Chapter 6: Eve (1)

  When I wake up, the world smells like antiseptic and cheap hand soap that's been scrubbed into the walls but never quite came out.

  The air tastes like pennies and sanitizer, like the building is trying to bleach the memory out of me.

  I blink at the ceiling and immediately hate it because it's the kind of ceiling that belongs to a clinic. I should know, I've been in enough of them. Fluorescent lights hum overhead, that particular frequency that makes you feel like you're trapped inside a refrigerator.

  I try to sit up and immediately regret it. The room spins, my stomach lurches, and pain shoots through my shoulder like someone's driving nails into the joint. The bed beneath me is military-issue, with rails on both sides like they're worried I'll roll out and escape. A heart monitor beeps steadily to my left, its screen casting a sickly green glow across the metal nightstand. There's a single window, but it's been covered with a shade that doesn't quite close all the way, letting in thin strips of daylight that only make the room feel more claustrophobic.

  Then it all came back to me.

  Fey's hand in mine.

  The sound of fabric tearing, her screaming, and her jacket ripping. My hands closing on nothing but air and desperation. Then fire, a wall of it, orange and hungry, swallowing the world. I can still feel the heat of it, the way it burned as it hit my shoulder, throwing me backward. The light going white, then brighter, then nothing at all.

  "Hey," a voice says. "Don't do that."

  I turn my head, slowly, and see a nurse standing beside the bed, holding a clipboard like it's a weapon. She has that exhausted, tight expression of someone who has seen too much human stupidity in one shift and is running on coffee and spite.

  "Where's. . ." I start, and my throat catches on the word, dry and raw like I've been screaming. "Where's Fey?"

  "I don't know who that is," she says flatly, not even looking up from her clipboard. Her pen scratches across the page with mechanical efficiency. "Name?"

  "Eve Hart, but I need to know. . ."

  "Hart. Got it." She makes a checkmark. "Any allergies?"

  My hands curl into fists under the sheet, nails digging into my palms. "I need to find someone. Her name is Fey. She was with me when. . ."

  "We've got thirty-seven injured, four critical, and a dozen more waiting for a room. I don't have time to search for your friends. Consider yourself lucky you're in here and not in the lobby like everyone else." The nurse's voice is clipped, professional in the way that means I don't have time for your feelings.

  "She's not just a friend, she was taken. . ."

  "Then she's not here." The nurse flips a page on her clipboard, still not meeting my eyes. "Which means she's not my problem. Now, are you experiencing any nausea? Dizziness?"

  "Are you serious right now? I'm trying to find. . ."

  "And I'm trying to do my job." She finally looks at me, and her expression is stone. Army nurse, I realize. Not hospital staff. The uniform should have told me that, olive drab scrubs instead of the usual blues, name tag across her chest that reads SGT MORRISON.

  "You want to file a missing person report, talk to the police outside. I'm here to make sure you're not dying," she says.

  "She went through the portal," I say, and my voice breaks on the word, desperation making it crack.

  The word tastes ridiculous, like I stole it from a fantasy novel and taped it to my real life. But I saw it. A clean edge in the chaos, a shape the world shouldn’t be able to make. "The. . . The thing that opened. She got pulled through and I need to know if anyone saw where. . ."

  Her eyes snap to mine, and suddenly she's looking at me like I just said the magic word that turned me from an annoying patient into something worth her attention. Her jaw tightens. Her shoulders shift, posture changing from dismissive to alert.

  "Portal," she repeats, and her voice has lost that bored edge.

  "Yes." My throat feels raw. "She was right there, I was holding her, and then she just. . . she slipped. The jacket tore and she. . ."

  "Stay here," Morrison said, already moving toward the door. "Don't go anywhere."

  "Wait!" I try to sit up and pain lances through my shoulder. "Is she here? Did. . ."

  But Morrison's already gone, the door swinging shut behind her with a pneumatic hiss that sounds too final.

