#agent nova

weeks went by at the roanoke estate. october turned to november. to december.

the house was still decorated, of course. but lilith had done her best, with the white lady’s help, to ensure that the lights were extra soft, glowing as gently as an embrace. “their eyes may hurt when you bring them back. we want the landing to go as easily as we can, yes? fortune favors the prepared.” lilith had spoken with such certainty. nova and wyvern clung to it with a white knuckle grip.

she didn’t sleep much, didn’t eat much. wyvern wasn’t much better off. they hardly came out of the basement office set aside for the chunk of the traceback formula development—their usual company was just each other, cups of coffee gone cold, and tea… but those were usually merlin’s.

lillith had been the one to make that phone call. merlin had dropped absolutely everything, hadn’t even asked arthur for approval. he’d just left. harry had gone with him, for his sake, sure, but also for rae. the necromancer wasn’t taking this well.

not many were.

there weren’t any protocols in place for this. “this is the fucking protocol!” wyvern had screamed at longma, in that first formal meeting after the incident; his temper had definitely gotten the better of him in this entire ordeal. “and now we’re just shooting in the dark, hoping that we can find anything, anything, to trace, to give us even half a clue as to which one of these hellholes you and drake so thoughtfully sent them to!”

“jeremy—that’s enough.”

merlin was beyond exhausted.

he didn’t know how much time he’d spent just standing in the middle of his girlfriend’s quarters—going over old journals, old case files, anything he could find. he reasoned that maybe there was a hint, something from the past he could grab and yank to the present to help them. hours? days? time had never seemed so disjointed. stock-still and fleeting all at once.

and a darker part of his mind conceded: you are afraid you will not find her. and you are trying desperately to find a way to keep her close. you will never get to apologize to charlie. it will die with you. and that’s something she might’ve found unforgivable in another life, right? the withholding of mercy?

he shook his head. brought himself back to the basement office with drake, longma, wyvern—and nova, who was leaning up against one edge of the whiteboard with her arms over her chest.

it was covered in formulas. equations. numbers, number, numbers.

it was right in front of their faces. it had to be, he reasoned. and this—this was something he could actually help with. he’d be damned if failure would catch him now, when the price of it was this steep and shaped like someone that he loved, that he wanted to m—

no. not yet. if he could find her, then maybe…

despite winter falling down over the estate grounds, it was warm downstairs. he had his shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows.  “look. let’s jus’—let’s jus’ talk this through again. y’ said that the traceback signal functioned as a receiver. correct?”

nova shifted on her feet, lifting a hand to her face. back to square one. she didn’t want them to see her expression crumple—but drake caught it, and felt sick.

wyvern heaved a sigh, his hands going to his hair. merlin swallowed and quickly went back to staring at the board.

don’t think about how she did that too. don’t think about it. focus. focus.

“yes. the traceback, it’s—it’s meant to pick up on device signals. we trace a path, boom, whip ‘em back to this timeline. hence traceback.”

merlin hummed, rubbing his scalp.

“okay—okay.” he picked up an eraser, clearing the board again. “let’s just try it again from the start. one more time. maybe there’s somethin’ we missed, like—passin’ a hallway in an old house…”

the initial panic had faded by then, out of necessity.

there’d been a few evenings where they each, in turn, had tried to solve the entire problem as quickly as possible. but the more they tried to fight against it, against time, the more frustrated they got, and it had ended in tears. for nova, most of all. and for merlin, just once: his first night in the states when he’d gone down into this exact office because he couldn’t stand to go to her room and find it silent, and empty.

and it’d been merlin who’d sat both of them down, one particularly raw night—pretending that they were recruits, that he was back home—and told them that trying to do this rushed wouldn’t move them forward. not the way they needed to move.

nova had buried her face in her hands. “do y’ understand, ellie?” she nodded, but didn’t speak.

wyvern and merlin encased her in their arms from either side.

he didn’t remember how long they stayed like that. but after they separated—that is when the work began. night after night of mathematics, theorems, conjectures. all dead ends.

but no one so much as uttered the phrase ‘give up.’ no one would.

*     *     *

“… wait.”

charlie didn’t quite have enough time to throw himself into a full panic. seraphim’s tone made him pause, and he watched her slowly get to her feet, staring at the skyborne city. “… i know that tower.”

“you recognize the city?”

seraphim squinted. “i—yeah. i think i do.” a head tilt. “… holy shit. holy fucking shit.” was there a smile in her voice?

it was charlie’s turn to struggle to a stand. his arm burned, and seraphim reached out a hand behind her to help him up. “why do you sound like this is a good thing?”

