Chameleon Moon

by RoAnna Sylver

  After a few silent steps, Lisette leaned closer to Rose and spoke out of the corner of her mouth with a grin. “Ooh, that was fun watching you put him in his place. I like it.”

  Rose didn’t answer, just stared straight ahead and rubbed Jack’s back. He’d stayed silent this entire time, and she was starting to worry. Wren squeezed Lisette’s hand and shot her one of the looks only they understood—and she looked up at Rose again. This time she wasn’t smiling, large dark eyes full of worry.

  “Miss Rose?”

  “Hmm?”

  “She’s gonna come back, right? Radio Angel? I just… really want her to be okay. She’s always there for us, we need her.”

  “Yeah. Everything’s going to be okay.”

  They left the red-glowing wound of what had been the House behind them.

  Zilch shouldn’t have still been conscious—or alive. Anyone else would have gone into shock or passed out from the pain long ago. Or died, succumbed to the sheer mass of excruciating burns and trauma. That would have been easier.

  “Hi, Zilch.” Finn knelt by their head and tried to smile. Smile or cry.

  The battered, bloodied group had found a bit of shelter in the lee of a collapsed skyscraper. They hugged the deep shadow, staying away from the orange spurts of fire and pale yellow light from the rising sun.

  Zilch’s mismatched eyes, the only bright and undamaged spots in their face, traveled up to Finn. They didn’t answer or move, but somehow they smiled with their eyes alone.

  “How are you feeling?” Finn asked, immediately feeling himself flush. “Oh, I’m sorry! Never mind, that was… I mean, how could you possibly…”

  Their eyes slowly drifted to half-shut; lowered their gaze.

  Finn wavered for a moment, biting his lower lip. Then the dam burst. “Zilch…” His voice was high-pitched and tight. “I’m so sorry—it’s all my fault, you wouldn’t be hurt like this if I’d listened to you! I should have stayed, and oh, God, the whole city, it’s burning! I – broke Parole, Zilch! And I hurt you! I hurt you all with my feelings!” Now the tears were coming, though he clenched his teeth to keep them in.

  Zilch let out a low, extended hiss.

  “Look at you. You’re hurt, and just lying here, and it’s all because of me! You shouldn’t have given me your suit, this is all my fault—”

  “Don’t!” Zilch’s voice was rough and broken and it made Finn shut right up.

  Finn gasped as something touched his hand. There, with the smallest movement imaginable, but the most they had the strength for, Zilch’s fingertip was touching the back of his hand.

  “More… important.”

  Hot tears rolling down his face, Finn very gently took their hand. They stayed that way for almost a full minute, Finn crying silently and Zilch just hanging on.

  “I’m so sorry about Regan,” Finn said at last in a ragged voice. “We’ll find him. Okay? I promise we will. I know he didn’t leave because he doesn’t care anymore, he just…” He stopped. Zilch had closed their eyes again, as if under another wave of pain. “I’m sorry.”

  Zilch let out a soft noise and he knew what they’d say if they could.

  “I know it’s not my fault. But it hurt you to lose him again, and I’m still sorry.”

  They were quiet for a little while. Finn wiped his face.

  “I know what brought the explosions back,” he said softly, and smiled. “Is it weird if it’s kind of a good thing? Because what made me lose them was being overloaded with awful feelings until I couldn’t feel anything at all. But when Gabriel connected all of us, I could feel all of you guys—you were all right there with me. I wasn’t alone. And there you were.” He gave a nervous little giggle, then looked away. “I just… I looked at you, and I… I think I felt what you…” He looked back again, shaking his head, eyes wide with wonder. “You feel so much, all the time, don’t you? Nobody knows it, but you do.”

  Very slowly, the burned, cracking corners of Zilch’s mouth curved up into a smile.

  “I’ve never felt that… much, before.” Finn’s voice shook. “I’ve never felt that kind of anything. I’ve never let myself. But when I…” He trailed off. His face was burning red again, but it wasn’t from the fire.

  Zilch just looked at him, eyes inviting him to continue.

