Chapter 6 Nebulous #4
"Your medicine is on the counter. I refilled your prescription for you, just in case." He knew she didn’t like to take more than she had to, didn’t want to be dependent and doped-up, but the option was there, regardless.
"Thank you," she rasped, voice thick with sleep.
With the hand that did not hold hers, he reached up and smoothed a lock of hair away from her temples. "I have to go."
His brown eyes searched hers, and before Rin could realize, he was leaning down, leaning over, and her eyelids fluttered, a gasp clinging to her slightly chapped lips.
But he did not press his lips to hers—a part of her cried because of it. No, he breathed softly against her temples, and his warm lips pressed tenderly to the space between her brows. Her fingers flexed in his hand, and when he started to pull away, she held on, just for a minute.
"Kit." Rin swallowed. "I—"
He stared into her eyes, too close.
What could she say… what could she do… besides let him go?
The memory of their real kiss lingered, even as she said, "I love you."
Kit’s lips twitched with a small smile. "I love you, Vesperin Vox."
Then, he stood. Her fingers slipped from his as she watched him leave. At the door to her bedroom, he paused, staring back at her with the dark light of not-quite morning making everything feel surreal as it streamed through her curtains.
She caught the glint of a dog tag hanging around his neck. The medals on his coat shimmered, and his eyes were pools of regret.
Her own eyes burned.
There, at the precipice of her door, he smiled, turned, then left.
The air was colder without him.
Rin didn’t know how long she lay in her bed, but the sun had risen, its heat warring with the ceiling fan as it cast golden light onto her floor and across her duvet.
She hadn’t been able to fall back asleep, and as the hours passed, unease churned in her stomach. Like she had just made a grave mistake in letting him go.
Alone, her thoughts drifted to the file folder the Soul Searcher had left for her.
What could it mean?
She reached for her phone, flicking through her messages and finding well-wishes from other trainees on the Alpha Team.
But nothing else. No texts from Sabine or Talor. Nothing from Kit.
She glanced at the clock at the top of the screen.
10:02 AM.
It had been hours of her lying in bed—wishing, hoping.
He would be well into the Stars by now.
Rin locked her phone and threw it by her side, flopping back down onto her pillows. Her lids were heavy, and her body was still plagued with exhaustion from her episode. Maybe she could sleep a little longer…
The shrill sound of her phone ringing broke her from her uneasy rest. Rin blinked her bleary eyes open, reaching blindly for her phone and answering it before she even looked at who it was.
"Hello?" she mumbled, rubbing a hand over her eyes.
God, her head hurt, and the nightmare hadn’t helped. It had been awful. Something about death, explosions…? But with every breath she breathed, the images slipped through her fingers, fleeting.
"Is this Vesperin Vox?" a masculine voice said without inflection.
Her brows furrowed, and she held her phone away from her face, glaring at the number. Unknown.
She placed the phone back to her ear. "Yes. Who is this?" She grew more alert with every second that passed.
"This is Director Aeric Hart at the Fleet, Division 07." The man, Aeric, paused, and Rin felt every drop of blood inside her body pool to her feet. Division 07—that was… that was Kit’s. Her hands shook so hard the phone rattled, and she had to fix her grip so it wouldn’t slip from her fingers.
"Vesperin, there’s no easy way to tell you this.
Early this morning, the Fleet ship that disembarked Earth for Sibeth had a technical malfunction. The blasters misfired."
He gave no further explanation, and the air in her lungs was sucked out, making her chest seize as she struggled to draw in a breath.
"What are—what do you m-mean? What are you… telling me? Why are you calling me?" A sob bubbled up.
Please. Please no.
Please, please, please.
She didn’t realize she was saying it into the phone until the man said quietly, "I’m sorry. Kiton died in the explosion. He had you down as his number one emergency contact. I was told, if anything ever happened, to call you first."
His words didn’t register. Nothing did.
Her ears were ringing, heart thundering. She was going to be sick. Violently sick. Nausea rose, a churning mass of disbelief, yet terrible, terrible understanding.
This was real.
Kit was—
The phone slipped from her fingers.
It all happened in a blur. Rin didn’t think she could recall any of it, even if she tried.