“it’s not, but i’m choosing to believe there’s no way it couldn’t help. c’mere, look—“ she stood right at charlie’s shoulder and pointed to the center, spiraling tower. “see that? that’s a part of a castle in an underworld capital city, korssrun. guess who was with me the last time i went there?”

“who?”

“ellie.”

and seraphim told him about the first time that she’d ever used the gate alongside the woman who was growing into a shape best described as ‘the love of his life.’ she could have cried at the wonder in his eyes, how the alarm melted from his expression even when she was talking about krueger, who for all intents and purposes was the exact opposite of a relaxing entity.

but it helped. it gave them a reference point, even if it was a little vague, and… possibly not a reference point at all.

“all right. so this is like… some weird inverted version of that universe. allllll right-y. all right, all right, all right…” seraphim took a few steps backwards and rubbed her hands on her face. think, think, think. “we just have to come up with a plan…”

“do you think they’re looking for us?” charlie winced, shifting on his feet. his gaze fell to the ground, slowly rolling back to the dark spots that marked where they’d landed against the rock.

“of course i do.” her answer was quick, firm. “if i know ellie like i think i do, she’s not going to sleep until she can find a way to bring us back. … or at least you.” that last bit was said quieter.

before charlie could open his mouth to ask her anything else, she gasped, “oh! oh that’s it! i mean—not like, it-it, but it’s a—“

“morgan!” he didn’t want her to know how bad he was feeling. but it leeched into his voice anyway. pain. every breath he drew was like a small layer of stone, gravel settling on the bottom of his chest. hot, suffocating. his skin was tingling. “please. just. slow down. what are you talking about?”

“i think—since they are looking for us—“ seraphim nodded with emphasis, confidence, but her voice trailed as if she was in the middle of a thought. “—it might be helpful if we found the…” she frowned, made a gesture with her hand. “… i don’t know, the landing point.”

“landing point?”

“i mean like the corresponding point where ellie and i met ground when we first came here. all the entry points for all the gates are pretty consistent in terms of the physical location where you hit.” her eyes went back upward. she stared at the tower. “this… this place isn’t mapped. i’m not going to pretend that this is a good idea, but it is an idea.”

charlie pressed his palms into his eyelids, exhaling, inhaling. “so. you think that if they try to get us back. the signal will come from there? be close to there?”

seraphim rolled her shoulders. she felt an itch as a bead of sweat rolled down her back and she hastily reached for her hair, snapping it up into a messy ponytail. the one time she remembered to keep a hair tie around her wrist. “yes. there’s no reason to think so, but there’s also no reason to not think so, and i’d rather throw my money in with what we can infer based on what we already know.”

charlie snorted.

“what?”

“nothing, you just—remind me of someone.”

“yeah? well you can tell me all about them on the walk over. c’mon.”

he frowned, but his steps after her were unwavering. “you know the way? how?”

seraphim glanced over her shoulder, smiling. she—looked tired. her skin shone in the muted light. charlie wondered if he, too, looked like some strange gemstone. but sweating only helps if it can cool you down… he tried to not think about it too much. a sharp wave of burning bit into his socket, a perfect circle of pain around the metal.

he tried not to focus too much on that, either.

“it’s just like wayfaring. that’s our north star. trust me, i know where we’re going.”

“whatever you say, maui.” it hurt to laugh but he did anyway.

“oh, i can see what’s happening here… you’re face to face with greatness, and it’s strange—“

“okay, you know what, i brought this upon myself, i can’t be upset—“

   *     *

and so they walked. and walked, and walked.

charlie was unnerved at the quiet. like they were the only things alive. the only sounds he heard were their voices, their steps, and the soft, round echoes that sounded after them among the stones. and it all looked the same, even as he would turn in slow circles as they went, trying to see as much as he could.

granted, there were the mountains. but the rocks were all the same color. they were all the same smooth-shaped like they’d been fished out of the bottom of the river. it rolled out around them until it dissipated in the white light that lit up the narrow horizon line.

and over them—well. the dark mass of… what had seraphim called it? krossrun? no, korssrun. what a strange name for a city, and—

he coughed. nothing but heat down his throat, into his chest.

it was getting harder to breathe. bit by bit.

was… was that static?

seraphim had a hand up immediately, placing it on charlie’s chest to stop him. at first, she hadn’t looked at him, trying to desperately figure out why it suddenly sounded like someone’s old tv was suddenly out somewhere ahead of them, stuck on a channel that didn’t work with the volume turned up to max volume, but then: “charlie? jesus, your arm—!”

he’d been slightly behind her, letting her lead way. at least, that’s he hoped it looked like. he didn’t want her to realize…

the blood had spread. a layer of red seeped from the edge of his sleeve upwards towards his collar, and down his side.

