I try to counter him, words of oblivion on my tongue, destruction fighting to come out of my fingers, even just erect one of Kopano’s shields, but he shatters my fist. Shatters my cheekbone. Shatters my collarbone. I’m his punching bag and he’s preparing for the boxing match of his life. All the shields I’ve been working on for months are nothing but distant memories in my past.
All the pain Jonah had hidden so easily earlier comes at me like the tides he loves so much, all this and more as wave after crashing wave of debilitating agony consumes me. Enlilkian is dragging me backward while I’m helpless to do anything but watch, time speeding up just a little but not enough to match our own, as two Elders grab hold of Jonah from behind and I can’t—I can’t—they hold him and the one whose body is a weapon turns into a stake and stabs my love, my Connection, my husband right into the chest over and over again until I am, don’t even know how to scream anymore my pain is so blinding and total and complete and I want to die wish it were me not him never him and he’s falling slumping in slow motion his eyes closing, I’m trying to kick, to wrestle myself out of Enlilkian’s grasp but I’m a rag doll and oh gods oh gods there is so much blood everywhere and things are blowing up around me this old venerable building is falling apart now in my terror he hits me in the head nice and hard and my eyes roll back and he’s telling me it’s for good measure be a good girl he says be a good girl and Jonah isn’t moving and each stab into my beloved another death and he’s no longer moving on his own and and Karnach is falling apart and I’m blinking I want to see him save him words are so hard thoughts words and then they pick him up and throw him over the side just like Mac and Kofi like he’s a rag doll too and the stairs break apart and fall too all the walls crumbling my chest it feels like somebody punched through and stole my heart and
I’m shaking. My heart is beating too fast. My ears are ringing.
A bright light blinds me, but I ... I’m too weak to move away. Even to shove something away with my hand. My eyelids go into overdrive in their efforts to focus. Holy hell, do I ache.
Wait. Why do I ache?
“She needs surgery,” someone says.
I don’t recognize the voice. There’s a blurry outline of a ... man? ... next to me. Male voice, as shaky as I feel. White coat. Face doesn’t seem right. Is purple-y, I think. I close my eyes tight and then open again. Still blurry.
“I’ve set as many bones as I can, but she’s got a bad concussion. And I think there’s internal bleeding that I can’t stop outside of a surgery room.”
Is he ... he’s talking about me?
I try to move, but a gentle hand presses against a shoulder. “It’s best to stay still.”
My chest hurts. Feels like ... feels like holes are carved in it. Like I’ve been cored over and over again. Like I’m still being cored.
Quiet murmuring sounds from the other side of the room. I think a door opens and closes.
“It’s a shame, little Creator,” somebody else says, “that you had to get rid of Bios.”
Now that voice I do recognize. If I thought my heart was racing before, that’s nothing compared to how I’m feeling now. Enlilkian is here with me. Where is here? Where am I? What—what—
Too many images hit me all at once. Karnach, under attack. Taking out nine Elders. Sophie. Mac. Kofi.
Jonah.
Oh my gods. Jonah.
I’m thrashing now, pain lasering through every vein alongside grief and rage, every blood vessel, every pore. I have to get out of ... this bed I’m in and get—I need to find him—
“Make that stop,” Enlilkian is saying.
Things are crashing around us, exploding, and I’m screaming and flailing and all I want to do is find him, make sure he’s okay, gods, please please let him be okay, but then my eyelids are drooping, my limbs slowing down until they are filled with weighted sludge.
“It isn’t wise to force her awake to only sedate her moments later,” I think the blurry man in white says, but here at the bottom of the ocean, it’s hard to be sure.
“When I want your opinion, I’ll ask for it. Until then, stay silent. Surely, you don’t want the same outcome as your mate?”
I want to fit these pieces together, but ... but it’s so hard.
Jonah. Oh my gods. Jonah. He can’t be dead. He can’t. He can’t. How can I breathe? How can I find a single breath in a universe he doesn’t exist in?
My eyes go blurrier than before, which makes sense considering I’m drowning. My heart hurts, just hurts so godsdamn much. Before I know it, that black abyss opens up below me and sucks me right in.
It’s the middle of the day, I think; soft sunlight filters through golden falling leaves to dapple a yard just outside the broken window in front of me. There’s what I think is a bench out there, white wicker, and a creaking swing, too.
There’s also what looks like a leg sticking out of the closet directly next to the window, covered in dried blood. I think it’s a woman’s; the toenails on the bare foot are electric orange.
Each breath I take in and out is a thousand knives stabbing furiously at my lungs.