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  The Phoenix Project

  Book II: Resurrection

  Katherine Macdonald

  Copyright © 2020 Katherine Macdonald

  All rights reserved

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher, except for small quotes used for the purpose of review.

  Cover design by: GermanCreative

  “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”

  Hamlet, William Shakespeare

  Chapter 1

  Nick

  He remembered the blast. He couldn't recall if he heard it before he felt it, felt the rumble in the earth as she was wrenched from it. The line went dead and he stood there, as numb as clay.

  He got out of the van. He moved towards the site. He saw the fire, saw the people fleeing. The rest comes in bits and pieces. It's possible he screamed. He fought against the tide of people rushing towards him. He must have called her name, at some point. It was fruitless, of course. She could not hear him. There was no reply.

  Pilot and somebody else must have run out after him and shoved him back into the van. Did someone render him unconscious? That part was a mystery. Pieces of the journey back still haunt him. The faces of the ones they had saved, who didn't know the one who had perished.

  He thought, somewhere in the dim, raw, fresh grief, that this was the worst of it. That first moment. The utter sense of loss and confusion.

  Then they arrived back at the base and Abi crawled out of the second van. Her searching face locked onto his; she was waiting for Ashe to appear beside him.

  She didn't know.

  Nick didn't have to say the words. One look at his face was enough.

  She started to shake her head violently. No words slipped out of her, but he could still hear her screaming.

  No, no, no!

  And then Mi was there, his sightless eyes searching, calling out for his sisters. His hands found Abi's, and she too didn't have to say anything. Mi did. Mi cried out. Ben appeared behind him, and looked between the two of them, confused and pleading.

  Nick made his way towards them.

  “I'm... I'm sorry,” were the only words that came. “I... I couldn't... there was nothing...”

  The words fell flat on his tongue. They were cheap and cloying and awful. He wanted to be sick. He couldn't even tell them that she'd been speaking to him, when she'd done what she did. He couldn't find the courage or strength to repeat her last words.

  Tell the others I love them. They... should know by now, but it never hurts to say it again.

  “What's... what's going on?” Ben blinked up at him. “Where's Ashe? Which van is she in?”

  Nick took a long, deep breath, sank down on his knees, and took Ben's hands. How would Ashe say this? He wondered. How would she want me to say it?

  “Ben,” he started, as calmly as he could, “Ashe isn't coming back.”

  “Not coming back... today?”

  “Not coming back at all.”

  “But... why... why not?”

  “Because...” Ashe wouldn't choke up. Ashe would be strong for him. She'd find the words. You can too. “Do... do you see all these other people?”

  “Yeah?”

  “They come from where you came from. Ashe wanted to give them a chance to be free, like you were. She went back to the Institute to save them. She got so many of them out, but she got stuck inside.”

  “So... she's trapped? We need to go back for her–”

  “Ben, if she was still there, then I would be too. But she isn't still there. She's gone, Ben. She's dead.”

  At this word, Abi let out a wail and sank to the floor. She didn't even seem to have the energy to reach out to Ben, who stood there, looking as numb as Nick had felt a few hours ago.

  Nick grabbed him before a single tear had fallen and pulled him into his arms. Scarlet appeared and tugged Mi onto her shoulder, and they all stood there in the hangar, a mass of choking sobs, while everyone round them quietly celebrated a victory.

  ◆◆◆

  The next few days were clouded over. His memory of that time was blurry, as insubstantial as grains of sand in an hourglass. He did not know what happened in them, or even how he really stayed alive. He was certain he didn't eat anything, but Julia forced a lot of hot steaming mugs of something into his hands at every opportunity. He drifted around in some sort of dark daze, not really believing she was gone.

  The second time they had met, she’d ended up unconscious. He’d always known she wasn’t indestructible, but she had come so close. He knew she’d always been a little bit scared to love him, to affix her feelings to his perishable breath, but he… his fears had been less than hers. She was like the ancient buildings on the edge of the slums, the ones that stayed standing no matter what had been thrown at them.

  It was not supposed to be her.

  Julia tried to talk to him. Scarlet tried to talk to him. So did Harris, Pilot, Mi, Abi, Ben. He could not think of anything to say, anything to express. He went to Rudy at one point and asked him for something to do.

  The leader's dark eyes burned as he growled his reply. “If you think I'm putting you on some dangerous mission so you can go and–”

  “Rudy, I'm not looking for danger. I'm looking for something to do. Send me to fetch something. Have me re-organise stock cupboards. I don't care. Just give me something.”

  Rudy scratched his chin with his long metal fingers. “I need someone to pick up a package from Henson at the gate. You up for a short drive?”

  Nick said he was. All the way there, he focused on the mission. He would collect the package, load it up, take it home. It was simple enough. Only, when he was on the way back, he saw how full the tank was, and another destination burned inside him.