“it’s fine, it’s okay, it’s—“ charlie couldn’t stop her, and how she moved closer to him so swiftly to carefully tug at his shirt reminded him so much of nova that suddenly his eyes were stinging and he had to glance sharply to the skyline.

“this is not! fine!” her voice came out hoarse and halting, going up a pitch in panic. shit. shit this was not good. “this! is! the opposite of fine! charles douglas hesketh!”

“that’s not my—!” but he had to stop abruptly, swallowing a genuine scream when seraphim’s fingers got too close to his skin.

“fuck, sorry, sorry—aw man… charlie…”

seraphim was a bit of a loss for words. they hadn’t stopped moving, not since they landed. she didn’t think either of them could. the idea of staying put, waiting on something or someone else to come for them without doing anything at all? absolutely fucking not. nope. not today.

but because they hadn’t rested…

well.

the tears around his arm socket, okay, they could be because he’d been moving. but these other marks, these blisters, those weren’t from movement.

“it’s burning you.”

“mm?”

“charlie.” he’d never heard someone’s tone change so much in such a short amount of time. but when seraphim looked up to his eyes, he had a hard time looking back at her. it was unnerving, watching the color drain from her face, yet not enough to take away the flush that went across her cheeks. “charlie, your arm socket is—it’s the metal. it’s been heating up the entire time, hasn’t it? that’s its reaction? flesh does, flesh does this, right, and your arm, it’s, it’s not flesh so it…” she uselessly gestured to his arm.

she wasn’t wrong.

he had felt it. been feeling it, been carrying it.

and had a new appreciation for that old story about the frogs who were very slowly boiled alive.

but of course he wasn’t going to say anything. what was there for it? he’d seen no water, or even evidence of water, or clouds, or shade, since they’d landed, and—the static grew louder. they both froze, looking ahead, waiting. there were quiet, agonizing whirs as both of charlie’s hands clenched into fists.

and charlie had thought to himself, i might need to keep it on me. best to go like everything’s all right.

nothing about their view changed. just that background noise—foreground noise, charlie supposed. it wasn’t something that was surrounding them—but it did sound wide.

“stay close to me,” seraphim said softly. there were tremors on the edge of her voice. “i don’t really want to waste time trying to go around whatever’s out there, especially when we might not even be able to.”

“do we have to go this way, morgan?”

seraphim pursed her lips together and nodded. “every time you look at me i can see the lack of trust in your eyes but i promise you this is the right way. i just need you to keep a kind of faith for a little bit longer. okay?”

charlie stared at her.

he tried to make her eyes turn into ellie’s, but the hazel, the browns, the greens—they were too different.

and it was only the idea of seeing them again that kept him upright, that distracted him enough to get his mind off of his arm socket, his thirst, the sweat that kept dripping down over his eyelids.

“show the way, fearless leader.”

seraphim snorted, reflexively. “yeah, leader. right. pretty sure good leaders wouldn’t let their colleagues get into the barrel of fun this has turned out to be.”

charlie did as he was asked, keeping pace right at her shoulder as they carefully picked their way over the smooth stone. always watching. listening. waiting. “it’s not like it was your fault.” their voices fell to hushed tones. “you rushed in to make sure drake was okay. i’m not sure he would’ve had the same reaction to getting snapped up somewhere like this.”

“and annabelle…” seraphim sighed. charlie couldn’t quite tell what emotion it carried. maybe there were too many. “she would’ve been heartbroken. it’s—is it better, then? that it was us?” for a moment, she stopped walking, frowning and gazing at the ground. but then she shook her head, blinking. “let’s maybe save the philosophical conversations for af—“

she didn’t finish.

they rounded a corner between two particularly large boulders, where a dirt path ran between them. it almost could’ve been a hiking trail, charlie decided, as he studied the ground. was it even dirt? who knew? but it was packed like dirt, packed like someone—something?—had walked over it numerous times, over and over and over again.

but he didn’t see any turns. just the impressions of something shaped vaguely like the foot of another human being. made by—

ellie?

charlie felt his voice rise up in his throat, but before he could speak, seraphim grabbed his arm, pulling him backwards roughly.

“m—“

“sh!” her hush was violent. she’d gone a sickly pale and he felt her hand trembling by his elbow.

seraphim very carefully leaned, looking past him. lifting a finger to her lips, she edged forward a few steps. charlie gazed over the top of her head around the stone.

it… it looked like ellie.

the static was louder than ever. it was like the hum he felt when he was underwater, the surface of the sea off the english coast a fractured glass ceiling over him.

she was facing away from him, and… and…

he blinked, shaking his head. it hurt to watch. he couldn’t make sense of it.

it was shaped like her, sure, but she wasn’t—solid. not transparent, not exactly, but more like her edges weren’t quite there. like parts of her were erratically blipping in and out of view.