  “It was love, wasn’t it?” Finn made himself ask, despite his nervous, pounding heart. “It was the best thing I’ve ever felt. It felt like holding your breath forever and then finally taking one, it was like everything, all at once, like, I don’t even have words! It just… exploded.” He marveled; it was true, even now words failed, even when the powerful memory of that overwhelming, healing emotion remained. “Even if it wasn’t mine. And even if it was yours for—”

  “Both.”

  “What?” He looked down quickly to see Zilch looking up at him with what he could swear was apprehension. Their face had never been the easiest to read and now had nearly lost all expression from its terrible injury. It didn’t matter. The shyness was there.

  “Him. You.” A hissing breath. “Yes.”

  Finn laughed, but he was crying again too. Vulnerable and suddenly shy and hardly able to believe what he was hearing. “R-really?”

  “No heart.” Their hand reached up to stroke Finn’s face, wipe away the tears—but couldn’t quite make it. Finn caught their hand before it fell, and let it gently rest on his own chest instead. “Still feel.”

  Finn couldn’t speak. It was too good.

  “Love you. Always have.”

  “I knew it!” Now he could speak. Not in his usual squeal, not an exuberant exclamation. “I knew it, I did. And I love you too, so much. So much.” It was all Finn could do not to tackle Zilch and shower them with hugs and kisses, but that would have to wait until they were both in much less pain. “But don’t worry. I’ll keep it under control.” He contented himself with holding Zilch’s hand against his chest, and smiling harder than he had in weeks.

  They stayed that way for a while, both feeling more than could possibly be contained, but forced to try. At least for now. Then Zilch gasped. “No…”

  “What?” Finn looked up—then gasped too, a shuddering, stunned breath, because he could feel it too. His heart pounded under Zilch’s hand, twice as fast as it should have.

  It beat in double time. There was a staccato, joyful rhythm on the right side of his chest, where none should be. A second heartbeat.

  “Explains,” Zilch said at last, breaking the shocked silence. “A lot.”

  ❈

  Danae shielded her eyes from the orange glare, squinting across the broken wasteland of the collapsed city. The sick glow didn’t just come from the sunrise, but from below, as shafts and cracks in the earth spewed out light and smoke and tongues of fire. She leaned against a half-crushed car to keep herself upright, gritting her teeth against the dizzying pain where her left arm had been. She could swear she still felt five fingers, every one of them on fire.

  “We can’t stay here long,” she said at last. Beside her, Evelyn sat on the ground, no energy left to do anything but sit and stare at the devastation. They rested a little way from the others, letting Zilch and Finn have a brief, precious moment of togetherness and privacy. “Eye in the Sky’s wide open today.”

  “I’ve never seen so many choppers at once…” Evelyn stared up at the machines that hovered above them. Dozens, maybe hundreds, filled the air with a constant thrum of blades over the sirens and roar of the fire below. Black shapes blotted the sky, a milling cloud that blocked out the pale sun. “I didn’t even know there were this many troops in the city. It’s… I’m…”

  Words failed. They listened to the helicopters and far-off screams of the wounded, painful moments slipping by until Danae spoke up again.

  “Evelyn, I…” She swallowed hard. “I’m sorry about Regan.”

  “Do you remember what he said?” Evelyn asked in a whisper, watching a cloud of ash float up in a column of smoke. “For the first time he w
asn’t afraid. Him and Gabriel…”

  “It wasn’t just to help Gabriel,” Danae said, shaking her head. “Instead of sticking around to actually fix anything—Rose, or even Cairus, the missing kid? Whatever he said down there? No, Regan just dumps a bunch of confusing stuff on us, then goes off to do God knows what, and leaves us alone.”

  “I think this was his way of trying to fix things.”

  “Well, he didn’t think about what it would do to anyone left behind.” Danae shrugged, shoulders hunched. “To you. Or—God, to Zilch. That’s selfish.” Danae crouched down beside her, then dropped awkwardly to the ground. Her legs had finally had enough. All of her had. She carefully reached her arm around Evelyn’s shoulder, Evelyn wrapped her arm around Danae’s waist, and they held one another up. Danae sighed, looking some distance away to where they’d left Zilch and Finn together.