  That was how he found himself back at the Institute, roaming through the wreckage. It had stopped burning now. The air was cold. A thin layer of frost coated the blackened hull of the building she had blown to smithereens. It was foolish, it was grim, it was pointless, but he felt that if he could find her body, if he could bury her, then maybe he could think of moving on.

  Because the reality was, he couldn't believe she was gone. He remembered her speaking of her connection with Gabe, of feeling his death. All he had felt was the thunder. He hadn't felt her go. If anyone could have survived an explosion, it was her. The Firebird.

  There were bodies in the wreckage. Dozens. Maybe hundreds. More than there should have been, and so many were clearly children. But some of them... some of them were inside glass tanks. Most were broken, but a few... a few were still full of liquid.

  What had Ashe said?

  “They kept them...”

  These people were dead long before Ashe came, and yet any one of the bodies splayed out on the frost-covered ground could have been her. He would never be able to tell. They were all burnt beyond recognition. He doubted if even her ID chip would remain.

  He sat there for hours, not knowing what to do next. Sort through them all, hoping for some kind of sign, or accept that no one, not even a superhero, could have survived such devastation?

  Another van pulled up.

  “Nick!” Scarlet raced out of the back, scrambling towards him and grabbing his shoulders. “Are you OK? We were worried sick!”

  “I'm not OK,” he responded. “But I'm not hurt. I haven't done anything stupid.”

  “Rudy and you might have another definition of stupid,” Pilot sa
id, emerging from the driver's seat.

  “I just... I just wanted to...”

  “Yeah,” said Scarlet softly. “We know.”

  “I don't... I don't know which one's hers...”

  “I don't suppose we could just pick one and bury it at random?” Pilot offered.

  Scarlet glared at him.

  “All right!” He threw up his arms, and marched into the wreckage.

  “What... what are you doing?”

  “I'm not about to bury this many bodies, but we can sort something out.” He looked at Nick. “What d'you say? One more fire, in honour of your girl?”

  “But... you didn't like her.”

  “No, but I like you, and I'm indifferent to all of these poor folks. Shall we?”

  Ashe would have approved of cremating her fallen comrades. She would have hated them lying there, feast for carrion. She may not have been particularly sentimental, but that much she cared about. She had always hated how the Institute tried to own their bodies. They could not be messed with any more.

  It was hard, looking at each one as they pulled it free, and wondering if it was her. He tried to treat each one with the care and reverence of a loved one, knowing that many of them had gone to the grave without knowing any affection at all.

  For a moment, he felt Ashe's own abhorrence rise from the earth, as keenly as some claimed to feel spirits. No wonder she hated this place. Well, it was gone now. She did what she vowed to do five years ago. Maybe there was a satisfaction in that, but he couldn't feel it now.

  He cried all the way home in Scarlet's arms, wondering how Ashe ever had the strength to carry on after losing Gabe, and wondering how he could possibly do the same.

  Chapter 2

  I tell them I don't remember the fire. It's easier that way. That way, at least some of the time, I get to forget what it felt like.

  The truth is, I remember the flames. I remember the explosion. I remember the feeling of my skin being torn from my bones. I should have been liquefied. I wasn't.

  I remember, briefly, lying in the snow. I was naked, splayed out, my flesh almost completely gone. At this point, I couldn't feel anything. I assumed I was dying. I closed my eyes and thought of my family. Nick's face burned brighter than any flame.

  The next thing I knew, I was emerging from some kind of hydration chamber, a gooey tank I'd been immersed in while my body recovered. I was almost completely bald, but my skin was smooth and unblemished.

  And Gabe was there.

  Gabe was there, somehow, inexplicably, he was there. I reached out to grab him –certain he was some kind of phantom– but he was ushered out of the room before I could do more than scream his name soundlessly into the mask that had been keeping me alive. My voice felt like slime in my mouth, everything filmy and choking.

  I'd like to report what happened next was a blur, too.

  Escape was the first thing on my mind. I was too weak at first to fight back, but the minute I could, I tried to set the room on fire. I did not get far. They'd planned for my powers, and within minutes I was crushed back against the wall under the power of a pressure hose. It was strong enough to fracture bones.

  I tried again, more carefully, more subtly... and then wildly again when I lost my patience. They slammed a couple of armbands on me which suppressed my powers after a couple of near misses. That limited my options somewhat.

  Gathering intel was my next move. I quickly learned I'd been in the hydration chamber for a full month. They'd found my body blown from the blast site. I was so badly burned, by their reports, that I was, in parts, more skeleton than muscle. I was not expected to recover. And yet, after a few days in the chamber, my body showed signs of regeneration. There is not a scar now to show where the flesh once peeled away.

  I knew about my recovery, but I didn't know precisely where I was, which would make it more difficult if I ever managed to brace the walls. From what I could tell, the fire I started had done its job and more or less destroyed the Institute building. Many escaped. Some died. Those that stayed –by choice or accident– were rounded up and shipped here. It was a disused facility. I assumed close by. I couldn't be sure, but the landscape looked similar and the air didn't feel any different. Everything outside smelled the same.