  I'm left alone in the sterile room, staring at the ceiling tiles like they might rearrange themselves into answers. My vision blurs and I refuse to let it be tears, I will not cry in a clinic bed like some inspirational tragedy poster they'll use for a mental health awareness campaign.

  But the image of Fey's hand slipping from mine keeps replaying behind my eyes anyway. The sound of fabric tearing. The way she screamed my name, like she was trying to hold onto the sound of me as she was pulled into that portal.

  Then the door opens.

  No knock. No warning. I guess consent is optional when you're lying in a clinic.

  It's a Hero.

  He's tall, broad-shouldered, and moves like someone who's never been afraid in a public building. Which would be more impressive if he didn't immediately walk directly into a rolling chair and pretend it didn't happen.

  The chair squeaks. He freezes mid-step. Then keeps walking like the squeak was a supportive sound effect. His cheerfulness has the same energy as a customer service rep reading off a script while your house is actively on fire.

  His hair is dark and too neat, styled with the kind of precision that suggests he spends more time on it than I spend on my entire appearance. He's wearing a jet black supersuit, skin tight, complete with a big red M plastered across his chest like a mascot got drafted into federal service. His cape has a subtle mud-splatter pattern that looks "artistic" until you realize it's probably literal.

  I recognize him instantly. Mudman.

  He's holding a clipboard. It has a smiling cartoon puddle sticker on it. I don't know what I was expecting from a government-sanctioned superhero, but it wasn't "third-grade teacher's reward chart."

  "Hi!" he says, way too bright for the moment. Then he points at his chest with both hands like I might have missed the giant letter. "Mudman."

  "I know," I say, because I am not emotionally available for a meet-and-greet.

  He looks relieved, shoulders dropping an inch. "Awesome. Great. I love brand recognition." He steps closer, smiling like we're about to bond over his merchandise sales.

  Oh great. It's Murderman, I think. At least, that's what the internet calls him. He has the highest casualty count of any hero in the downtown Chicago area. Ten people suffocated under his mud during a monster attack two years ago. Then it happened again. And again. And eventually people started wondering whether it was truly an accident each time.

  His pupils are shaped like sharp-edged petals, deep brown and wrong in a way that makes my skin prickle. It's the kind of detail you can't unsee once you've seen it, like the universe made eyes and then decided to add a decorative flourish for fun.

  "Eve Hart?" he asks, flipping his clipboard open.

  He almost drops it. He catches it against his chest and smiles like he meant to do that.

  "That's me," I say. "Can I interest you in the location of my missing best friend?"

  He glances down at the clipboard like it might have the answer written there. "Right. Your friend." A pause. He shifts his weight. "You told the nurse her name was Fey?"

  "Yes."

  "We don't have a Fey admitted." He says it gently, like he's breaking bad news about a canceled pizza order.

  My fingers curl into the sheets. "She got pulled into the portal."

  His head tilts, just slightly, "okay. . ." he says slowly. "So. . . I read your intake notes." He taps the clipboard with one finger. "You hit your head."

  "I know I hit my head."

  "And you're concussed," he continues, nodding like he's explaining basic math. "Concussions can cause confusion. Memory distortion. Visual phenomena." He pauses, glances at the page again like the word is hiding there. "Sometimes even… hallucinations." The word lands between us like a stamp. DELUSIONAL. File complete.

  My pulse spikes hard enough that the heart monitor beeps faster. "I'm not lying."

  "I'm not saying you're lying." He holds up one hand, palm out, like he's calming a spooked animal. "I'm saying your brain just got thrown into a blender and it's doing its best." He gives me a thumbs-up like I’m a toddler who almost didn’t die, and I hate him with my whole soul. I have to physically stop myself from biting the thumbs-up off of his hand. "Brains are very brave. And very. . . squishy."

  I stare at him. At the thumbs-up. At the cartoon puddle sticker on his clipboard.