“what—“ he couldn’t get the rest of the words out. he felt seraphim’s hand on his bicep, her grip trembling but firm. he swallowed. it was like a weight had settled beneath his lungs, and the longer he looked at the back of that stranger’s head, the heavier it got.

he wanted to go up to her. he wanted to run his fingers through her hair. he knew it wasn’t her. but if he could just feel her one more time, or something like her, one last time... because would they even ever get out of here alive?

“… what is it?” he finally asked. his voice barely registered a whisper, and he tried to lean as close to seraphim’s ear as he could so the sound didn’t get lost in the static.

“not human.” her answer came low, and sad. she was staring at her too. “i’ve—i’ve never seen one this close before.” one? seraphim put one palm over her chest, and seemed to convulse, before inhaling. it sounded a bit like a rattle, on the edges. “i’m... surprised there’s one here. but if we’re quiet, and keep going, it—“ she choked back a harsh cough. “it won’t bother us.”

“why does it look like ellie?”

for a second, seraphim didn’t react. then she laughed, ruefully, once, tugging at his elbow to keep going forward. they pressed as close as they could to a line of jagged boulders that acted as an edge to—charlie supposed he couldn’t describe it as a shallow gulch. cliffs rose up around them, but they weren’t very high; there was a cleft in the stone right in front of them just wide enough for them to pass through.

“it looks like ellie to you?”

“yes. … who do you see?”

seraphim didn’t turn, but she also didn’t let go of charlie. she kept her eyes up ahead of her even as she moved to pushed him forward, so she could guard him from behind. just in case.

and that was the only time she looked back.

it kept changing. both shapes were tall. one had a head of thick, black hair. longer than she remembered, but recognizable. the other had no hair at all.

she didn’t answer him until they were safely out on the other side of the path, where the cliff walls sloped down into a sandy valley. the more they walked, the softer that static grew. soon, it would disappear entirely, leaving only the familiar, heavy silence in its wake. “someone i miss. that’s its trick.”

the mountains were still in the distance, but this new clearing was basically featureless. it made charlie nervous. there was nowhere to hide. “and what—what was it, exactly?” the adrenaline had kicked in, now that it was safe. his hands were shaking, and his heart was in his throat. why was it so hard to breathe?

but as soon as it ebbed, the biting, burning pain in his arm socket came back with such a vengeance that he almost didn’t hear seraphim answer.

“something like a demon. but not quite.” her cheeks were rosy but the rest of her face was a blanched shade. she looked almost like a doll, and coughed again. “i’ll, uh… tell you all about it when we get out of here. we’re close now. this all looks—familiar.” her voice quieted at the end as she looked upward, gazing at the city. their unholy constellation that was helping them chart their course. “that’s why it’s there. it’s there for us. like some fucked up sign post. christ help us…”

seraphim shook her head, abruptly turning her back to charlie.

he was glad.

she didn’t want him to see her face crumple, and he didn’t want her to see how much pain he was in.

seraphim got it back together. it took her a second. but she thought about merlin, and imagined him, in his quartermaster tones, encouraging her.

she had to get back to him. she felt a curl in her heart, and here in this literal hellhole, she was willing to grasp it with both hands and a white-knuckle grip.

“okay—okay. what do you think, homie, have a mile or two left in you?” charlie swallowed, nodding. he’d never had cottonmouth this bad in his life, and he was trying to focus on literally anything to get his mind off his arm. he picked seraphim’s soft drawl. it seemed a bit more pronounced when she got emotional, he noticed. he wondered how many shades of her voice that only merlin had gotten the chance to hear.

and then he started thinking about how merlin and seraphim even ended up together at all, which led him right back to ellie, and she was the shape that kept the pain away as he followed seraphim’s steps.

they traveled in silence, for a while. it was a tired quiet, but not one that met them with their guards lowered completely.

seraphim was lost in her own puzzling. those entities appear for a reason. where are we? where the fuck could we have landed that would make something like that thing appear, like it was on purpose, like it was planned by someone, something else?

she didn’t have to even lift her eyes from the ground. she knew where they were going.

but charlie didn’t, and he tripped once, reaching out awkwardly to catch himself and almost landing on seraphim in the process.

his metal plan landed squarely on the stone, which meant his body weight bore down further on the machinery.

the pain was blinding, instantaneous and charlie couldn’t stop the retched, gagged and very loud swear word that came out of his mouth. seraphim jumped, startled. “jesus! charlie? charlie what’s wrong? did you twist something?”

he had to take deep, gulping breaths, but it was just like breathing in steam. there was no relief. “i’m—fine, i just—need a second—“

but seraphim, for all her flaws, wasn’t a complete moron. as charlie awkwardly sat back onto his knees, his hand went to his arm socket. not touching it. but close. her eyes followed to the scarlet-soaked material of his shirt.

oh, this is bad. this is very bad.

