Allie's War Season Four (158 page)

Don’t let her sleep...not until she starts to act more coherent,
Balidor said.

She should get checked out by one of us before she sleeps...a seer, I mean...
I heard someone else say, maybe Yumi.

It’s a form of light shock, maybe connected to the events of the previous year...

Someone else said that. A male voice that time, maybe Balidor again, or Wreg, or Jon.

I heard Jon there again, not long after.

His back still hurt, his light, but I felt his frustration more than anything, his wanting to talk to me. I felt him mad at Revik, at Balidor, at Kali, at Ullysa. I felt him wanting to talk to me, but I told Angie not to let him in, either.

Someone else came to the door, too...later, I mean.

Hours later, I suppose.

That person didn’t say much, at least not where I could hear it.

I didn’t hear his actual voice at all, not at first, but I felt his light.

He stood there for a long time, and I felt him arguing with Angie, trying to get her to let him in. I felt him tell her that she wasn’t helping me, that none of them were helping me, whatever they thought, and whatever I told them. I felt him threaten to force his way in. I felt him say that one of the seers had to see me, that they had to let at least
one
of the higher-ranked seers check me out, to make sure I was all right...that it didn’t have to be him.

Jaden heard or felt something, too, because he frowned, looking at me. He sat on a different couch in the same room, across from the one where I sat.

Not long after that, Jaden went to the door, too.

He slammed it not long after, and locked it, but before that, I heard voices raised. I heard Revik’s voice that time, loud, angrier than maybe I’d ever heard it, but I felt the fear there, too.

I didn’t care. I closed my eyes through most of that, and just willed him to go away.

Eventually, he did.

Truthfully, I was surprised none of them had forced their way in by now.

I’d been expecting one of them to. I was relieved beyond words that they hadn’t.

Angie stayed with me most of that night, and Sasquatch, although he didn’t say much. Frankie sat on the floor and laughed and complained about men being jerks and told me I should let Revik stew until he figured out he couldn’t be such an asshole and get away with it. Jaden played video games with Sasquatch when Frankie wasn’t playing, and did things on a hand-held and talked to Dante on the comm about things to do with the Displacement Lists.

I felt him watching me through most of it, though, staring at me, even when he wasn’t looking at me with his eyes. I felt his attention on me, and after awhile, I struggled to deal with that, too. Mostly, I fought to ignore it.

The night passed slowly into day that way, and Sasquatch handed me a blunt somewhere in that, and I smoked it, unthinking, then coughed because my lungs hated it...hated the smoke, and hated the taste of it...and then I worried I might fall asleep after all.

But I didn’t fall asleep.

A few more hours must have passed, another interval, another period of time on the clock where they freed Revik from his cage.

He came back and pounded on the door again, but no one answered it that time. I told them it wouldn’t do any good, that he could unlock it with his mind, which seemed to make all of them nervous, maybe even scared, but he didn’t open the door that way, either.

I felt grief on him. I felt him trying to talk to me.

I don’t think I was angry, even.

I just wanted him to leave me alone.

I wanted silence, and in this room, even with Frankie chatting mindlessly about the guy she had a crush on from down the hall and the explosions and music from the monitor as Sasquatch kept playing video games and the sound of Jaden talking to Dante on the comm, it felt quiet in here, almost weirdly peaceful, maybe just with the mundanity of it all.

I knew it wouldn’t last, this vacation from reality.

But after Revik went away the second time, he stayed away longer.

Another night came. Then another day.

Kali came by, somewhere in that, but I told them not to answer the door that time, either, and eventually, she went away, too.

I still hadn’t slept, but I was getting more and more tired.

“You should take a shower,” Angie urged me.

I looked down at myself, realized I was wearing combat clothes from the beach, that I probably had sand inside my underwear and shirt and bra, and in my hair. I tried to think back on how long I’d been sitting there, drinking the occasional beer and eating food when someone handed me a bowl with rice and veggies in it. I was still thinking about it, when someone knocked on the door again, hard that time.

I could feel him there, and something told me that this time, I wasn’t going to be able to just wish him away. I had my light shielded, just like I had pretty much since I’d gotten here, but I knew that wouldn’t help me, either.

That time, he scarcely bothered with Angie at all when she answered the door.

I heard him say something to her, something I couldn’t make out, then he raised his voice.

“Alyson!” he said. His voice came out harsh, close to a command. He put light into his voice that time, enough that I felt myself tense where I sat on the couch. “Alyson! Come out here. Now. Or I’m coming in there.”

He didn’t have to tell me he meant it. I could feel that he meant it.

I saw Jaden frown, right before he started to regain his feet.

That time, I got up before he did.

They all froze when they saw me stand, staring at me. Even Sasquatch looked over, without pausing his game, so that his animated avatar got pummeled by the zombies he’d been fighting onscreen. I stared, weirdly fascinated when they began chewing on the avatar’s different body parts. Then I blinked, looking back at the rest of them.

I stood there, fighting for equilibrium, then I met Jaden’s gaze.