  “So love saves the day.” She turned to look up at the helicopters range over the ruined crater that had once been parole. “For some of us.”

  “The city was going down anyway.” Evelyn shook her head and fiddled with the dial of a handheld radio they’d picked up in the street. The thing still worked, but every channel was fuzz. All the stations had been knocked out, and there was no voice on the airwaves to guide them through this time. “It was only a matter of time. Finn gave the inevitable a shove, that’s all.” She paused, staring out at the destruction. She bit her lip, reopening a half-healed cut and swiping at the warm trickle.

  “Oh no, I’m not blaming him! If someone tries to blame Finn for this, I’ll kick their ass right into the barbecue. It’s just that we got lucky. A lot of other people didn’t.”

  “No, they didn’t.” Evelyn said quietly, looking out at the destruction. “Sometimes love isn’t enough.”

  “So what is?” Danae cast a long, exhausted look at the space where her arm had once been, still stunned by the phantom-limb pain. “I mean… I’m asking you, Ev. Looking at all this, how do you keep going? What do you believe in?”

  “I…” Evelyn swallowed hard, biting her lip. Rose’s absence gaped like a hole in her ribcage. “I don’t know. Right now I don’t know. Sometimes everything isn’t going to be okay.”

  “Listen. I’ve never had much faith. In anything. When you look for the worst in humanity, you tend to find it. But I believe in you, Evelyn Calliope.” Danae sighed, leaning over and kissing her, soft, deep and warm. Resting her forehead against Evelyn’s, it was easier not to cry, as it always was—but she did anyway. When she opened her eyes again, they were wide and bright, even as tears cut clean streaks down her blood-and-ash-covered cheeks. “And I believe in Rose. She’ll protect Jack, she’ll keep the others safe until we find her. I swear to God, we’ll find her.”

  “Or she’ll find us.”

  Many things changed. Some things didn’t. For a while, the longest time they’d had together since this nightmare began, but not nearly long enough, they held one another, felt the absence of the missing pieces of their heart, and remembered all the things that remained the same.

  “Supposed to be a full moon tonight.” Evelyn looked up at the smog-choked sky. They couldn’t see the moon or a single star, just the white searchlights of helicopters. Past those, the iridescent, crackling dome of the barrier, like lightening through storm clouds, ever-present and impenetrable as ever. Nobody in Parole had seen the moon in almost ten years, but it wasn’t the kind of thing you just forgot. “I guess it’s a chameleon moon.”

  Danae furrowed her brow at the funny phrase. “What’s that?”

  “Something my mama said.” Evelyn’s smile was slow, but one of the first things that day that didn’t hurt. “What Regan said down in the fire… about a storm coming. It got me thinking—she said the same thing. I wonder what they know. I wonder what’s on its way.”

  “Whatever it is, we’ll be waiting.”

  “With open arms.” Evelyn held Danae close in her own for a moment and just breathed; tried to capture and freeze this moment in her mind where she breathed her in, instead of smoke. Remembered the smell of roses and new grass, resolved they would be a reality. One day there would be reunion instead of just memory. “And then… cycles of the moon. Like a blue moon, or a blood moon. A ‘chameleon moon’ means change. A shift. The world is about to turn. Nothing will be the same.”

  “Well…” Danae said softly, looking out at the black sky and orange haze. “Sometimes that’s a good thing.”

  ❈

  Screams of sirens and victims filled the smoky air, but for now, the scorched, shattered wound of what had been the Turret House was deserted. Except for a dog.

  A repaired Toto-Dandy sat still and calm, sitting in front of the wreckage. He knew his mamas Danae and Rose, and his small pup Jack would be back to find him soon, to pet him and scratch his ears and tell him he was a good boy. His gleaming, gemstone-hard mechanical eyes stayed calm as his tongue lolled out in a doggy smile, and his tail thumped in contentment. And very patiently, he waited all alone for his humans. That’s what good dogs did.

  Then, suddenly, he wasn’t alone.

