To the stratified deserter, the collapse was not yet real. In fairness, from the frosty windows of flight 8809-C-Epsilon packed with the Empire's most luxurious refugees, all the world is just a little diorama anyway as we break past the clouds and float untouchably into the infinite ceruleum blue. How fortunate were we to take flight as the dregs of the motherland smoldered at our backs, our impeccable skyscrapers twisted and smoking like last night's cigarettes in the ashtray while we sip aged whiskey in earnest belief that a little hair of the dog will take the edge off the horrors we have yet to reckon with seeing. Hingan-expat-turned-Garlean-crooner, the mononymous Tosa, who moved to Garlemald when her music career began to really take off tries to muffle the sound of the pill bottle shaking when she taps out the little helpers that will put her straight to sleep, but half of us in this place could name the prescription by the sound of the rattle alone. Her haunted eyes are naught but two dark holes pointed dimly at the seat behind her until the meds take hold.
Iâve been drenched in misery long before this bitter flight, a widow for six weeks, and I mark the passage of each like my own baby, my grief nurtured quietly from grape-sized to grapefruit in the blink of an eye. Our firstborn was to be named Valentina after a painter we could both agree on (a huge deal, if you know me, not that you do), and our second would be Alexander, for my father-in-law that shaped my husband into the man he is, was. Two children, a boy and a girl; there were ways to guarantee it, Darius told me, and ways to promise their good health; we'd met with no fewer than three specialists to discuss how, and I was struck with awe at their quiet power to shape flesh and destiny. One of the manifold tragedies of the Empire was its capacity to create miracles with one hand while it bloodied the other. I had begun to shift my diet, to meticulously cull the impurities from my presence at every turn in order to prepare for the treatments that would make my body a gilded bassinet for a child that was designed to be loved beyond measure. Now Iâm left with an empty cradle, both within and without. I fill the space with another gimlet, the stewardess arriving with impeccable timing the moment I set one glass down to replace it with another. I must say, the service at the end of the world is remarkably sharp.
We're no more than forty-five minutes into the flight and the convivial chatter has quieted into a grave silence. This wasn't some gradual sobering; quite the opposite, in fact, as the sedatives half the flight swallowed at liftoff with a swig of champagne in toast to the ashes of civilization have begun to take hold. I alone remain awake and lucid under the black veil I've been wearing all six weeks, and I have the liberty from under this pall to people-watch with flagrant disregard. Nobody looks at me here, nobody even attempts eye contact or so much as a sideways glance. Before you remind me that we're all carrying a weight under these depressing circumstances, they haven't so much as acknowledged Iâm alive since the funeral, a massive affair that drew thousands, and I have always sensed their relief that they no longer have to pretend to love me in order to express their genuine affection for my more-lovable husband. Has it really been so bad sharing vodka tonics at charity galas? Did they really suffer some unrecoverable indignity when they were forced to compliment my gowns and listen to my haughty rambling at the same time I was forced to smile at photos of their horrible, ill-behaved children and pretend not to notice the uneven seams on their low-quality tailoring? What was my most grievous act against these wilted personas except being too interesting, too esoteric, too untouchable?
I am violently jarred from the throes of these self-righteous, self-pitying thoughts by a swift-passing burst of turbulence that forces the massive craft to tremble, and I think itâs the gin coming unmoored in my gut, at first, but the blast of nausea that hits the cabin shortly thereafter is enough to briefly lift a groggy Tosa from her medicated slumber, blinking wide and innocent as she lifts her head from her beautiful companionâs shoulder. Perhaps she, too is thinking that the cocktail pill-chaser wasnât such a good idea, after all, but before she can get an answer, her head falls back down and her coral mouth hangs ajar. Just like that, sheâs out again. Iâm tempted to bite down on a little helper of my own, bearing in mind that itâs going to be a long flight if every slight wobble of the airship is going to twist my insides so indelicately, but decide in a stroke of fate that Iâve had one drink too many to be certain I can still safely mix substances without being tomorrow morningâs embarrassing obituary.