“you’ve lost a lot of blood.” she said quietly. she’d been wishing for merlin this entire time, thinking of all the times he’d bandaged her scrapes and bruises and true, maybe charlie would’ve preferred rougarou or cherub as medic, but… “and those burns are going from first to second degree. charlie, we need to take your arm off, we could be looking at permanent nerve damage if we don’t, and the weight’s tearing these wounds open more—“

“no!” he was started at how loud his own voice was. “… no.” he said it again, softer. “we aren’t alone out here. you don’t have virgil, neither of us is armed, except for this.” he winced as he lifted his metallic arm. “i need to keep it on me.”

seraphim leaned back on her heels for a second. two seconds. three. “… okay. sure. you know best. at least let me help you up.” she offered one hand that he gratefully took, pulling him back up to his feet.

but as soon as he was standing, seraphim gripped his arm with both hands, wrenched one direction, and pulled.

it snapped off with a piercing, metallic tang, and seraphim was screaming.

the relief by his shoulder was immediate but it was overshadowed by the sight of his own limb lying useless in the dirt and seraphim, stumbling backward until her back met rock, tears streaming down her face mingling with sweat. she had huge, burning welts over her palms. “shit. shit shit shit shit, fuck, fuck, jesus—“ a cascade of swears and cries for her god.

“why did you do that.” he couldn’t tear his eyes off of the machinery. “why did you do that?!” no matter how that steel had burned him, his anger was much, much hotter.

seraphim was choking out sobs. it sounded like she was suffocating. “ellie isn’t here to take care of you, so i have to.”

he stood, silently, staring at her. seraphim sniffed, wiping at her face with the back of her hand. “ellie isn’t here to love you, and you don’t love you, so i am going to, because i’m here and it is just us, charlie. it’s just us. i know this sucks, i know it’s scary, i know that you don’t know me that well and you’re freaking out that i’m the one that you’re stuck with—“

“morgan—“

she kept going. “but you. have. to trust me. i am not going to bring you home with you needing a fucking skin graft! i am not bringing you home to ellie damaged, i am not bringing you home scarred!”

she looked up then.

and he thought, wow. i wonder if she’s ever looked at merlin like this. how did he survive it? and… wait, what was wrong with her eyes? why were they silver around the edges? had long had they been that way?

“but i am bringing you home. if we have to defend ourselves, then we will burn that bridge when we get there. but right now i’d rather us take the stealth route. we will keep our eyes and ears open. we won’t let anything sneak up on us. and we will find a way to the landing point. okay?”

charlie was quiet, but then softly spoke: “… okay.”

this time, seraphim didn’t hide her face. charlie watched the water stream out of her eyes, which looked—“uh, morgan?”

she took off her outer shirt with trembling hands, swearing under her breath, leaving her in a tank top. sweat got into the welts. it was like someone was rubbing salt on them. fuck, it hurt. but every time she looked at charlie, she could see how much straighter he was able to stand, how he seemed to breathe a little easier. worth it. absolutely worth it.

“yes, charlie?”

his eyes caught sight of a large scar at her shoulder. he blinked, trying not to stare. “uhm, can you… can you look at me? for a second?” she used her shirt to bundle up his arm, cradling to her chest awkwardly, like a baby. palms not touching the fabric.

“what? why?”

“just—just look at me. for a second.” seraphim flinched only slightly when charlie brought his hand up to her face, gently pushing up her eyebrow with his thumb. it was a movement he’d seen merlin do, a few times before. he opened his mouth, closed it, opened it, closed it—would it be worth even telling her?

but she interrupted before he could say anything: “… are they silver, where the whites are? shiny, maybe? like polished iron?” something like dread laced her voice.

“… yes.”

seraphim sighed, pursing her lips together and nodding. “okay. we’re, uh, we’re running out of time. but we’re ah, we’re close, okay? we have to get moving. like, right now.”

“all right, all right. ladies first.”

“leaders first.”

“that too.”

but he was only able to hold his tongue for maybe fifteen minutes. not having his arm attached did feel a lot better. but he still felt trapped inside of… he tried to find words, something comparable. a sauna, he supposed, was the closest he could come up with. a very dry sauna.

but then he started to wonder how long they could survive here, where the air they breathed seemed to be poison, and what he could give to just be able to sit down, to find the point, to go home, to see her—

stop it. … stop it.