  "There was a portal," I say, and my voice is shaking now, frustration bleeding through every syllable. "I saw it. Soldiers saw it."

  "No one else reported a portal," he says.

  "So you're saying. . ."

  "I'm saying," Mudman interrupts, smiling like he's trying to keep me calm, "you were in a room full of smoke, strobing light, active villain effects, and fear. That's like. . . the perfect recipe for your brain to draw a door where there isn't one."

  I stare at him. "My brain drew a door and then threw Fey through it?"

  Mudman spreads his hands helplessly. "Missing persons get escalated. There's a whole process." He brightens suddenly, like he remembers he's supposed to be inspirational. "Hope is very important!"

  "Stop," I say, because my throat is tight and I'm about to throw up from rage or nausea, maybe both. "Walk me through what you think happened, then. If my best friend didn't go through a portal, where did she go?"

  Mudman's smile tightens. "The villain attack created chaos. Stampede conditions. Debris. Disorientation. It's possible she was just separated from you."

  “That's not what happened.” I say, groaning as the strained effort of speaking caused ripples of soreness through my head.

  He watches me for a moment, and something in his expression shifts. Not unkind, exactly. Just... tired. Like he's had this conversation before and knows how it ends.

  "Look," he says, and his voice drops the inspirational hero tone, becoming something closer to human. "I can promise you, there's no portal. No magic doorway. No dimensional rift." He lets out a small laugh. "Trust me, if portals existed, I'd use one to skip my commute. Traffic is the only monster I can't defeat." He says, adding his inspirational hero tone towards the end.

  The joke lands flat. He knows it does. But he's already moving past it, like momentum is the only thing keeping this conversation from collapsing entirely.

  "I'm not crazy," I say, but my voice comes out smaller than I want it to. Defensive. "I know what I saw."

  "I'm not saying you're crazy." He pauses, choosing his words with visible care. "But listen, there's no portal. There's no such thing as magic. What there is, is a missing person case that will be investigated properly. We will find your friend." Another pause. "Eventually."

  "So you're just going to. . ."

  "I'm going to finish this intake," he interrupts gently, "and make sure all your information is in the system. That's what I can do right now." He shifts his weight, and the movement makes him look less like a hero and more like someone who's been standing too long. "Why don't we just. . . get through this? Then you can rest. Doctor's orders and all that."

  It's not a question. It's a polite command wrapped in concern, the kind that makes resistance feel petty.

  I turn my head toward the window. The view is nothing. . .just another section of the building, gray concrete and narrow windows that probably don't open. My reflection stares back at me, pale and washed out, a ghost in a hospital gown.

  "Fine," I say to the glass. My voice sounds hollow. Defeated. I hate it. "Get on with it."

  I hear him shift, hear the rustle of paper as he flips to a new page. When he speaks again, his voice has that forced brightness back, like he's trying to rewind to the beginning of this conversation and pretend the middle part never happened.

  "Okay! So!" The enthusiasm is almost aggressive. "Any allergies?"

  My head throbs in time with my pulse. My shoulder aches. Somewhere in the back of my mind, Fey is still screaming my name. "No," I say. "No allergies."

  Mudman scribbles something down, nodding to himself like he's accomplished something meaningful. "Great. Also, I'm going to recommend you rest. Concussions are very… bad." He nods solemnly, like he's delivering ancient wisdom. "They make you see things. I should know. . . I've had a lot of them."

  "Clearly," I say.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  He doesn't catch what I said. Or maybe he does and he's just really good at pretending he doesn't. Either way, he closes his clipboard with a decisive snap, then immediately fumbles it against his own hip. He catches it on the second try and clears his throat like the fumble was part of some elaborate performance art.

  "If you remember anything else let us know," he says, and the qualifier lands like a slap. "And… try not to stress yourself into more hallucinations. Stress is very bad for brains."

  He smiles like he's being kind. Like he's handing me a blanket instead of calling me delusional to my face.