Peace overtakes once again, restored as quickly as itâd gone, and Iâm just helping myself to the complimentary Hannish Culture Digest not five minutes later when another quake rattles the glasses on the tiny airship tables. This time, very few of us are stirring in response, and I note from behind my dramatic veil that the stewards are exchanging furrowed looks as they watch over their wayward flock of tranquilized sheep when the next invisible wave hits with such ferocity that I double forward and immediately empty my latest gimlet back into the glass in the most dignified way I can muster under the circumstances. I hear the sickly gagging of another whoâs also met this unfortunate fate, and low groaning rises up from the far end of the cabin. Nobody rushes to offer me a napkin, a breath mint, or a modicum of dignity; instead, as Iâm dabbing at my mouth with the corner of the airline napkin, the staff, still clutching their own bellies, are hustling toward the cockpit, leaving the rest of us to our confusion. I turn my attention to the seats around me, where several have begun writhing in their seats, clutching at their stomachs in agony that seems to exceed my own.
I search for another conscious face and find my gaze meeting that of a well-heeled pureblood man sporting a fresh cut (and where he found a barber in these times is a mystery unto itself, one for another day). He stares at me strangely, studying me over, and Iâm on the verge of making a rude remark when I remember my veil and pull it back over my head. âWhatâs happening?â he mouths at me once heâs certain Iâm awake, and I shake my head swiftly in return. His thick brows sink and he looks away to watch his seatmate, ostensibly his wife, begin to murmur indistinctly with a heavy-lidded gaze. He lowers his head near her to listen and Iâm briefly transfixed by the tender scene playing out ahead of me, one where he strokes her strawberry blonde curls and regards her affectionately. He holds her chin with his thumb and curled forefinger and it strikes me just then that itâs exactly the way Darius used to hold mine. Before I know it, Iâve reached up to pull the veil back over my face to collect myself as a great, yawning chasm rips open in my belly. A familiar, old yearning gnaws at me as though it were simply waiting for me to return to it in good time, and I know I always will, I always do. The truth of the matter is, Iâd prefer to be subsumed by all the unallocated love left for my husband left orphaned in my breast than to move past it. This miserable, rotting hollow I call home.
The intercom opens, and I barely pay it any mind. But when the dead air drags on for longer than anticipated, spilling out an airy hiss, a dry static with no voice, Iâm forced away from this tragic reverie to frown up at the metal box. âWell, donât just leave us hanging, say something,â I crab up at the device. Iâm just on the verge of settling on ignoring it again when the whisper drifts through, tinny and bereft of life.
Itâs my turn to hang now, speechless. The world narrows in, Iâm staring through a tunnel. It happens again.
A cold nail drives into my heart, all time coming to a halt as I look around and suddenly realize my fellow passengers are all behaving with disturbing irregularity. Tosa has fallen to her hands and knees on the floor, where sheâs begun to crawl and wriggle with twitching discoordination, and her companion is groaning with increasing volume; no, itâs not groaning anymore, itâs some garbled, malformed attempt at speech without the coordination of tongue and teeth. Itâs alien bleating, joined by a caterwaul that comes from the seat directly behind me. I stand up and turn so fast that my soiled glass smashes to the floor, and what meets me is the glassy stare of a Populares political advisor who makes eye contact with me and begins to chant, sending froth flying from her mouth.
My head swivels to the left as another voice joins, off-key. The strawberry blonde claws at her husband. âGlory! Glory!â
My neighbors, the ones with whom I shared my dwindling stock of sleep aids, fall to the floor with limbs twisted, somnambulating as this frightening fervor grips them, changes them. The choking and gurgling is inhuman, their movements grotesque. An elderly womanâs eyes have rolled back as she stares sightlessly at the ceiling, her sunken mouth trying to join the rising cry.
âGlory to the Empire! Glory to the Empire!â
The last thing I remember before all hell broke loose on flight 8809-C-Epsilon, packed with the Empire's most luxurious refugees, all the world a diorama so far below our lofted breakdown, is the sound of a gunshot.