Rin only knew, after that call, that everything had gone dark.
Whether she had had an episode alone or passed out from shock or cried herself to sleep, she’d never know.
She had woken up to find Sabine hovering over her, deep shadows under her eyes, and her hair tangled.
She and Talor both had flown back from wherever they had been as soon as they heard the news.
It was a nightmare of meetings with lawyers, funeral directors, and the Director of the Fleet, who had presented Sabine and Talor with a small metal box filled with belongings they had salvaged from the blast.
Kit’s belongings.
Rin’s hands shook as she looked inside, finding a dog tag within.
The metal was bent at the corner, flecked with dark ash across the numbers on the front.
She tugged it over her head and vowed to never, ever take it off.
It was warm from where it had been in the box, and she tricked herself into thinking it was because it had just touched Kit’s flesh, warm from him, and not from a sun-warmed, metal box that was lifeless.
All he had been reduced to were the tiniest specks of memories.
The dog tag, a few medals, a half-burned photo—the part that was left, covered in soot and red flakes she really didn’t want to know about.
She would never know what the photo was of, what memory he thought was so important that he should carry it with him.
She didn’t sleep. She didn’t eat. She nearly forgot to take her medicine… if it weren’t for Lucien.
Lucien, who was her anchor—a rock to tether herself to so she wouldn’t float away.
Strong and unshakable, as he showed up at the door with disbelief in his green eyes and such intense, moving sadness that she fell apart, right there, on the front steps.
He caught her and held her, and they fell to the ground on the porch as he rocked her in his arms.
She had cried until it hurt, cried until she felt hollow, until she feared one more tear might split her open, leaving her empty and dry inside.
Salt from her tears lingered on her lips as Lucien tucked her in bed and pulled the covers up to her chin.
He sat at her bedside in her room, and she wondered if he had ever even been in her room before.
He looked strange, among her things, sitting in a spot that—Kit had once occupied.
The pain was so intense that she wondered how anyone could ever survive this. When she whispered that to Lucien, quiet and soft, not able to meet his eyes, he had merely licked his lips, adjusted his glasses, and stared down at her as she lay, lifeless in bed, saying:
You may not be able to, Vesperin, but damn it all, if I have to pull you back from the edge with my bare hands, I will.
It had been the most emotion she had ever heard from the man, and she doubted it would ever be the last.
She clung to him, and he held her up, kept her safe, made sure she drank enough water, ate enough so she wouldn’t collapse, even when she pushed food away, too sick to eat.
Only, in her grief, she missed the way he always pulled back slightly when Sabine or Talor were in the room.
When they held a gathering at the house, and it had become stifling, filled with their colleagues and people who smiled fake, sad smiles and gave their condolences.
She had sequestered herself upstairs, in Kit’s room.
Sat on his bed and held one of his leather jackets to her face and breathed in his scent of pure, clean air.
Lucien had found her, sat on the bed with her, and wrapped his arm around her, letting her lean on him.
When Sabine had found them there, Lucien had torn away from Rin like she was diseased.
And Rin never thought to stop and wonder why—why Sabine’s eyes had narrowed. Why Lucien had steered Rin downstairs, away from Sabine, or why Kit’s mother never even shed a tear when her son had just died tragically.
Rin stood among the headstones like a ghost.
The sun was tucked away behind dark clouds, and she had never been more grateful. She didn’t think she could handle a beautiful day, not when they were all gathered before an empty casket.
The green carpet thrown over the uneven ground made her sway in her black heels as she shifted, hands cold as she twisted her fingers before her.
"Vesperin, really, don’t fidget so much." Sabine leaned over, her black dress perfectly pressed as she held an unused white tissue over her mouth to stifle her words.
The pastor’s voice washed over her. The occasional sniffle in the crowd made anger roil inside her stomach. They didn’t know him, none of them did—not like her. Even Sabine and Talor—Kit’s fucking parents—didn’t know him like Rin did. She would never see him again. Not in this life.
As the pastor called them all to bow their heads and pray, Rin didn’t. Her tired, dry eyes stared vacantly at the closed casket. She had no tears left to give.
It was pretty. Dark wood topped with a spread of lilies. Not Nightfell roses. When Sabine had asked if she had wanted to donate a specific type of flower, Rin had kept her lips sealed. Nightfell roses were for Kit and Rin only.