  Then he gives me a little two-finger salute and backs out the door, like he's leaving a stage, before turning and walking away, cape swishing dramatically in the hallway.

  The door swings shut.

  And I'm alone again.

  My best friend just got sucked through a wormhole and the official stance is your brain made up Narnia. Great. I love it here.

  The heart monitor beeps its steady rhythm. The fluorescent lights hum their refrigerator song. Somewhere down the hall, a phone rings twice and stops.

  I stare at the ceiling tiles and count to ten.

  Then I sit up. "If no one is going to look for her. . . I'll do it myself," I say.

  I swing my legs over the side of the bed, and the cold linoleum against my bare feet is a shock that sends a shiver up my spine. The IV tugs at my arm, the tape pulling at my skin. I look at it for a second, the clear tube snaking up to the bag of saline, the needle buried in my vein.

  Then I rip it out.

  The sting is sharp and immediate, a bead of blood welling up at the insertion site. The alarm screams like I’ve committed a crime, which. . . fine. Arrest me for caring.

  I grab a tissue from the bedside table and press it against my arm, then slide off the bed.

  I make it to the door and pull it open.

  The hallway is bright. Too bright. The fluorescent lights stab into my skull like ice picks, and I have to squint against them. But I can see doors. Rooms. Other patients, maybe. Other people who were there.

  Other people who might have seen Fey.

  "Excuse me!" A voice besides me, sharp and authoritative. "Ma'am, you need to get back into bed!"

  I ignore it. I start walking, wincing as pain shoots through my legs.

  "Ma'am!" The voice is closer now, and I hear footsteps. "You're injured, you need to. . ."

  I turn and see a nurse striding toward me, her face set in that expression that means she's about to physically drag me back to bed if necessary. She's young, maybe mid-twenties, with her hair pulled back so tight it looks painful.

  "I'm looking for someone," I say. "My friend Fey. She was there, she. . ."

  "You need to get back to your room right now," the nurse says, reaching for my arm.

  "I don't care," I say. "I need to find. . ."

  "You need to get back in bed before you hurt yourself even worse," she interrupts, her grip tightening on my elbow. "Come on. Let's go."

  I try to pull away, but the movement makes my shoulder scream and my vision blur. I stumble, catching myself against the wall.

  "I'm not going back," I say, but my voice is weaker now, the adrenaline starting to fade and leave me with just the pain. "My friend is missing. No one will help me. I have to. . ."

  "What's going on here?"

  I look up.

  Two figures are walking toward us down the hallway, and they're not medical staff. They're heroes. Full costume, masks, the works. One of them is bright, a gradient suit that goes from purple to yellow, golden plating, a sun emblem on her chest. The other is dark, almost black, with silver lines and a crescent moon. They are followed by a soldier in full combat gear. His visor gives me my own reflection back, small, pale, and already half labeled as a problem.

  The bright one speaks first, "Is there a problem, nurse?"

  The nurse's grip on my arm loosens slightly. "This patient pulled out her IV and left her room. I'm trying to get her back to bed."

  The dark one's mask tilts toward me, her eyes unreadable behind the sleek faceplate. "We can help with that." She looks at the nurse. "We'll escort her back to her room and make sure she stays there."

  "I don't need an escort," I say, but my legs are shaking now and I'm pretty sure I'm about to fall over. "I need to find. . ."

  "Let's get you back to your room first," the bright one says, "then we can talk about what you need."

  She steps forward and takes my arm, firmly enough that I know I'm not getting away. The dark one moves to my other side, and together they start guiding me back down the hallway.

  We reach my room. The door is still open, the heart monitor still screaming its alarm. The bright one guides me inside while the dark one tries to close the door but is stopped by the soldier who was following us. He doesn't enter the room. He instead stands in the hallway, watching myself and the two heroes.

  The bright one steps forward. "I'm Lumina," she says. She gestures to her partner. "This is Nocturne. We're here to help."