  I was probably still no more than a day's journey from Luca. From home. From Abi and Mi and Ben and Nick.

  I will come back to you. I will get out of here.

  I do not yet know the when or the how, but that much... that much I'm sure of.

  I spent weeks in solitary, re-building muscle and regaining my strength and learning to be powerless. Eventually, they let me see Gabe. A reward for going several days without fighting back.

  Some days, as I paced around the room, I could feel him. He was close by, thinking of me. His mind touched mine like the warmth of a hearth. No words, just feelings. It was really him, he was really here. He was... joyous, frightened, angry, scared, elated. I felt each one with him, and the sensation only intensified when the door finally opened, and they let him in.

  The last time I saw him, he’d been a lean twelve-year-old. Despite living with this twin, that was the face, the form, I held in my heart. But he’d broadened over the years, become more muscular than his brother, not quite as tall. His white-gold hair was shorter too, cropped close to his scalp. His gold-green eyes locked onto me, and for a moment every awful thing in the world seemed fixable.

  “Gabriel.”

  “Eve!”

  He crossed the room and I folded into his arms, trembling like a child. I felt like I would shatter into splinters without his arms around me. He's here, he's here, my thoughts spun. He's not dead, not trapped in a tank, not a burning corpse on the battlefield.

  “The others?” he asked, releasing me. He grabbed my face, as if not quite believing in my existence either.

  “They're fine, they're safe, I kept them safe! I did what you asked–”

  “What did you come back for?”

  “I wanted to free the others.... were... were you there? Why didn't you escape with them–”

  “I felt you,” he explained. “I heard you call out to me. I went to find you and found Adam instead. We both got wounded in the blast, but I crawled out of the wreckage. I... I found you in the field. What was left of you...”

  I cannot even imagine what that was like for him, to find me in that state. For that to be his first vision of me in five years.

  “But... how are you even here? I... I felt you die.”

  “I did. Briefly. They brought me back.”

  “I didn't feel that part.”

  “You were too far away. Think about it. We'd never been further than a few rooms away, our entire lives. This connection between us, whatever it is, it has its limits. You... you can feel me now, can't you?”

  He ran a hand down my arm, and electricity surged through me.

  “Yes,” I whispered. “I can feel you.”

  I launched myself into his arms again, not knowing how much longer we had until they came back to separate us.

  “I should have known,” I breathed into his chest. “I should have felt you anyway. I would have come back–”

  “And died yourself, and left the others?”

  But I have done that. That's exactly what I've done.

  Gabe, of course, knew this without me having to speak. “They'll be all right, Eve. They're tough, and older now. They'll be safe.”

  “I know,” I told him, thinking of the Phoenix Project. Rudy would keep his promise. They'd be under his protection. I just wouldn't be there. “And it's Ashe, now.”

  “What was that?”

  “My name. It's Ashe. I... changed it. I didn't want anything they gave me.”

  Gabe chuckled. “That sounds like you.” He placed his hand on the back of my neck, against the soft fuzz of my re-growing hair. “It suits you,” he said. “Ashe.”

  I was just about to fold into his arms again, but then the door opened, and two guards wrenched h
im away.

  That was six weeks ago. I have been back at the Institute for three months.

  Chapter 3

  Nick

  5th March

  Dear Ashe,

  It's been three months now since your death, longer than the length of time I knew you for. That's crazy, isn't it? How can someone who was only a part of your life for such a short amount of time reverberate into every other moment? You cling to my past and shadow my future. I am not sure I will ever escape you. I'm not sure I want to.

  Julia told me that keeping a diary would help deal with my grief, and Julia is usually right about things. At this point, anything is worth a try, but what I didn't tell her when I said I would do it is that I was planning on writing to you. I'm not sure that's wise. I already see you, I already talk to you. Will writing down my words really help? I think they'll just keep you closer when I'm supposed to let you go... but I don't want you to go. I want to carry your ghost with me to the grave.

  I can count the weeks I knew you for. I can count the days I could call you mine on my hands. I don't understand why I've been so altered, why I can't just return to the shape I was before I knew you. It isn't normal, right, to be so affected by someone?

  But then your words, before you went... you told me you thought you could have loved me forever. I felt that way almost the moment we met. You crashed into my life and exploded it; nothing could ever be the same again.

  I think I'm going to love you until the day I die, even if that's fifty years from now.

  I am never going to stop missing you.

  Chapter 4

  The door to my cell clicks open. I do not sleep in a dormitory with others. I think they are afraid of the effect I might have on them, the ones that didn't escape. They don't know how many stayed out of loyalty, or because they were confused or blocked or stopped. I might have been playing the part of the model soldier for weeks, but they aren’t idiots. There’s more than one way for me to start a fire.