[Aftermath Interlude]

Chapter 15 / 01

The Bowl of Glass

Geoff lay on his back as he came to. The ground was hot, and so was the air. It was stifling in his lungs. He could feel the sun on his chest. He moved his fingers against the ground, smooth like glass.

It was hot, but not dry. He rubbed his fingers together, realising they were wet. No wonder it was so hard to breathe. He opened one eye and flinched it shut at the bright afternoon sun.

“Shit,” he said.

He heard boots tapping on glass nearby and decided to try and sit up. He was stiff, but he made it into a sitting position. A hand squeezed his shoulder and the pain reminded him he’d injured it. The hand was too small to be Rick’s, but it was strong.

“We survived.” Lamet sighed. “But at great cost.”

Geoff raised his head. He was surprised they were alive. It was hard for him to believe. But they were, and that made him afraid to see what the cost had been. His eyes opened. He was sitting on the gentle slope of a basin of glass that sat where Central Hometoll had been. There were no more sharp protrusions or deep cracks. Just a spiralling glass bowl pooled with water and jagged ruins of the Leviathan Train’s twisted hull. A thin mist hung over all of it, not really obscuring anything, but reminding him of what happened.

“Thank you, Lamet.” he breathed. “But did we win?”

Lamet extended her hand. He took it and she pulled him to his feet.

People were scattered all around, and few moved. He started scanning for Rick by looking for his afro, or Sparlyset’s bright hair.

“Only the Lightweaver can sense Warbinger’s presence, so we must find Sparlyet to answer that question.”

“The laughter is gone.” Geoff said, squinting. There were so many people, and Sparlyset wasn’t the only one with pink on her.

“It is a good sign,” Lamet agreed. Her eyes only opened half way, as though it was a struggle to keep them open at all.

As he looked over the haphazard scattering of people, he noticed a body that could be Rick’s. He turned to Lamet before leaving. She staggered as though she was barely even aware she was standing. “I need to find Rick,” he said. She turned her palm out, but her arm didn’t raise.

He intended to run, but his legs protested so he made more of a shamble towards him. He almost felt guilty, passing so many people. He could hear their groans, cries for friends and loved ones, Rick wouldn’t want to be found first, but… he had to.

Peter stumbled into his path, looking like he just crawled out of a sewer with his damp hair matted to his head.

Geoff caught the man by the arm as he lost balance. “How are you holding up?”

His dull gaze looked across the glass basin. “By your arm, I think.”

Geoff tried to laugh, but it came out as a cough.

“Lamet used water and ice to cushion the crash, I think,” he explained. “Hopefully everyone made it. If your bones can handle it, can you organise anyone who can walk to check on those who can’t?”

Peter nodded, pulling his arm from Geoff’s grasp and taking him tightly by the shoulder. Geoff winced. “You know, when we reached Caboose Park, a lot of people were not happy about those aliens. But they’ve done right by us.” Peter coughed and spit up some water. “You should take this.” he wiped his chin with his sleeve, and handed him a handheld radio with his other hand. “This switch…” he flicked it. “Just a radio now. If you know the frequency you want, the dial does what you expect. I’ll go… do what I can.”

With the switch on, the dial didn’t snap to the marked channels. Different patterns of static came through as he fiddled with it. He kept turning it as he walked, trying to narrow in on the channel the Pillars were on.

When Geoff reached the man he’d been looking at he could tell immediately it wasn’t Rick. It was a lighter skinned man, older and without Rick’s tight afro. From a distance, he had confused the dirty blue staff uniform for Rick’s HDF one. There was a lot of navy-blue around.

Geoff turned the man over. He wasn’t breathing. There was no pulse either. He double checked to be sure. It made his stomach churn. There was officially a body count, and if he included the men from Storage, the count was now ten that he knew of.

He straightened his back, his grip tightening around the radio, and looked around again. “Rick!” he shouted.

The radio buzzed. “What?” came a voice through the static.