  Nocturne nods once, her sleek faceplate catching the fluorescent light. "Let's get you back in bed," she says.

  I let them help me onto the mattress because I don't have a choice. My legs are shaking too badly to hold me up anymore, and the room is doing that tilting thing again where the walls tilt left and my stomach tilts right and nothing quite lines up. Pain shoots through my shoulder as they ease me down, white-hot and vicious, and I have to bite down on a sound that wants to be a whimper.

  Lumina stands beside the bed, and I can feel her eyes on me even through the mask. "You should probably change," she says, seemingly out of nowhere,

  Lumina's gaze flicks past me. Toward the hallway. Toward the soldier standing in the doorway, watching us with a blank, helmeted stare.

  She looks at him for a long moment.

  He gives a small nod.

  Lumina moves to the door and closes it. The latch clicks, and the room goes private in the way an interrogation room is private.

  And everything changes.

  Lumina's entire posture shifts, her shoulders dropping, her head tilting in a way that's suddenly familiar.

  "Oh my god, Eve," she says, and there's a laugh in her voice now, bright and slightly hysterical. "We were literally on our way to see you when we saw you running down the hallway in a hospital gown with your entire ass hanging out."

  I blink at her.

  Nocturne makes a sound that might be a snort behind her mask. "The nurses were freaking out. We thought someone was trying to escape."

  "I mean, you kind of were," Lumina adds, and she's bouncing slightly on her heels now, "But like, in the saddest way possible."

  I stare between them, my concussed brain trying to process the sudden shift. The way Lumina moves, that specific bounce. The way Nocturne's voice has gone from smooth and professional to dry and amused.

  "Do I..." I start, then stop. "Do I know you?"

  Lumina gasps, actually gasps, like I just insulted her entire existence. "Seriously? You can't recognize me?" She gestures at herself, at the ridiculous gradient suit. "Okay, I know the hair is different, they dyed it, can you believe that? And this outfit is so not something I'd wear in a million years, but come on!"

  And there it is. That exact blend of theatrical offense and affection that could only belong to one person.

  "Cindy?" I say.

  "Not on duty. Technically."

  The dark one, Nocturne, steps forward, and when she speaks, her voice has that careful precision that screams Abigail even through the mask. "Hero names while we're working. It's… it's a thing. Apparently."

  My brain finally catches up. "Abigail?"

  A pause. Then Nocturne nods, and I can hear the smile in her voice even if I can't see it. "Nocturne. Which, okay, I know it sounds like a perfume brand, but I had no choice.”

  Lumina. . . Cindy... taps the sun emblem on her chest. She leans in conspiratorially, her voice dropping. "I wanted 'Solar Flare' but they refused."

  I stare between them. My friends. My friends who I've known since high school, who helped me move into my apartment, who stayed up with Fey and I during finals week surviving on energy drinks and spite. My friends who were powerless yesterday.

  My friends who are now standing in my clinic room dressed like they walked out of a comic book.

  "You got powers," I say, and it's not a question because the evidence is literally glowing in front of me.

  Lumina's entire face lights up behind the mask. "Yesterday! During testing! Eve, it was insane. One second I'm standing there thinking here we go, another negative result, and then suddenly my eyes turned into flowers and people started saying I had powers.”

  "It was amazing," Lumina says, bouncing slightly on her heels. "Terrifying, but amazing. And then they rushed us through registration this morning, like, we barely had time to process what was happening, and now we're here! First day! Official heroes!"

  She gestures at her suit with both hands like she's presenting a prize on a game show. "I mean, look at this thing. It's ridiculous. I look like a sunset threw up on me. But also kind of cool? I can't decide."

  "Can you…" I start, then gesture at their masks. "Can you at least take the mask off? I mean, if it's just us?"

  Lumina's gaze flicks past me. Toward the hallway.

