over his shoulder, down the deserted street, I shuddered. The snow was falling lightly, and the sky had grown darker. I looked around, the scenery around me dark and forbidding. There was literally no sign of life, no footprints in the snow except those of Robbie. It was so silent that I'd swear I could hear the snowflakes gently floating to the ground.

"Where is everyone?" I whispered, almost afraid to disturb the stillness of the scene in front of me.

Ciaran shrugged. "Gone. Dead. Depends who you're talking about."

I gaped at him. Widow's Vale was a small town, yes, but it wasn't as if it only had a few hundred people.

"What could have possibly happened that could empty a town like this?" I asked.

"I'm surprised you haven't figured it out yet," my father said, still looking ahead at Robbie.

I didn't say anything for a moment, just thinking. "Well, wait … if Robbie is here … where are the others? Where's Bree? Where's Hunter?"

Ciaran paused as Robbie disappeared through the creaky door of a toy store. I shivered upon seeing the grotesque clown dolls adorning the front window display. Their bright, freakishly happy faces seemed so out of place that it was inappropriate. "I think we're about to find out."

I watched him for a moment as he held the door open for me and, with a deep breath, nodded and stepped through the doorway.

Because you can't jump the track
We're like cars on a cable
And life's like an hourglass glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button, boys
So cradle your head in your hands
And breathe
Just breathe
Breathe
Just breathe

The basement of the toy shop was cold, maybe colder than it was outside, and it seemed damp and dingy with only one lone light hanging from the ceiling. I looked around me in surprise as Ciaran and I descended the stairs after Robbie, our feet not echoing as his did. A rickety wooden table stood near the far wall, a few chairs grouped haphazardly around it. Two small twin beds sat in the corners of the room, uncomfortable-looking woolen blankets atop them. As Robbie unloaded the food from his garbage bag onto the table to his small audience, I stared in horror.

Bree looked so different. Her long brown hair had lost its gorgeous sheen, and it hung just past her shoulders, no longer as shiny and sleek as it had once been. Her eyes seemed sadder, somehow, and she looked so much older. Sky's hair was still as light blonde as it had ever been, but her dark eyes confirmed the passage of time that had taken place. They held a new kind of sorrow, something I hadn't seen in them before. Raven looked somewhat still the same, except her hair was a little shorter and she, like all the others, looked thinner. There was something about looking at all of them … my friends as they would be in the future … that saddened me. They seemed so different … so unlike the people I had once known.

"Okay, ladies and … um … ladies," Robbie said with a sigh, setting a can of tomato juice on the table and naming each subsequent item as he lifted it out of the bag. "We've got juice, peanut butter, tortillas, wheat bread, regular bread, um … date bread, pickles, mustard, ketchup, Spaghetti-O's, and about forty cans of soup."

The others looked at him incredulously.

"Um, okay … just as a question," Bree began, "did you actually look at what you were picking up?"

Robbie looked exasperated. "Well, you know, you could have come with me. It's dangerous enough wandering those streets. I just wanted to get out of there as quickly as I could."

"We're not complaining," Sky said.

Bree snorted. "Well, sure, we're not now. But when it comes time to fix up a peanut butter, pickles, mustard, ketchup, and wheat bread sandwich –"

Sky looked dangerously at her. "We're not complaining."

"We're not complaining," Bree whispered meekly.

"We just have to tough this out for a few more days," Sky said with a sigh. "Then … it'll be time, and hopefully after that things can go back to normal."

Suddenly I was finding it difficult to breathe. I gasped and choked for air, but my lungs couldn't seem to come up with the oxygen they needed. My friends didn't say anything; they couldn't see me or hear me. I was a ghost in this world.

"Goddess …" I gasped, doubling over and clutching my stomach. I felt like I was going to be sick. I had to get out of there. Ciaran followed me, calling my name as I ran back up the stairs to the main level of the shop, knocked over a display of Malibu Barbies, and barreled through the door of the shop, that irritating dinging of the bell ringing in my ears.

There's a light at the end of this tunnel
You shout because you're just as far in
As you'll ever be out
And these mistakes you've made
You'll just make them again
If you'll only try turning around

When I ran out of the shop, I sank down to my knees on the snow-covered sidewalk, trying to ground myself to no avail. I still felt sick, lightheaded, and overly confused. When I saw Ciaran emerge out of the shop behind me, I whirled around and glared at him.

"Take me out of here! I don't want to see anymore!"

"You don't have a choice," he said firmly. "You chose to come here, and now you've got to witness what this world has to show you."

"It was me they were talking about," I whispered. "Wasn't it? I'm the one who's done this to Widow's Vale. I … I destroyed it."

Ciaran laughed emotionlessly. "Not quite. You haven't destroyed it yet. Not completely. But, you know, it is rather amusing."

"What, amusing that I've completely ruined my friends' lives?" I screamed.

"No, amusing that … ever since you found out I was your father, you've lived your life in fear." He stepped closer to me. "Fear that you'll turn out just like me." He paused and suddenly looked nostalgic. "Never mind the fact that your mother was one of the greatest white witches that the world has ever seen. Never mind the fact that her coven hadn't practiced dark magick for decades." I bit my lip and didn't say anything. "No, because you had a father like me, you were automatically evil."