Geoff released his grip on the button with a start. Then he held it close to his face and adjusted the dial until the static cleared. “This is Geoff Friction, what channel is this?”

“Hi,” she said. It was the shy voice of a woman, her sharp speech as gentle and clear as a small wine glass. It was one he hadn’t heard much of, but he recognized it.

“Longhorn, glad you’re all right. I don’t know if you can see this from whatever new perch you’ve found, but I think we won this thing, and there are a lot of hurt people down here.”

“The hospital,” she said quietly. “They closed the curtains.”

“Sorry to hear that, Longhorn, I know how you like the view. Is there anyone who can send help?” He kept squinting for Rick, but the wet glass was so bright.

The warped shell of Caboose Park slumped at the crest of the basin and he decided to look there. If nothing else, the slight height improvement could help him see.

Longhorn finally answered when Geoff was half way up the slope. “I sent Toy,” she said, sounding even more shy than usual. He could almost see her blushing through the radio.

“Thanks, Longhorn, rest up.”

Once he reached the top, he looked down over the scene below. It looked like most people were getting up, stumbling against the gentle slope and slick glass of the basin. He was grateful for that. Peter had a small group together, joined by Lamet and the puren guardsmen.

Things will be okay, he thought. Not great, but okay.

Yes, Lamet thought in his head, startling him.

Sorry, I forgot we had this thing.

Yes, for a few more hours.

Since he still couldn’t see Rick or Sparlyset, he dragged his tired feet across the top of the basin towards Caboose Park. It was smashed to bits, but two of the walls had a section that still clung together. When he reached the mountain of broken steel, mud, and stone, he peered into every corner he could find. He didn’t see Rick, or anyone.

Everyone must have been thrown into the basin when the car cracked open. But then where was Rick?

He stepped past the mud and scrap at the basin-facing part of the crumpled train car to the other side. There he saw a door, the ones that blocked the tunnels, laying almost flat over a fan of pastel pink hair. His heart skipped a beat. If Sparlyset was dead, then even if Rick survived he might never be the same.

He took the edge of the door in both hands and heaved with his legs to lift it up. Sparlyset and Rick were both underneath, but he couldn’t flip the door. Holding it up, he stepped carefully around them, dragging it to the side until the slope helped him slide it away. Once it was clear he let it drop bang and jogged back over to them.

They were both muddy, but there were no obvious injuries on their bodies that he could see. Rick would know better. The rising and falling of Rick’s chest filled Geoff with so much relief he could kiss the man. He fought his instinct to grab his friend and carry him to the hospital, and instead checked Sparlyset first. She wasn’t breathing—that he could tell—and neither could he find her pulse. But she wasn’t human. He had no idea what to do.

“Rick!” he shouted, as he poked her sides. The rib cage was familiar enough. Then he checked the middle of her chest to find her sternum. The anatomy was close enough, so there was no other choice. He placed his hands on her and began to press hard. Hard enough it could break something, he thought. There was no way to know if it was different for purens.

He remembered Lamet probably heard him think that, but… Lamet! How do I save Sparlyset?

“Rick, wake up damnit!” he called out loud.

He leaned close to her face and pinched her nose. He took a deep breath, then Sparlyset coughed up water. Once again he felt drowned by the relief that filled him. He turned her over on her side and she vomited over the glass.

“Rick, Sparlyset needs you! Wake up!” his friend’s hand moved.

Lamet came up the slope behind him, walking with a bit more vigour than she had had before. She knelt beside their heads.

“I have no healing left for them,” she said calmly. “There were many injured.” She touched Sparlyset under the chin with two fingers, then placed a hand on her forehead. “It seems they both will live, thank goodness.”

Geoff nodded. Feeling obliged to the purens he turned his palm upwards. “They don’t deserve this,” he said.

“Neither do the dead deserve their fates. At least they are still with us.” She looked up, and he followed her gaze to the bright sky where Oval was still visible, hanging there untouched by their sun like an illusion. “We may have won for now, but Warbinger will one day return.”