  Nocturne's head turns slightly too, like she heard something I didn't.

  I follow their eyes.

  Through the small window in the door, I can see across the hall. Half-shadowed in a doorway, the soldier still watches. Arms crossed. Not pretending to be subtle. Just standing there like this wing is a terrarium and we're the animals inside it.

  Lumina shifts uncomfortably. "We… can't. Not while we're on duty." She sounds genuinely apologetic. "Secret identity stuff. They were really specific about it."

  "Like, really specific," Nocturne adds. "We had to sign seventeen different forms. I counted. They didn't even give me a chance to read them.”

  I lower my voice, even though I know the soldier can probably hear me anyway. "Because…?"

  Lumina gives a tiny shrug, "They're probably making sure we don't, I don't know, accidentally reveal our identities on live TV or something."

  "Which is fair," Nocturne says.

  The way they're both standing makes something in my chest tighten. But I push it aside because they're here, they're my friends, and maybe they can actually help.

  "Have you seen Fey?" I ask, and the question comes out smaller than I intended.

  Lumina and Nocturne exchange a glance. I can't see their full expressions behind the masks, but something passes between them.

  "We. . ." Lumina starts, then stops.

  She looks at Nocturne again. Nocturne's head tilts, just barely, and her shoulders shift in what might be a shrug.

  "Maybe we should watch the news?" Lumina says finally, already moving toward the TV before I can respond, like momentum will carry her past the awkwardness. "I'm sure Fey will turn up… okay? We were briefed on this. They showed us everything."

  She presses the power button.

  The screen flickers to life, and immediately I'm assaulted by the over-saturated colors of a news broadcast. The logo in the corner reads Channel 7 News, and the ticker at the bottom is already scrolling with words like BREAKING and DEVELOPING and HERO RESPONSE.

  A woman with perfect hair and a suit that costs more than my tuition sits behind a desk, her expression arranged into that specific blend of concern and excitement that news anchors do when tragedy is good for ratings.

  ". . . continuing coverage of yesterday's devastating villain attack at the university," she's saying, and her voice has that breathless quality like she's narrating the end of the world. "We want to warn our viewers that some of this footage may be disturbing."

  The screen cuts to shaky phone footage, the kind that's been filmed by someone running for their life. The colors are enhanced, saturated, making the fire look like it's burning in high definition.

  And there's so much fire.

  The stadium where I was standing less than twenty-four hours ago, is engulfed in flames. Explosions bloom in the windows, one after another, each one bigger than the last. Glass rains down in glittering sheets. Smoke billows out in thick black clouds that look like they've been edited to be even darker, even more ominous.

  "Fuck," I whisper, because I was there and it wasn't like this.

  It was bad. It was terrifying. But it wasn't this.

  The news anchor's voice continues over the footage. "The villain, identified as Scorchmark, unleashed a devastating attack that left dozens injured and the building in ruins. Witnesses describe scenes of absolute chaos as students fled for their lives."

  The screen cuts to an interview with a guy I vaguely recognize from campus. His face is smudged with soot that looks applied, and he's breathing hard like he just finished running a marathon.

  "It was like a war zone," he says, and his voice cracks in all the right places. "Fire everywhere. People screaming. I thought I was going to die."

  Cut back to the anchor. "But in the midst of this tragedy, heroes emerged."

  The footage shifts, and suddenly it's not phone cameras anymore. It's professional. Cinematic. Slow-motion shots of heroes arriving on the scene, their suits gleaming, their movements choreographed like they're in a movie.

  Mudman is there, rising from the ground in a wave of earth, his cape billowing dramatically in wind that doesn't exist. They’ve got him framed like a movie poster, like the camera itself is in love with him. He throws up a wall of mud that blocks the fire, and the camera catches it from three different angles like they had a whole crew filming.

  "Heroes responded within minutes," the anchor says, "containing the threat and saving countless lives."