"No," I whispered.

"No?" he repeated incredulously. "But that's what you think, isn't it? I suppose we do have our similarities, after all, looking at this future. Meaning, of course, that we both killed our muirn beatha dans.

My mouth went dry and the world seemed very quiet suddenly. "What?" I managed to choke out. "What are you-" Then the horrible realization hit me. Oh, Goddess … this was the world. This was the world where I was truly evil, where I had given into my dark legacy, wholly and completely. "What did I do?" I asked through gritted teeth.

"Your last true link to humanity," Ciaran said with a sigh. "He came to you unarmed, bound his own powers, and asked you to either listen to him or kill him."

I couldn't breathe.

"You chose the latter."

To stop the sob erupting out of me that I felt rising in my throat, I bit my lip so hard that I could taste blood on my tongue.

"Oh, my God …" I whispered, my heart physically hurting.

Ciaran continued, nonplussed. To him, this was truth. This was fact. To me, this was the end. "You had let go of everything, everything that once meant something to you. Anyone with a connection to your past, your friends, your family … they all had to go. They stood between you and your ultimate goal. What was that?"

I knew the answer to that innately. "To not hurt anymore."

He just nodded simply. I stared into space, unable to focus my gaze on one thing when my mind was racing millions of miles per hour and my heart felt like it had literally been torn apart. After just sitting there for a while, just breathing, just trying not to have a complete mental and emotional breakdown, I looked up at Ciaran, who was sitting patiently beside me.

"Show me," I whispered.

2 a.m. and I'm still awake writing this song
If I get it all down on paper it's no longer inside of me
Threatening the life it belongs to
And I feel like I'm naked in front of the crowd
Because these words are my diary screaming out loud
And I know that you'll use them however you want to

The gravestone was simple, just a marble headstone set into the soft earth at the cemetery by the Episcopalian church on West Old Sterling Road. The lettering was simple, free from deceptions or fancy swirls. Simple but somehow sad. A lot like he had been.

HUNTER NIALL
1985 – 2007

That was all it said. Simple. Sad. I bit my lip as I stared at the cold words engraved into the black marble. Something about them seemed so unreal. Was Hunter really buried right underneath where I was standing, underneath the tombstone that bore his name? It seemed surreal, to say the least. The snow was swirling around in the sky, but there, just standing there, it seemed very quiet.

I heard the quiet sounds of someone walking through the gathering snow and looked to my right to see Sky standing next to me, looking at the tombstone as well. It would have been very strange to see. Ciaran, me, and Sky just standing in front of a tombstone, all of us staring at it as if wondering if it would get up and start dancing. Sky couldn't see us, of course. To her, she was the only person in the world at that moment. She touched the top of the tombstone with her hand gently, shivering slightly as a gust of cold wind blew around us.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, and suddenly I felt very uncomfortable. It wasn't our place to be here, Ciaran and me. We shouldn't be listening to Sky's quiet ruminations at her cousin and best friend's grave. "I'm sorry we couldn't stop her before it came to this." Her voice broke slightly, and I looked down, tears threatening my eyes. Her voice tightened slightly. "But we'll stop her. I promise. One way or another." She sighed. "Wilson and the others are coming down from New York City. They should be here soon." She looked down at her hands. "We're going to try to strip her of her powers before she can hurt anyone else."

I bit my lip and swallowed the lump rising in my throat.

"It's not about vengeance, if you're wondering," she said with a small smile. "I know you wouldn't approve of that. It's just … I keep wondering how many other Skys there are out there with Hunters they love. And I'm not going to let her take their Hunters away." She gave a weak, embarrassed smile as she traced the letters on the tombstone. "Goddess, listen to me, I'm getting so emotional. I just …" She broke off as a tear slid down her cheek. "Goddess, I miss you. I don't know how we can survive without you, Giomanach. I don't know how I've survived these last five weeks."

A pause.

"But it's almost over," she sighed. "And then … I don't know, maybe life will go on." She paused as she stood again. "And then you'll be able to see her again. Who knows? Maybe she's sorry for everything she's done and you guys can be together again."

I'm not sure how long I stood there with Ciaran by my side, just replaying Sky's one-sided conversation with her dead cousin in my head. The sorrow in her voice had taken on a whole new dimension when I heard it in my head, and my heart ached for her and the others with a kind of pain that I had never felt before. I knew what made it hurt so much, though. Guilt.

I looked back towards the main town as night began to fall outside. The moon had risen and light was bouncing off the fallen snow in the cemetery, creating a beautiful and haunting painting before my eyes. I wanted to just collapse in the snow and stare up into the cloudy, dark sky forever, just being. But I looked at Ciaran with a question in my eyes.

It's almost time, isn't it? For them to go to me and try to … ?

He nodded and gave me a verbal answer. "Yes."

I nodded, bracing myself. "Well, then, let's go."

But you can't jump the track
We're like cars on a cable
And life's like an hourglass
Glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button now
Sing it if you understand

So breathe
Just breathe
Just breath