When I look over, Reed is frozen in place, staring in terror across the bridge.
I know that stare. Too well.
“Reed.” I snap my fingers. “Come on.”
“Do you see him?” Reed whispers.
“I don’t see any—”
“My father, he’sright there.” He pauses. “He’s angry with me.” Reed sounds confused, wounded.
I move to face him, but his attention remains on the specter of his father.
With my free hand, I jerk his chin down, forcing him to meet my eyes. “He’s not there. It’s not real. Your father is back on Earth.” Exactly where we need him to be if we’re going to survive this mess. “None of this is real. I need you to keep it together.” I cannot drag Reed along unwillingly, screaming about his father, through this ship.
Reed rubs at his chest. “But I can feel it. I can feel how angry he is.” A paranoid whine enters his voice. His gaze flicks from me back to his father.
I pinch his cheek, hard enough to leave a red mark.
He yelps, and then glares at me.
“Then you guys shouldn’t have made the MAW five-hundred-whatever work so well,” I say through clenched teeth.
He blinks down at me and then back across the bridge.
“He’s gone,” he says, stunned.
“He was never there. Remember that. Most of what you’re going to see from now on is not real.”
He nods but looks less than convinced.
As soon as we reach the hallway, me leading the way, pulling an unresponsive Kane at my side and Reed at the back, I realize my mistake: in my rush, I forgot the work light on the bridge.
It’s so dark out here, I can’t see my hand in front of my face.
Fuck.
Maybe that will make what comes next easier, if we can’t see it.
Maybe not.
I feel for the wall and start forward. “Stay close,” I warn Reed. “If we can move fast enough, maybe we can avoid…”
Becca appears ahead of me, laughing and dancing in her nightgown, waving me forward.
No, apparently not.
I do my best to ignore her, keeping my hand firmly on the wall, moving it along the textured wallpaper and the smooth doors aswe go. If I were to give in to distraction and simply follow her, it feels possible that we might somehow be lost in here forever. Like those fairy-tale children without their bread-crumb trail. Like when I followed Becca into the quarantined hab.
Becca vanishes unexpectedly.
And my step hitches for a second.
“What’s wrong?” Reed demands, bumping into me from behind.
“Nothing. I—”
Heavy blows land against the smooth wooden door currently beneath my fingertips. From the other side. The door shakes in its frame, moved by the force.
