Misato had no idea how long it would take for the breach to destroy Coeur d’Alene Station; she only knew that she and Deshawna would go first. She let go of the woman, watching her fall to her knees and then over onto her side. Misato sat with her, feeling the platform rattle and bounce, the key chip falling out of the control screen, plunging down before being whipped into the erratic orbit of the core. Watching it disappear, she felt a pit open up in her stomach, a longing she hadn’t expected or wanted. She could have retired. She didn’t need this last adventure.

There was never any guarantee of another side, of more adventures. There was only the flood of last-minute regrets and the taste of Jenny’s lip gloss, the last memory she wanted. The only memory she needed.

Deshawna looked like she was at rest, curled up, the remains of her hair blowing in the draft of the core. And so Misato lay down next to her on her back, folded her hands over her chest and closed her eyes. She could feel Jenny’s hair sliding through her fingers as she settled her head on Misato’s chest to sleep. Their cats, Charlie and Wrex, wove between Misato’s legs with their warm, slinky bodies, wrapping themselves around knees and ankles until at last contented, huddled safe beneath the covers. It was so, so warm. Her skin itched, and if she touched it, she feared it would fleck away like ash.

“Okay,” she murmured to the hot spinning fires above. She was warm and safe, her work was done. “I love you, Jenny. Bye.”

44

The thick, strange tentacles bursting through the office door sagged, leaving a gap wide enough to see through, wide enough to show the field of rigid, waiting obstacles in their path. It was like they had thrown a matchstick into a beehive, and now all the riled, furious insects wanted to act, wanted to sting.

“There’s too many,” he heard Rosalyn whisper at his side.

She hadn’t spoken since he held her back from following Misato, and her bitter, silent fury had wounded him as much as seeing his friend go. He didn’t have time to explain to her that this was how it was always going to happen, that they both knew it, and that surely she had run this scenario in her head enough times to see that they were knee-deep in the cluster’s final moments. That she hadn’t really counted him and Misato among the cluster’s numbers touched him, but made this all-too-predictable betrayal harder. But Misato would fulfill her promise, and now he had to fulfill his. What he knew and Rosalyn didn’t was that no matter how many of the dying cluster’s sentinels remained, he would get her on that evac pod.

Only her desperation protected her from the truth.