  More footage. More heroes I don't recognize, doing things that look heroic and impressive and absolutely nothing like the confused scrambling I remember. There's a woman in blue who's apparently controlling water, dousing flames with precision that seems physically impossible. A man in silver who's carrying people out of the building, moving so fast he's just a blur.

  And nowhere is there any mention of a portal.

  The anchor's face fills the screen again.

  "Tragically, several students remain missing in the aftermath of the attack," she says.

  The screen cuts to a photo of Fey.

  It's her student ID picture, the one where she's smiling that half-smile she does when she's trying not to laugh at the photographer.

  "Authorities are asking anyone with information to come forward," the anchor continues.

  "This can't be real," I say, and my voice sounds distant, like it's coming from someone else's body. "This isn't what happened. I was there," I say, louder now, because my pulse is spiking and my hands are shaking and the room is starting to tilt. "I was holding her hand. There was a portal. A circle. Symbols. She was pulled through and I tried to hold on but her jacket ripped and she. . ."

  "You have a concussion," Lumina interrupts.

  Her yellow eyes, petal-shaped pupils bright behind her mask, look at me with something that might be pity.

  "The evidence is really clear, Eve," Nocturne says, "no one saw a portal. Everyone saw the same thing, fire, explosions, people running. That's what happened."

  "You're wrong," I say, but my voice cracks on the words.

  "We're not," Lumina says, and she steps closer, her light pulsing with what I think is supposed to be reassurance. "Eve, I know this is hard. I know you want to believe what you remember. But sometimes our memories aren't reliable, especially after trauma. The officials showed us everything. They were very thorough."

  "The officials are lying," I say.

  "Why would they lie?" Nocturne asks, and she sounds genuinely confused. "What would be the point? Multiple independent witnesses all reported the same thing. The footage backs it up. The physical evidence backs it up. There's no conspiracy here, Eve. There's just… what actually happened."

  "And what actually happened," Lumina adds softly, "is that Fey got separated from you in the chaos. She's missing. We're looking for her."

  The TV is still playing. The anchor has moved on to talking about the hero response time, about how quickly they contained the situation, about how this is a testament to the importance of the Hero Program.

  It's a commercial. A recruitment ad disguised as news.

  And two of my friends are standing in front of me, in their new hero suits with their petal-shaped pupils, telling me that what I saw didn't happen.

  Telling me that I'm wrong.

  Telling me that I'm broken.

  "Get out," I say quietly.

  Both of them freeze.

  "What?" Lumina's voice is small.

  "Get out," I repeat, and my voice is steadier now, cold and flat. "If you're just going to stand there and tell me I'm crazy, then get out."

  "Eve, we're not saying you're crazy," Nocturne starts, but I cut her off.

  "Yes you are. You're just using nicer words." I look between them, at their masks and their suits and their absolute certainty. "You've been heroes for what, twelve hours? And you already sound exactly like them. Like Mudman. Like every other government mouthpiece who's been in here telling me my brain is broken."

  "That's not fair," Lumina says, and her glow flickers with distress. "We're trying to help you."

  "By gaslighting me with propaganda?" I ask. "By telling me that what I experienced didn't happen? By choosing to believe a bunch of officials you just met over someone you've known for three years?"

  "We're just trying to help," she says, and her voice breaks on the words. "We're trying to be there for you."

  "Then believe me," I say, one last desperate plea. "Please. Just believe me."

  But they don't move. They stand there in their suits, glowing and dark, sunrise and midnight, and they look at me like I'm the one who's broken.

  Like I'm the one who's lost.

  "Go," I say again, and this time it's not a request.

  Then they turn toward the door.

  She opens the door. The soldier in the hallway straightens slightly, watching them emerge. They walk past him without a word.

  The door swings shut.

  And I'm alone again.

  The people who are supposed to help me think I'm delusional.

  I know what I saw.

  Even if I'm the only one left who does.

  Even if that means I'm completely, utterly alone.