Chapter 26
The Fold echoed with stillness—a soundless hum beneath his skin. Colors pulsed in the distance, soft as a dream. It was peaceful. Calm.
Wraith was not.
She had been tense since she’d woken him when she’d rolled off her bed and exited her quarters without a word.
How do you thank someone for giving you exactly what you needed? Especially when you’re the last person they ever wanted to give it to.
He still didn’t know. So had said nothing.
He could hear her tapping her finger on the yoke, rapidly and repetitively.
Tap, tap, tap. Tap-pause. Tap-pause. Tap-pause. Tap, tap, tap.
“What’s with the tapping?”
The sound ceased immediately. Followed by a soft curse.
“It’s a long story.”
“We have time.”
A pause.
“No, we don’t.”
The tapping started again. Slower this time, and only one repetition.
“Look, Major. Helios. The Fold is going to kill you. You have days. Maybe. If you’re lucky. And you’re going to take me with you.”
He started to speak, but she cut him off.
“Don’t interrupt. I know what I’m talking about. And I also know one thing we can try that might stop it. Again, Maybe.”
She fell into silence and the tapping resumed.
There were so many things he could say. Should say. Couldn’t.
“It’s risky,” he guessed.
“You might say that.”
“Well, if I’m dead anyway, why not just go for it?”
“Because if it works, you won’t be the same. And I can’t undo it.”
“Undo what, Wraith? Help me understand.”
In the distance, the aurora bloomed. Violet and green and pink.
She barked a humorless laugh.
“You can’t.”
“Are you talking about becoming one with the Choir like Shade was talking about.”
Another laugh. Almost ragged.
“Actually, that’s close. But no. This isn’t the Choir’s brand of subsumption.”
She breathed deep. “I do this, Major, and it works? You become like me. A Ghost. Half in. Half out. Forever.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I know.”
Whatever she was feeling ran deep. Not anger—maybe fear. And he’d been so sure she’d had all of that scraped out of her long ago.
He wanted to see her face. Couldn’t. So, he leaned forward and reached over the seat to put a hand on her shoulder.
“Ash?”
Her voice was a whisper and almost fragile. “I’ve told you not to call me that.”
Wraith swallowed hard.
Helios hadn’t moved his hand. Hadn’t said a word. Just held the space, as if she hadn’t handed him a death sentence and a possible life sentence in one breath.
Her finger tapped out SOS again. She couldn’t stop herself.
Then she lifted her hand and placed it over his. For just a moment. And in that breath, that brief contact, she let it go. The last, bitter dregs of her hatred.
Not for the system. She’d hold that grudge until her final breath.
But for him.
Against all odds, Golden Boy had turned out to be that rarest of creatures.
A good man.
If somewhat misguided in his loyalties.
She put her hand back on the yoke, pushed the Banshee forward, and looked out into the Fold.
Distant auroras flared, the silence steady and strangely comforting. Her pulse settled. She was ready to make peace with whatever was coming.
“Okay, Helios. We’re going to fly for a bit.” Her voice was steady now. Doubt was gone. It would either work, or it wouldn’t.
If it didn’t, she’d be past caring. And if it did?
Well, she’d burn that bridge when she came to it.
The cabin felt different. In an instant the tension had vanished, sucked out like air vented to space.
He kept his hand—still tingling from her touch—on her shoulder a moment longer. Drew it back.
“What now?” he asked.
“Now? I need you to lean back and close your eyes. Focus on my voice. On the feel of the Void.”
“The Void? Don’t you mean the Fold?”
“Helios… did you really think they were different?”
Uh, what?
The Void was at the core of spiritual belief. The Fold was the Inbetween. The idea that they were one and the same was somehow… heretical. And he did not consider himself a religious man.
Somehow, he managed to huff a laugh, “Believe it or not, yeah. I did.”
“My voice, Helios. Focus on it. And let me know when you feel the Fold change.”
“Change?”
“You’ll know it when you feel it. Now shut up.”
“Can I say thank you first?”
A beat of quiet. “You just did. Now close your eyes and hush. Try not to think.”
He laid his head back. Closed his eyes. He had no idea what he was supposed to be feeling. Was just starting to analyze it when Wraith started talking.
“The Inbetween’s an ocean under the surface of real space. Most of the time, we skim the shallows. But when you dive deep… the whole ocean changes.”
Her voice seemed to resonate; a concordance with the fractured hum of the Fold that was always just beyond his reach.
“The depths are different. They don’t just hum. They echo. Go deep enough? They sing.”
She seemed closer, somehow. He could almost feel her wonder. Her resolve.
Something seemed to settle on him. In him.
And he could feel the ebb and flow of the Inbetween.
It was—not alive. So much more than alive. It existed. It was.
Then it changed pitch. Like a tuning fork had been dropped into deep water.
Something was coming.
He opened his eyes, “Uh, Wraith?”
She didn’t move, but it felt like she’d been jerked away from him like a snapped wire.
“Oh fuck,” she said flatly.
Then he saw it. The largest Other Ship he’d ever laid eyes on rising like a monument beside them.
Wraith would have cursed herself, but there was no time.
She yanked the yoke hard to starboard, the whole cabin lurching with the strain. A sickening vibration passed through the frame of their Banshee that was not designed to operate this deep.
If they punched out here, they were dead.
If they stuck around: dead.
And just when she’d thought they might actually survive.
Reaching for him had been working.
Sluggish. Strange. But working.
They were integrating.
But she’d been so focused on Kael that she hadn’t even felt the Others.
He had.
She pushed as much speed out of the Banshee as it would give. Rising from the depths far too fast. She could hear Kael gasp for breath.
Shit.
She was going to kill him before the Leviathan could.
A quick roll of the Banshee and they were diving again. Kael’s breath evened out a bit.
“What… the fuck?” His voice was hollow, disoriented.
“Later.”
Now they just had to survive. Her only hope was to outrun them.
And that hope died a second later when the Banshee shuddered once… and then just fucking died.
The Leviathan rose, and swallowed them whole.