Shielding Fleur, I crane my neck, searching the cliffs above us for the person controlling the remote. White light floods the edge, and I put my arm up to cut the glare. The drone zips closer, its searchlight swinging back and forth across us. I kick out wildly, my foot slicing the air. I kick out again, strike the edge of the drone, and send it flying.
“Fleur! Wake up!” It hums louder as it swoops down for another pass. Fleur stirs. She sits up fast, shielding her eyes when the searchlight cuts across her. “Run! Get to the trees!” I boost her to the ledge. Shestruggles for a fingerhold, showering me with dust. The drone buzzes close behind us as she scales the remaining feet to the road. I’m right behind her when she reaches back and drags me over the edge. Hand in hand, we run, dodging the light as we duck into the trees. They’re thin and sparse, no canopy to shield us.
“Where are they coming from? Who’s controlling it?” She pants, peering around a trunk.
“I don’t know.”
The drone hums above us, dousing us with light. Heavy footsteps close in, flashlights cutting in and out of the trees.
A voice calls out. “There! I see them!”
I reach for Fleur’s hand, ready to run, but there’s no time. They’re too close. She plants herself in front of me, directly in the path of their lights. Her hair rises in a halo of static and the ground shudders.
She jerks her fist. The trees rustle and something heavy smacks the ground.
Someone swears Gaia’s name.
A voice cries out as the drone loses control and crashes in the brush. A cat yowls. Fleur jerks her fist again. I call out her name, too late to stop her as she drives the point of the branch into the ground.
FLEUR
Woody blinks up at me, his horrified expression framed by a tangle of long hair.
He looks down at his chest, then lower, at the space just below his groin where my branch pierced the dirt. His head drops back against the ground and he exhales a tremulous sigh.
“What are you doing here?” I fall to my knees and throw my arms around him, squeezing every last ounce of breath from his lungs.
“Narrowly avoiding death, apparently,” he says, working his ankles free of the creeping juniper. Marie holds Slinky a few yards off. I rush toward her, then stop myself as she backs away. We settle for an awkward wave.
Jack helps Woody to his feet. “How the hell did you find us?”
“Are you kidding?” Slinky leaps from Marie’s arms, startled by her coarse laugh. “That tornado was ridiculous. It made national news.”
“So did your police sketches,” Woody says. “When they said you were spotted in Phoenix, we figured you might be on your way here.”
I search the gaps in the trees behind them, my delirious smile withering.
“Where’s Poppy?”
“And Chill?” Jack asks, still breathing hard.
Woody and Marie look past us toward the canyon, their faces falling when they realize we’re alone. Woody turns away, favoring his injured leg as he recovers Chill’s drone. He dusts it with his shirt, picking absently at a broken propeller.
“Chill’s bringing Poppy. They’ll be here soon,” he says with a tight smile.
Something feels off. Why won’t either of them look at me? “What’s wrong?”
Marie flicks the wheel of her lighter over and over in her pocket. The look she exchanges with Woody nearly stops my heart.
“It’s Poppy. She’s really tired,” Woody says. “She’s... not doing so well.”
Jack stiffens. “What do you mean?”
“We were right... about what we thought might happen,” Woody says hesitantly. “Chill doesn’t see so well anymore. And Marie’s allergies have come back.” He glances up at me, an apology glittering in his eyes. I reach for Jack.
“Poppy,” I whisper. Cystic fibrosis isn’t a virus or an infection. It’s an aggressive, progressive disease that’s rooted in her genes. I should have known it would come back. In retrospect, all the early signs seem so clear—her fatigue on the boat, the cough I thought was the start of a cold, the salty tang that clung stubbornly to her skin... I foolishly chalked it up to the sea air lingering in her hair and on her clothes.
This is why she didn’t want to leave the Observatory. This is why she wanted me to stay and fight.