  A long shudder went through the synthetic wolf’s body, from the tip of his metal nose to the end of his tail. Then Toto-Dandy did something no dog ever did. He held out one front paw in front of his face, and studied it. He looked at the paw for a long time with hard, cold, very intelligent eyes, formulating complex, very human thoughts.

  He shifted carefully on his paws, testing their balance. He began to stretch out front and back legs, experimentally move the tail. Slowly, the wolf that wasn’t a wolf anymore took a step down the hill of rubble and twisted metal. Then another, faster. He kicked up his huge paws, tail waving behind him like a flag of victory, and let out a howl that echoed throughout the ruined buildings under the hundreds of thrumming helicopters.

  Then, just before he bounded away into the smoky streets—he stopped dead. Raised his muzzle to the air and gave a long sniff, rotated the sharp ears. His new, intensified senses picked up a familiar scent, and he turned his oblong, pointed head to face its source.

  “Heard you wanted me dead,” said Garrett Cole, leaning casually against a battered building, as if the city around him wasn’t crumbling to cinders. He didn’t wear his sequined tuxedo today, just the plain black shirt and pants he’d worn when he’d left the Emerald Bar, but somehow, even with everything else around him falling apart, there wasn’t a hair or thread out of place, or so much as a fleck of ash on one sleeve.

  The smile that seemed to cross Hans’s new, metal face was wolfish indeed. It was amazing how expressive fangs could be. “No hard feelings.”

  Garrett just smirked and surveyed the huge metallic form before him, meeting its cold blue eyes with a slow blink of his own, like one a dog might get from a cat who knows it’s safe behind a window. “I always did say you were a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

  “Looks pretty good on me, don’t you think?”

  “I think you got very lucky.”

  “I’m not lucky!” For the first time, Hans bared his new teeth in a snarl. “I’m prepared. And I have a lot of loose ends to tie up.”

  “Mmm.” Garrett stuck his hands in his pockets, giving the wolf a sympathetic nod. “We have that in common. We certainly do.”

  “Honestly?” Hans let out a frustrated bark as his adversary relaxed further, leaning back against the ruined brick wall and crossing one ankle over the other. “This is even better than I planned! Killing you personally is gonna be so much more satisfying!”

  “I’d think so.” Garrett examined a frayed fingernail.

  “And I get to find out exactly what this new body can do!” He took one slow step forward, dinner-plate-sized paw raking the ash-covered ground.

  “I’d love to hear all about it.” He paused, considering as Hans took another step toward him. “After you tell me what in the world you were after in the first place.”

  “I’m about to sink my teeth into your lying neck, and you want to know what I�
��m after?”

  “I do indeed. This is just so unlike you, Hans,” He sounded almost concerned. “You usually think things out so much better than this. A lot more carefully. First of all, even thinking of coming after me? That alone…” He scratched the side of his nose to hide a smile. Even Garrett Cole wasn’t about to laugh in a snarling wolf’s face, but he had to let it out somehow. “But then, what’s this I hear about blackmail, kidnapping, coercion, assault…”

  “My plans were solid.” Hans growled. “I did everything right. I had leverage. I had control. I did everything you ever taught me to—”

  “Everything I—? Please. I taught you to look at the big picture and make big changes with small touches. This?” He spread his hands, looking around in dismay and standing very still as if suddenly surrounded by an invisible minefield. “This is an embarrassing avalanche of amateur mistakes. A tragedy of errors turned deadly, and avoidable from the start.”

  “It wasn’t my fault! I was really trying to help them!”

  “Hans,” he said in a patient, sympathetic tone. “Even if that was true, you and I both know that’s the one thing in any plan that matters least. Ever.”

  “I was. All they had to do was listen to me, and everything would have been fine. I really was trying to save them all!”

  “Funny,” Garrett’s tone dropped, sudden as opening a stage trapdoor. “From here it looked like you were trying to kill me.”

  Hans’s growl returned with a vengeance. “You got way too comfortable at that Bar of yours. While you were giving ‘em the ol’ razzle-dazzle playing emcee—no, playing superhero, playing king—I was a ghost! For ten years!”

  “I had a life, Hans. And a plan, unfolding on my own time.”

  “Too long!”

  “The world doesn’t move just because you want it to.”