“It’s okay. I should go.” I looked around at all of them. Frankie, where she sat next to Sasquatch on the couch, looking almost like a kid where she huddled next to his big form. Jaden, with his long hair and his wiry frame from being on the ship and probably from working crazy hours with Dante and all of the rest of them. Angie, where she stood by the door, watching me with a worried expression on her face.

“Thanks,” I said, not sure what else to say.

“If he’s an asshole, come back,” Frankie said. She’d paused her player, and it stood in a strange waiting pose, swaying slightly as the game waited for her to return. “Seriously,” she said, her dark eyes mirroring the seriousness. “You can stay with us anytime,” she said.

Sasquatch nodded, his brown eyes holding sympathy as he looked up at me. “Like, anytime, Allie-potali,” he said, gripping the game console in one hand as he frowned towards the door. “He seems like a dick, seriously,” he added, his voice lower. “...A real ass-munch fuckwad.”

I nodded, fighting to smile, and just nodded again.

“Thanks,” I said again.

Then, not sure what else to say, I turned and walked towards the door.

I felt more or less like I was in my body again, even if I didn’t exactly feel normal. More to the point, I didn’t feel like I had in the cafeteria with Jon and Wreg, where I had no idea where I was or what was happening. I felt like I knew who I was, where I was, even if I didn’t really care about any of it. Even the thought of dealing with it made me feel sick.

I was really fucking tired, though.

My whole body hurt when I walked across the common space to the door. When I saw Revik standing there, the look on his face felt closest to a punch, although I didn’t stare at him long enough to figure out what his expression meant, precisely. Looking up at him, I could only hold his gaze for a few seconds before I looked at Angeline, and fought with words.

“Thanks, Angie,” I said finally.

She threw her arms around me, wrapping them around my shoulders and back. She stood there, as if trying to make me feel better through the sheer force of her own will. As she held me, she also rubbed my back with one hand, gripping me a few seconds longer than a normal goodbye. It touched me, enough to break through some of the fog that still seemed to be strangling my light. When she let go, I found myself clutching her arms, and it took me a few seconds longer to release her.

She looked at Revik then, frowning.

“You’re a real asshole, you know that?” she said, her voice cold.

When I turned, Revik wasn’t looking at her, though, he was looking at me. His eyes studied my face, even as I felt his light skirting around me cautiously, as if trying to read me without getting too close. I couldn’t hold his gaze that time, either.

“Come back anytime,” Angie said, louder. It still felt like she was talking to Revik, maybe more than she was talking to me. “Anytime you want, Allie. You can stay as long as you want, too.”

Revik gave her a hard look that time.

I felt anger on him, even as his fingers closed around my arm. He tugged at me gently, trying to get me out of that doorway, and when I glanced behind me that time, I felt as much as saw the real source of his anger. Jaden stood there, his blue eyes cold, staring at Revik.

He stared at where Revik held my arm, his face a pale mask.

“Yeah, Allie,” Jaden said. He raised his voice, even more than Angie had. “You can come live with us if you want. Just say the word. We have room. Fuck. We’ll
make
room...even if it means sharing beds. You can be sure of that...”

I felt another hard pulse of anger off Revik, even as he enveloped me in a cloak of his light, pulling me closer to him.

That time, it felt almost protective.

Before I could think about that, either, we’d started walking.

Or really, Revik started walking, and I followed him.

We were at least fifteen or so steps further down the hall and away from that door, when the door closed behind us. I felt Angie there again, briefly, indecision in her light.

She thought she’d given me to an abuser. She’d let my husband come and collect me, and she couldn’t decide if she’d done the right thing.

I wished I could tell her it would be all right, but I knew how that would sound, too.

I don’t remember telling them anything, truthfully, about why I was there...but I could guess how I must have looked, showing up at their door. They knew Revik as Syrimne, as a killer. They knew him as someone who would probably hurt his wife, since he’d killed so many before. I hadn’t wanted to talk to them when he came for me.

Jon might have said something to them.

Hell, I might have. I wished I could remember. I had no idea what I’d said to them, when I first got there, or even in the few hours after that.

I remembered Angie at the door, yelling at someone not long after I got there.

Someone who, in my slightly less foggy memories, now sounded to my mind like Jon. But of course Jon would have come here first. Revik would have asked him to come. Balidor might have asked Jon to try and talk to me, too. They would have sent him, because Jon knew Angie and the others...but they hadn’t let Jon through that door, either.

Thinking about that, I felt a sudden flood of warmth for my old friends, for their attempts to protect me from the harm that they saw. They’d been trying to keep me safe, in their own way, if only by keeping them from coming in the door.

I thought all of that, even as Angie finally shut the door behind me.

As soon as that door shut, the anger on Revik seemed to dissipate, like a cloud torn apart by wind. He stopped walking in the corridor at once, looking me over with his eyes and light, maybe twenty yards away from the door to the room that housed what remained of my old life, and the people I had known before I met him.

As Revik looked me over, his eyes turned openly cautious once more.

I saw him noticing my clothes, and probably how I smelled from the look on his face.

When he spoke, he said the last thing I expected him to say, though.

“Are you stoned?” he said, still looking me over.

I tried to remember when I smoked that joint with Sasquatch, and frowned.