“morgan?”

“yes, charlie.” why did she already sound resigned?

“… why are your eyes like that?”

seraphim sighed, but her pace didn’t slow, not at first, not really. the rocks around them seemed to slowly level out, from cliffs, to boulders worn smooth by a river that wasn’t there anymore, then finally to what charlie would’ve described as a clearing. a meadow, maybe. but he’d never seen a meadow made up of only rock, sand and silence before. not like the ones he’d played in when he was smaller—with his brother. with james.

drake, cody, jeremy. each name formed once, echoed, and then disappeared.

it wasn’t just ellie he missed.

and merlin wasn’t the only person on seraphim’s mind, either.

charlie almost ran into her when she stopped walking, one hand going up to touch her back. accidentally, he brushed that same large scar with his fingers. she didn’t seem to notice. instead, she asked quietly, her voice shaking: “are we in a clearing? sort of round, even space, except for what might be a sharp cliff jutting up somewhere overrrr there?” and seraphim pointed to where, yes, there was an abrupt lift in the rocky surface of the wasteland.

“uh—yeah, morgan. we are.”

“and we’ve been walking for what feels like—what? a few hours?”

charlie rolled his shoulders. “feels like more than a few, but, yeah. hours. … why?”

slowly, she turned, staring at the ground. and when she looked at him, she was smiling. sweat glistened on her forehead, sliding along her eyebrows.

“groovy. we found the point.”

but charlie almost didn’t hear her.

pinballs.

they looked like pinballs.

she didn’t have pupils anymore. it was entirely possible she wasn’t looking at him.

“jesus christ.” this was the worst time to be hit by an overwhelming sense of nostalgia for an arcade charlie wasn’t even sure was still around the south end.

“you sound upset, chuck.” she laughed but it wasn’t cheerful.

“morgan, uhm—your eyes—“ seraphim pursed her lips together, and it looked like oil was starting to roll down her cheeks.

oh, he thought. she’s crying.

“yeah, uh, i can’t see anymore, but hey, again, it’s okay, because we found the point. i know we did. if we’re—if we’re in a place—“ she sniffed. “that looks like what i described, we’re here. this is—this is it—“

seraphim swallowed. it was just all darkness. just like it’d gone all the other times she’d lost her sight. but this—something about this was different. her entire face ached, sure, that was familiar. but it was like a pulse both hot and freezing in equal portions was moving back further and further into her skull. like someone pressing fingers into her eye sockets.

she wasn’t sure how long she’d be able to ignore it. especially if ran its course.

“so…” charlie began, slowly. “now we wait.”

seraphim nodded. she didn’t bother to wipe at her face, leaving the black tracks where they were. “yeah. now we wait. we uh. we can rest now. things are going to be all right, you’ll see. we just ah, we just wait right here…”

wordlessly, charlie took her elbow. he eased her down next to him, and they sat together in the quiet, backs warmed against the stone.

“morgan?”

“chuck?”

she heard him chuckle, but just once. “what will happen to you? if they don’t find us?”

seraphim sighed. “i’ll lose my eyes. it’s ah, ocular degeneration. they’re uhm. disintegrating, but at least they’ll look shiny before they go. and you’ll get heatstroke.” she said it in the same tone she would’ve described a sports play.

“and we’ll both die.”

“… yeah. we’ll both die.”

   *     *

it was christmas eve.

nova had never felt less festive in her life—although every time she looked at merlin, she imagined he felt the same.

and she had never felt more defeated.

she didn’t know how many times that day they’d gone over the formula. she didn’t know how many times she’d excused herself to cry. she knew that dinner was happening—had happened?—upstairs, and that three plates had been carefully prepared, left on a desk, and went untouched.

she was sure they all looked a bit thinner at this point.

wyvern and merlin were speaking softly behind her, but nova was standing just where she’d stood for countless hours. staring at the numbers at the whiteboard. willing them to speak. and they still hadn’t.

so she leaned back on her heel, rubbing at her face. just for a second—she let her mind wander to charlie. she pressed her fingers over her eyes.

she thought of him smiling. out in the snow. she thought of watching him from far away, of him looking back at her.

she pictured love in his eyes, lips curled into a crooked smile. snowflakes on his eyelashes. not saying anything at all. just there. with her.

just there with her...

“… jeremy?” she had to cough, her voice initially coming out as a kind of croak. “jeremy. hey. i think i have an idea.” wyvern grabbed his coffee, gone lukewarm. he took a big swig anyway, not that it helped much these days. “these variables right here… these are the factors that sort of shape how it’s looking for a signal, right? this is the ‘how’ in how we’re looking?”

wyvern hummed, nodding. “you got it.”

