His brightness had faded slightly, enough that she could see beyond the glow – not that it helped much. In the fashion of dreams, he was many things: a shining orb, a child, a wisp cradled in black wings, the man in the apple tree.
And he was Sam. And Sam was him, and had been all along. Or something?
She waited for rage to flare, but all her anger had burnt out, leaving her throat coated in ash. Clouds of the stuff billowed when she coughed.
Pale fingers over her mouth. “Don’t… don’t do that.”
Sam looked worn. His suit was rumple and singe more than fabric, and the robin’s-egg of his shirt only served to emphasize the sallow of his skin. “You know, when you promised you’d ask for help? I kinda hoped that meant you’d do it before ending up dead.”
“I knew Alcor was strong, but he completely maxed out the reading on my Sight Specs. There’s no way we can defeat him face to face. If we’re going to keep you from ending up like every other Mizar, we need to do something, before he claims you.”
“Like what?”
“Dad’s journals didn’t get that far. I think I have a plan, but it’ll take some time to put together.”
“How much do we have?”
“If he were a more typical demon, I’d say maybe til the next eclipse, or some other conjunction of celestial bodies, but Alcor is completely unpredictable. He could strike anytime from next year to tomorrow.”
She swallowed, static dancing at the corners of her eyes. He met her gaze. “I know it’s scary, but you’ve got help. Just come back at midnight, okay? I’ll get as much as I can together and we’ll do it then.”
It probably doesn’t hit Stan, until he sees all three of them on the couch one afternoon, watching TV with their partners and two or four wee ones at this point-
-and Willow is pregnant, and starts to wheeze, and bitches as she gets her inhaler out that now when she coughs and cant breathe, she feels like puking on top of that-
-and Acacia is kind of squinting at the TV, because her depth perception is kind of off, and she seriously needs to get a new prescription for her remaining eye but doesn’t want the optometrist to scold her for not taking care of her glass eye-
-and Hank needs to get up to get a soda, and reaches for his cane with the chunk of amber on top, before sheepishly sitting back down as Vivi scolds him because he overdid it yesterday-
backup 