Allie's War Season Four (90 page)

I knew, just by which side of the room it lay on, which tank he was looking in on. He didn’t glance over at me again, not for what must have been a few minutes.

“Why aren’t you in there?” he said finally.

He pointed at the window, not looking at me.

Even so, his voice shocked me briefly into silence. It sounded exactly the way I remembered it. Maybe that one thing was enough, given how little we’d spoken since I had any idea of who, or even where I was. Maybe it was that deeper tone he used, the one that seemed to come out of his chest as much as his throat, his German accent blunting the syllables.

“I would be in there,” he said, into my silence.

I followed his eyes and fingers to the other tank, where Lilai lay in a crib.

I watched her sleep, her tiny fingers gripping the plush arm of a stuffed elephant that Balidor, of all people, had found for her somewhere. She’d been wrapped in footed pajamas that had elephants on them, too, presumably a hand-me-down from one of the humans on board who had small children. Lilai looked peaceful in sleep, even if I could almost see the denser currents of light around her form. I knew if I was even a little more aware of myself, and of the reality of her, just watching her there might have terrified me.

The fact of being a parent at all might have terrified me.

Looking back at Revik, I saw his eyes on her, unwavering.

Without trying to interpret his expression, I stepped deeper into the room. I focused back on our daughter when Revik’s eyes remained on that transparent wall. I couldn’t help swallowing at the tension I could see in her tiny face, even as I made a vague gesture with one hand.

I felt almost defensive once I’d thought about his question.

“They wanted me to wait,” I said.

“Why?” he said simply.

I shrugged, tearing my eyes off her with an effort. “They wanted me to wait until they’re done checking her light...until they know what Shadow did to her.” I swallowed again, harder that time. “Because I’m her mother, I guess. They say we’re likely...you and I...we’re likely to light bond with her at a deep level, as soon as we spend even a small amount of time together. They say the Dreng eradicated any trace of my light from hers, from before...”

I trailed, not really wanting to talk about my brief pregnancy, or the untimely C-section.

Hesitating, I shrugged with my hand, feeling my face warm as I added,

“...Balidor’s worried Shadow might have done something to her light. Something that could harm her...or even kill her, if we’re not careful. Tarsi seemed to think his fears are warranted. Both of them think Shadow had big plans for her...”

I trailed again, seeing Revik wince.

He didn’t answer me, not at first. He didn’t move, either, but continued to lean his body forward, his face close to the thick organic partition. I watched his clear eyes stare at our daughter on the other side, his chin resting on his arms where they folded over the guardrail under the observation window.

Then he let out a humorless laugh.

“Yeah,” he said.

He still didn’t look at me.

Standing there, I fought with whether or not to approach him. Most of that giddy, half-out-of-my-body thing had finally dissipated from when I’d first come awake in New York. Even so, I couldn’t pretend by any stretch of the imagination that I felt normal. I could feel the distance between us being stretched by that oddness in my light, amplified by it, maybe.

Even so, I had to fight not to touch him, or to step any nearer.

I forced myself to just look at him, instead.

He looked lean. Maybe leaner than I’d ever seen him, without being starved, the way he had been when he first got away from Terian in that mountain prison. Meaning, he looked like he’d spent more time running and in the ring than he had lifting weights; I didn’t see an ounce of excess flesh on him anywhere. He looked like he’d defaulted back to his hyper-practical mode, including with his eating habits...which didn’t really surprise me, either.

He wasn’t yelling at me, but somehow, this felt worse.

I continued to watch him, looking periodically at Lilai through that transparent window only to look back at him. We just stood there like that, not talking, for what felt like a long time.

When he finally straightened, I jumped a little.

I watched him hit through a sequence of keys on the edge of the window. He did it soundlessly, almost in rote, barely seeming to pay attention to what he did.

Slowly, like paint dripping down from the top and sides of the screen, the image of our daughter in that dimly-lit, greenish-tinted room disappeared. I felt myself flinch a little when it happened, a kind of sickness in my light when I could no longer see her, even though I knew she was still there.

I felt something similar touch Revik’s light as well, but he hid it from me quickly...so quickly that I wondered if I’d felt it at all. In any case, I couldn’t feel it on him now, and Lilai was gone, too.

Now it was just us.

He faced me. I couldn’t help noticing he didn’t look at me, though.

“Do you want to explain?” he said.

He made a vague motion with one hand, his other one still gripping the guardrail under the observation window, which now just looked like regular wall. Still avoiding my face and eyes, he motioned delicately again.

Again, I found myself following his hand and fingers with my eyes.

Pain coiled through my light, even from that simple thing.

“Allie?” he said. “Are you going to explain? Or not?”

I swallowed. It felt like something hard had suddenly gotten stuck in my throat. Shaking my head, I clicked softly, barely conscious I did either thing. I wasn’t sure what I meant by either thing, either, other than maybe a subconscious part of me that didn’t want to explain at all, but wanted just to skip this part, and what I suspected his reaction might be, so I could just slide my arms around him instead. I looked at him again, in dark pants and a white shirt, and I just wanted to touch him. I had to fight to keep that want out of my light, to keep it away from where he might feel it...and probably misunderstand it.

Or maybe understand it better than I wanted to admit to myself.