“okay, so what—what if they weren’t saying anything?”

merlin frowned. “i don’ follow.”

nova’s heart seemed to lift an inch or two. oh my god—oh my god. her hands shook as she grabbed for the eraser, swiping off chunks of the board. wyvern started, “ellie, dude what are—!”

“what if we’re looking for a signal that’s not there?” she asked. but it wasn’t with despair, it wasn’t something dark. merlin’s expression fell anyway, and he rubbed his thumb over his bottom lip, looking to the ground.

she shook her head, trying to get her thoughts into some kind of order. “i mean—we know morgan had her glasses on. that was in the footage. and she probably still has them, hamish, she’s still alive, i know she is, they both are, but what if… what if we changed this so that it wasn’t looking for a signal? what if we found a way to only look for power, anything with a switch in the on position?”

wyvern clasped his fingers behind his neck, gazing up at the ceiling. “like we were just looking for any familiar electrical components that were running… not any that were trying to communicate with us, specifically.” he inhaled deeply, putting his hands over his mouth—and softly made a sort of gentle, screaming sound. “… we’re dumb. we’re so fucking dumb.”

“shut up, no we’re not. i don’t even know if this’ll work—“

but merlin already had a marker in his hand, writing up new equations that they hadn’t used before. it felt better on her eyes already.

“it’ll work.” he said, and quieter, added: “… because i don’t know what else to do if it doesn’t.”

“all we have to do is configure the eye.” wyvern muttered, right at merlin’s shoulder in two long strides, “if we do that, we recast our proverbial net over the same spaces we’ve been looking, and we’ve got to find them. we gotta.”

nova felt a surge of hope surge up so strong she staggered back, hitting the edge of a desk with her tailbone. wyvern looked back over his shoulder at her. she was smiling.

it took her a second to remember what it felt like. to recognize it. hope.

“we will. … we will.”

   *     *

“… i’m sorry.” seraphim tightened one arm around charlie’s swaddled robotic piece, pressing the bundle more into her chest. she focused on the dull pressure points that ran diagonally over her heartbeat. anything to distract her from the painful blindness.

“why.”

she almost broke at how tired he sounded, how hoarse. like the sand had finally gotten into his vocal cords, rubbed them raw. how long had they been sitting here? how long had they been gone?

she could see the time in the corner of her spectacle frames. she could see the single bar of battery that was left. still no signal, naturally. there wouldn’t be any to be found here.

at least they’ll have the video. they’ll have the audio—this. they’ll know. even if my glasses are all that’s left. they’ll know.

seraphim refused to consider that their bodies would rot here. die here, maybe. but stay? absolutely not. it was getting more and more difficult to keep her thoughts in words. they were starting to devolve into just screaming.

“i thought—i thought that it would be easier for them to find us here.” she swallowed. “i thought—“

“there was never a guarantee.” charlie interrupted, sadly. “it’s okay. it’s okay…”

one of seraphim’s hands had been lying, palm-up, on the ground between them. charlie slid his underneath it.

seraphim opened her mouth to say something, but: “let’s just sit for a while. okay? we’re—we’re both tired. it’ll be all right if we just sit, right?”

so she nodded, letting her head fall against his shoulder. she closed her eyes, not that it changed her view.

and she didn’t know if she fell asleep, or if she passed out. she didn’t know how much time passed before she was hearing charlie speak to her, “… you seein’ this?”

she didn’t open her eyes. what’d be the point? “seein’ what, charlie.”

“it—it looks like a wisp.”

god, she was so tired. she missed merlin. she kept trying to will the scent of his cologne into her nose, but all that she could smell was haze.

maybe, if she fell back asleep, she would dream…

“a wisp?”

charlie didn’t move. he just watched this point of light, moving on its on like a specter. it had blinked into existence maybe a few feet over where they were sitting, a sudden star. and he’d watched it, curious but detached.

what was going to happen was going to happen. he didn’t have the energy to do anything about it now.

the light had floated down towards them until it was finally on level with his eyes. there it stayed, motionless. like it was looking at him.

“yeah,” he said. “a wisp of the woods.”

seraphim didn’t say anything or lift her head. even if she had, she wouldn’t have seen charlie tilt his head to one side, and reach out.

she wouldn’t have seen the flash of light that enveloped them.

   *     *

nova stood over drake’s shoulder the entire time, watching every single keystroke, watching the grids go out over and over and over again. wyvern was on the other side. merlin was pacing. nova hadn’t quite seen him nervous before. it was unsettling.

