Chapter 95
- Kaysi -
We were expelled from the portal into a chilly wooded clearing beneath an overcast, gray sky. The earlier snow drifted at a gentle, slow pace as it fell from the air to the earth.
Evan collapsed to his knees beside Josh, who lay in the snow, pale, unmoving, and deathly still.
"Josh?" Evan shook him. "Josh! Wake up— we're back."
I knelt, pressing my hands to Josh's chest. His breathing was shallow and ragged. The bleeding from where his arm used to be had finally slowed, but the skin around the wound had begun to blister and fade to a sickly purple. Frostbite was setting in fast—Josh had no protection from the cold.
"He's lost too much blood to maintain the circulation he needs to stay warm, pulling heat from his body." I said, pressing my palm against the jagged stump, "We need someone here—now!"
"When we crossed over into the Abyss, our Soursense had to have triggered a distress signal to the other Waymakers."
Evan scrambled for his device, praying it still worked after the Abyss, which had rendered it non-functional before.
"Come on, come on…"
To our relief, it rang—and someone picked up.
"Becky!"
She was the closest person to us.
"This is Evan." His voice cracked with desperation, barely making out the words. "We found Josh, but he is down. He lost his arm and is fading fast. We are all injured. We're just outside the South Demming Ridge Woods. Please—come quick!"
There was static; Becky's voice cracked through, frantic. "I am on my way." Stay alive, all of you. I will find you." I don't think she heard all of what we said, but nevertheless, she was coming.
I glanced over at Evan. He was still bleeding, holding his side where his father had stabbed him. I don't understand. Once I left the Abyss, my memories should have vanished.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. "He used us," I whispered. "Your father... he plays sick games."
Evan looked at me, startled. He hadn't expected me to remember. I shouldn't have remembered anything after leaving the Abyss. But I did.
He nodded slowly. "He would've killed all of us to bring her back."
Suddenly, the air shimmered—and from the trees, Becky emerged, her red hair whipping in the wind. Her jacket was soaked in melted snow; she'd clearly been outside a while, maybe since we vanished into the Abyss.
"Where is he?" She spotted Josh wedged between me and Evan as we tried to share our body heat with him. She dropped to her knees beside him, instantly opening her backpack, flinging out coats and a thick thermal blanket as she rushed to stabilize him.
"No.... no, no, no...Josh...what happened?!"
"His arm's gone," Evan replied. "A demon took it."
Becky's hands glowed with soft blue light as she hovered them over the wound. "His Phoenix essence is trying to repair itself, but it's... twisted?"
"There's something else that happened to Josh there," Evan said. "His blood—it was burning cold. Not like before."
"The Abyss tainted him," Becky murmured. "It's like it smothered his flame."
I watched as pale frost crept along her hand into Josh's skin. Where a normal wound would've burned or bled, Josh's body shimmered with a darkness trying to escape and a strange frost, almost like ice, trying to protect him from within.
"I need to heal him deeper. This isn't working. Becky's eyes were glowing. He's fading. The phoenix inside is flickering—torn between death and rebirth, I can feel it. I can't let him go."
Her power surged. Ice and light spiraled around Josh, swirling like a storm.
"I just don't know if I am strong enough to keep him anchored to this world," she admitted, her voice trembling, Becky's powers flickering."
I reached out and gripped her arm. "Rebecca Flatter, ma'am—you are fearfully and wonderfully made. You can do all things by the power of your Creator. Doubt yourself not."
She met my gaze. Then nodded, breathing deeply.
The snow suspended midair, stopping in time. I could feel the spiritual pressure—overwhelming, full of love, and ancient.
"I'm going to try something new," Becky gritted her teeth. "He's not just fire anymore. When I revived him last time, he absorbed some of my ice. That ice-fire inside him... I'm going to be its anchor."
From the pendant around Becky's neck, a burst of divine energy erupted—Holy Ice in its purest form. A spectral white fox made of ghost-light emerged, dancing around Josh in the air. The energy lifted him slowly from the ground.
The fox circled him, glowing brighter, guiding Becky's powers.
Then, light flashed.
Josh arched back, gasping as a glowing blue form began to take shape around his shoulder. Ethereal tattoos lit up across his body in swirling, tribal patterns. His once severed arm... began to reform. It was as if she were trying to reverse the sands of time.
The arm formed, but not as flesh and bone, as something else entirely.
Metallic. Alien. Translucent.
Etched with glowing lines and ancient runes, the arm formed like armor, dark, radiant blue like aged glacier ice touched by divine fire. It pulsed with spiritual energy, forged from the very essence of rebirth.
The ghostly fox nudged Josh back to the ground and brushed past Evan and me before returning to Becky's pendant, fading into light.
Josh lay unconscious, still—but alive.
I stared, breathless. "Wh...what was that?"
Becky wiped sweat from her brow, clearly drained. "That wasn't healing. That was... rebirth. The phoenix evolved again. I couldn't restore his real arm—his body rejected it, maybe because it's still in the Abyss. But the divine spirit gave me a new option. A new arm."
She smiled faintly. "I guess I was just the needle and thread."
Evan dropped by his brother, cradling him. "He's going to be okay, right?"
Becky nodded. "If he rests. And if that arm stabilizes. That said, she looked at us and frowned. "You're both healing, too."
We glanced down. Our blood was dry. The wounds from our fight are gone.
"Count that as a thank you," Becky said. "And I'm glad you both made it back." Becky smiled.
Becky took a seat next to Josh, waiting for the others to arrive.
We sat there under a tree that sheltered some of the snow from falling to the ground. We finally could catch our breaths; none of us spoke, just enjoyed the calm.
I looked at Evan. "We can't go back to normal, you and I, can we?"
"No," he said, "not after what we saw, not after what he did.
He said, looking over at Josh.
I looked at my hands, and I could still feel the dim power I used to protect Josh and Evan. My eyes blurred. A sudden pain struck my skull.
I could feel it—my memories slipping, fading like smoke in the wind. The wind was like a storm; it moved so fast. Names, places, and laughter, all dissolving like before. Evan, Josh, and The Waymakers are all just...shadows.
"Evan," I said, gripping his arm, tears streaming down my face. "It's happening."
His face turned to me, eyes wide, struck. "Kaysi?"
"I…I am forgetting again. I am losing my memories fast. It's tearing me away from this reality—pulling me down, drowning me in it. I... I don't want to go."
He pulled me into a tight embrace, holding me like he never wanted to let go.
I clung to him and whispered, "Don't let me forget who I am."
And everything went dark.