“Allie?” he said.

I nodded that time, barely noticing I did that, either.

Clearing my throat, I nodded again.

“There isn’t a lot to explain, Revik,” I began, taking another breath. “I mean...you know what they did to me.”

He nodded, but that look in his eyes didn’t waver. “Tarsi?” he said.

He didn’t bother to say more. The question was pretty self-evident.

“Yes,” I told him. “I contacted her.”

“When?”

I felt that tightness in my throat worsen. “The first time?” When he continued staring off to the side, that empty look on his face, I sighed. “I don’t know. I think after Jon woke me up. Tarsi said I started talking to her that same day.” Pausing on that for a beat, I added, “That’s what I remember, too. I contacted her...and Vash through her, I guess.”

Revik nodded again. “Why?” he said, still staring off to the side.

I knew what he was asking me.

Somehow, it didn’t help at all that he didn’t say it aloud.

I followed his eyes around the rest of his compartment inside the tank, noticing only then that the room had been furnished, making it look more like a studio apartment than how I remembered that first version of the tank, in those mountains of China. A bed stood there, what had to be a queen-sized mattress, at least. I also saw a door, probably leading to some kind of bathroom cubicle combined with a small washroom. On the other side of the wall, I saw a desk with a lamp. On it rested a headset, a hand-held, even a good-sized monitor. Next to that stood a small couch. Someone had given him a bookshelf, too, and filled it with paper books, most of them old-looking, probably scripture, or some kind of commentaries. I guessed Wreg had given him those last, considering the pristine shape of the bindings.

Revik and Wreg were two of the only people I knew who even read paper books.

Looking back at his face, I could feel him waiting for me to speak.

“Look,” I said. “I’m not sure if I can answer what you want to know. I don’t know exactly why I went to them...or why I felt it wasn’t safe to go to you. I just did.”

Revik didn’t move. He didn’t even nod that time. When he still hadn’t said anything, a few seconds later, I gestured with one hand, maybe copying him, I don’t know.

“I’m sorry,” I said, somewhat lamely.

He didn’t say anything to that, either.

Walking over to the bed, I sat down, combing my hands through my hair. Exhaling again, I sat up straighter, my fingers grasping my thighs as I looked up at him.

“Revik,” I said, hearing the tension in my own voice. “I thought Cass was going to kill me. I thought I was dead, when she had me on that plane to San Francisco. I remember that part. I remember landing in Golden Gate Park in a helicopter. I remember getting to mom’s house, and her telling me I didn’t deserve to be a mother...” Seeing him wince, I swallowed, shaking my head. “...but I gotta tell you...everything after that is pretty fuzzy. Well, not fuzzy exactly...but it’s not clear like being down here, either. I remember a lot of it. I can’t say I wasn’t conscious, not exactly...but my mind worked differently. I remember it differently than I remember things down here, too. And I don’t know if I can explain to you how I was thinking back then...”

Revik nodded, his face unmoving. He seemed to think about my words.

When he spoke next, I still didn’t hear any accusation in his voice.

“You didn’t think to have them tell me?” he said. “Down here, I mean?”

Hearing the deadened sound in his voice, I shook my head, clicking again as I exhaled.

“It came up,” I admitted.

I felt him waiting again, and swallowed, telling him the truth.

“Look, don’t blame Tarsi,” I said, feeling my face warm. “It wasn’t her...or Vash. It was me. They even tried to talk me into telling you what I was doing.” Not looking up that time, I swallowed again. “I honestly can’t explain why I said no, Revik. It just seemed like a bad idea to me at the time. I don’t remember knowing anything about Menlim’s construct...but some part of me still thought it was a bad idea for you to know.” Hesitating, I exhaled again.

“I made them promise not to tell you, Revik,” I told him. “I made them promise not to tell anyone. No one but the few people we needed...”

Seeing a muscle on his cheek twitch, I hesitated again.

“Revik, I’m sorry. I really am.”

But he didn’t seem to hear that part.

“What you did in our bedroom,” he said, cutting me off, as if his mind still ran on a separate track. “...In the hotel. I saw you die, Allie.”

Watching the stillness of his face, I sighed again, exhaling.

“Yes,” I said. “Yes, you did.”

I could feel him waiting.

Exhaling, I shook my head, feeling sick again. “I just knew I needed to,” I told him. “I knew I needed to be connected to all four of you to come back.”

“Come back?”

“From the wires,” I said patiently. “From what Cass did to me.”

Again, he didn’t answer, not even to nod.

“I wish I could tell you more,” I said, frustrated. “I really do. Maybe you should ask Tarsi. According to her, I
did
connect to the two of them, and that it reconnected the different levels of my light. She says it did
more
than that somehow, waking up some ‘Bridge’ part of me that had been dormant. She says the death thing made that possible, too...maybe by opening up areas of my light that had been cut off before. Or maybe just by decoupling my light from the structure it had been holding, freeing up my aleimi to take on a new form...”

I felt another shimmer of emotion off of Revik’s light.

It was there and gone, too fast for me to read anything specific, but I tensed.

“She was with you in all of that, too?” he said.

I felt my face warm, suddenly understanding what I’d felt.

“Yes,” I said.