“this is the last sort of quadrant that the gate was locked on to before they split,” drake explained, “so if mo’s glasses still have any life in them, they’d be—“ a soft ding. a small green dot, pulsing like a heartbeat, and with every pulse came a chime. “—here.” it came out almost a whisper. “they’re—they’re right here, guys.”

nova’s eyes stung. thank you, thank you, thank you… “okay, so, we’ve got a lock on them, how do we get them here?” but wyvern was already at the gate console, and a familiar hum filled the room. nova had never been so happy to see the faint blue rings, to see the tendrils spark into being their proper shade of white. but they weren’t reaching out, no. it was like they were flowing into a space back behind the gate, somewhere they couldn’t see.

“we employ the fuckin’ traceback is what we do. drake, how strong’s the grip?”

drake frowned. “strong enough for a pull. we’re doing this right now?”

“they’re outside of our flow of time, we have no idea what their status is, where they landed, if they’re hurt, or how much time has passed, we’re doing this now. merlin, do me a solid and use that comm right there to get aly and caroline down here? just… just in case. now, everybody just stand tight for a second.” for a few minutes, nothing happened, save for a tense silence broken only by wyvern’s furious typing. the gate gave its own background white noise.

and rougarou and cherub did make it down to the basement, equipment bags in tow, right around the same time that there a sudden snap; charlie and seraphim materialized about four feet off the floor and unceremoniously dropped. the thuds would’ve echoed if it wasn’t for the rug.

merlin had to fling his arms around nova to keep her from charging forward. “charlie? charlie!”

“easy, easy, we need to let them get checked out first—!“

charlie’s eyes were closed, his countenance peaceful, as if he was just sleeping. cherub had her hands on this throat, his chest—“he’s breathing. he’s breathing, but—“

“they’re burning up.” rougarou had been left to contend with seraphim, who hadn’t quite fallen asleep inside of the wave the brought them home.

their temperatures clocked in at 102.5, according to the small reader in cherub’s hands. their breaths rattled, rasped.

and merlin watched, horrified, at seraphim’s ravaged, blinded frame. he couldn’t immediately think of a way to articulate how he felt about her eyes.

seraphim felt the cool air of the basement first. and yes, she could hear them, hear everyone. after a moment, recognized them. but it wasn’t rougaoru’s voice that made seraphim realize in whose arms she was lying in, it was her perfume.

that brought her back. the smell of recovery, the smell of home, the smell of returning after centralia and other hells.

“… aly?” seraphim choked, hand fisting the material of rougarou’s shirt, trying to cling to anything familiar. but she didn’t let go of charlie’s arm. she had a white-knuckled grip on that bundle. there were hands on her face again, her eyebrows.

“morgan… morgan, what did you do to your eyes?”

“i’ll tell you tomorrow.”

“if you can crack jokes, you aren’t dying.”

nova surged against merlin’s grip, even as she could see that charlie wasn’t awake. and she wondered how he stood so still, seeing seraphim finally succumb to unconsciousness.

but to seraphim, all she knew was that she could feel the floor. she could feel and smell rougaoru. she was breathing clean air. there wasn’t an entity with static following them anymore. no desert. no skybound city. no white light beyond what she’d left behind.

she was safe. she was home.

and so.

she let herself black out.

*     *     *

charlie woke up slowly.

he hadn’t realized how much pain he had been in until the pain was gone, replaced by a strange warmth that made his head swim. he blinked a few times until the ceiling lights came into focus.

i’m in medical. they found us. we’re home.

he inhaled deeply, exhaled.

home. home. home.

there was beeping somewhere in the background as he tilted his head and saw nova, asleep in a chair next to his bed (along with an iv line that ended in his arm—that explained the lightness). she was so close. he watched her chest rise and fall, tried to memorize how her hair fell over her countenance. his heart sank at the darkness underneath her eyes. her face looked thinner.

there were questions that roamed around on the edges of his mind. he didn’t know where seraphim was, or his arm. and he was vaguely sure that there hadn’t been christmas lights up when they’d left. how long had they been gone?

but charlie left them where they were. for now, there was just one thing he wanted to do with what little energy he had.

gently, charlie reached out and took nova’s hand, moving it so that it rested between his head and his pillow. he pressed a slight kiss into her palm, a promise. he looked up at her one more time, though his vision stung and blurred. he closed his eyes and swallowed the lump in his throat.

on the other end of the medical bay, merlin sat in a chair against the far wall, carefully regarding seraphim. she had bandages wrapped around her head, covering her eyes; there were dark stains that reminded him a bit of smudged ink. he made no move to be closer, just watched her, holding his chin in one hand.

and charlie’s last thought before he fell back asleep rather mirrored the quartermaster’s.

she’s worth all of this.

… is she worth all of this?

somewhere upstairs, merlin could hear raucous singing, muted by the walls.