They hadn’t been able to find a body…
It hurt to picture Kit in a thousand pieces, floating lifeless through space. Or maybe he had fallen back into Earth’s orbit and burned up, ash scattered over her. Maybe she was even breathing him in right now. Each soft, weary inhale, taking a piece of her best friend inside her.
The prayer washed over her, meaningless.
Rin’s eyes drifted, finding Lucien dressed in a simple black suit, standing among the crowd of fake mourners.
Except that the shine in his eyes under his glasses seemed genuine; the downturned tip to his lips made her heart clench in solemn companionship.
She felt—no, she knew—that Lucien was saddened by this.
Maybe because he and Rin had grown so close in the week since Kit’s death, or maybe it was something else.
Either way, she was so grateful for him in this moment, for the way he found her eyes and forced a smile onto his lips, giving her a tiny nod of reassurance.
The prayer ended, the pastor calling for the family to step aside so condolences could be shared.
Sabine wrapped a cold arm around Rin’s shoulder, folding a hand over the bell sleeve of her black gown.
"I told you to iron this before you wore it," she tsked, leading her to a copse of trees in the shade.
Rin didn’t reply.
Faceless people stepped forward in a blur to shake their hands and tell them all how wonderful Kit was, how much more life he had left. It was getting harder for Rin to ignore the ache of unfathomable grief burning in her throat.
Just when she thought she was going to fall to the ground and curl into a ball, it was over.
The mourners who didn’t care about Kit got into their cars and drove away. Going to lunch, going to a happy house, soon forgetting all about the man who didn’t even have a body to bury.
Sabine left Rin’s side, walking to the casket and placing a pale hand on top of it, head bowed. Her hair was impeccable, brown with blonde highlights. Talor came to Rin’s side, a hand falling on her shoulder. She looked up at him—the sight of his freckles made her heart squeeze.
"Vesperin." Talor’s voice was low and deep.
His brown eyes fell to the dog tag around her neck.
"Sabine and I will be staying in Solar City indefinitely. Come back home. Don’t stay at the Academy.
" She saw the faintest glimpse of heavy emotion seep from Talor’s careful control.
"Families must stick together in a time like this. "
"Okay," she whispered brokenly, staring at the casket.
Talor squeezed her shoulder and dropped his hand.
He called for Sabine, the woman wrapping her arm around Rin too tightly, before they both piled into their car and left.
Rin didn’t move.
"How are you doing, Vesperin?" Lucien murmured lowly from her side. The sound of his voice made her look up, seeing the graveyard empty—besides them.
The lilies on top of the casket swayed in the wind, and her heart stuttered dangerously in her chest. She didn’t wince, even as the squeezing motion made her head swim.
When she didn’t speak, Lucien opened an arm, folding her into his chest with an ease that seemed like they had been together for lifetimes. Her cheek brushed against his chest—it was dark there. Safe. He smelled of spiced sandalwood.
"It should’ve—" Her words broke off in a choked sob, clawing its way up her throat. She couldn’t contain it anymore.
Lucien’s hand soothed over her hair. He didn’t speak, just swayed her gently. Like the lilies in the wind.
Eventually, Rin pulled away from Lucien with a desperate noise, taking one step toward the casket.
Her ankle twisted, her knees gave out—and suddenly she was on the ground.
There was no strength left to catch her.
Her lungs heaved for air that wouldn’t come as she stayed kneeling, fingers curled into the bits of grass peeking up from the edge of the carpet.
Her white hair hung over her shoulders as she wept, tears falling from her cheeks in a steady stream of sadness. She felt like she might die from this.
"It should’ve been me," she sobbed. "I was supposed to die before him."
Firm hands touched her back as Lucien knelt by her side, holding her through her tears and grief.
She wept as if something had been torn from her—because it had. No matter how tightly she clenched her fists, she couldn’t grasp what had already been taken.
"You weren’t supposed to make me try to live w-without you… It was supposed to be m-me," Rin hiccuped through her tears. "I should have asked you to stay."
The graveyard was still and empty, and she broke apart in the quiet, the sound of her sobs endless.