⸂SHUT. UP.⸃
For all that Gale’s new position as person who was keeping all the kids quiet wasn’t endearing her to said children, it was a relief to Emilia. At least she didn’t have to deal with signing at them to zip it. She had enough to worry about as it was, her attention split between walking—and not falling or dropped Astra while doing so—sending her energy zipping through the city, searching for the missing child, and turning what little focus remained on using her energy to heighten her hearing. Oh, and she had to pay extra attention to any sound lingering in the aether. Double hearing.
Every little sound, distant as they usually were, was a potential sign of where the child, Stephy, could have run off to. Half the time, the energy she sent squirrelling after the mystery noise returned having found one of the homeless kids. They were still grouped together, thankfully, but their haphazard twists and turns through the city, following signs from the aether, were making it difficult for Emilia to immediately rule out that they were the cause of any noise.
The rest of the time, her energy had bonked against the glass-like material of one house or another’s windows, the occupants the source of the noise. Most of those times, Emilia hadn’t wanted to dwell on the exact source of the sounds she’d overheard—it was the middle of the night, okay!? The origin of most noises was… you know, obvious. Personally, not being a voyeur, she was contenting herself to believe whatever noises she heard—moans, grunt, spasms, banging—were children crying. Children cried out all the time, but especially when nightmares of the dark came. Nightmares and the hunger of babies was clearly the cause of all the noises she heard.
Actually, it would have been nice if she couldn’t convince herself of such things—if the noises she heard had been more clear-cut as either adult fun time or crying children sounds she could have ignored the former. They weren’t that clear, however. A noise could come from anything, but the majority of the sounds filling the night were distance voices, and the aethervoices that floated her way were too far away, too obscured for her to realize what their source was until her peeping energy returned, and she regretted searching for the runaway child.
That regret wasn’t going to stop her from continuing to search, however. These children, regardless of how caring for them had become increasingly painful as their trek went on, were still children. They were innocent and scared, and Emilia had to keep them safe, not just for her or them, but for V and the children who had risked their lives to keep ones like Stephy safe.
In hindsight, it was possible the homed children had actually been less work while they were catatonic. Being slow and difficult to move was infinitely better than this panicked desertion of their group!
⸂Shh!⸃ Gale hissed at one of the kids again. Emilia wasn’t sure which one it was. There were just so many moving and talking now. She had definitely been told all of their names—save the boy who no one knew and still wasn’t talking, currently being totted around by Kelly. Many of them were so quiet and distant from her and the core group who had been working on the challenges, however, that she hadn’t retained their name.
The chastised child grumbled, foot kicking against the ground and catching on something. Whatever it was went flying, colliding loudly—at least to Emilia’s enhanced ears—with a building.
“This is terrible,” Emilia mumbled to herself as she caught Benny’s hand, the boy having stumbled. At least in her case, the only ones who could potentially hear her or the noise of their walking were other visitors or the rare local with their hearing intact. Honestly, at this moment, she’d accept anything coming along. Most people had a soft spot for kids. There was just something inherently inhuman about hurting kids, and she figured that regardless of who came along and how seriously they were taking the raid, they’d be pretty likely to help her deal with the kids… before killing her.
Emilia was okay with that. She was pretty done with the raid anyways. It wasn’t fun. It was stressful and terrible, and she was going to need a vacation once all of this was over. Screw the Ship’o Stars and the mystery knotter man waiting for the bartender up there. She was going to use Olivier’s money and go somewhere else—take all her friends on a vacation out of the pink tide. The Black Knot and SecOps and the Club Cartel could deal with the knotters being slipped into people’s drinks.
She was a civilian… kinda. Technically, she and the rest of her unit had never been decommissioned and were still on active duty, even those who had returned to the Free Colonies. Something about how it was easier to keep them on, and pay them for doing nothing, than deal with giving them access to military shit if something happened. Nothing had happened, although she knew a few of her unit members used their active status to get around the laws and regulations when it came to dealing with echoes, or stay up to date on the latest military intel and research.
Emilia shook herself as she readjusted her hearing, her energy having naturally shattered with the loudness of whatever the child had kicked. She was about to return to moving, the group having briefly stopped while Gale and the child bickered about how whispering wasn’t being quiet, when Miira caught her sleeve.
The preteen looked grave—fierce and determined in a way Emilia had only seen her during the chaos of the water slides. Her jaw flexed, she sucked in a long breath. ⸂I think we should stop looking.⸃
The group stilled, all eyes turning to Miira. In Emilia’s arms, Astra peeked out of her neck.
⸂Why?⸃ Caro asked.
⸂We’ve been looking a long time,⸃ Miira explained, turning to look at the other kids. Nearly all were younger than her, only Gale older, while Kelly was around the same age. ⸂We haven’t seen any sign of them. Benny even tried to search the aether, and before you say anything, I know most of us don’t believe that stuff, but he still tried for us. Neither he nor Emilia have found anything. Gale, Kelly and I have been looking too. There is no sign of her, and we can’t wander the streets forever.⸃
⸂But… we have nowhere else to go.⸃
Miira shifted, eyes turning back to Emilia. ⸂You can find the others, right?⸃
Emilia nodded, while the others broke out into a chorus of complaints. In the opinion of many, they had made the wrong decision to follow Sawyer in the first place, and the disappearance of Stephy had been a wonderful excuse to be free of the homeless children.
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⸂You can’t be serious, Miira!⸃
⸂They were running around the city all willy-nilly! That brat pretends to be reading the will of the world, but he’s just getting everyone lost!⸃
⸂Yeah!⸃ a number of the children replied in unison.
Miira turned back to them, eyes burning as she glared them down. ⸂They risked their lives for us! They lost a bunch of their friends, getting you lot down those slides! We might not believe what they do, but we owe it to them to trust that they’ll keep doing what they think is best, not just for them, but for all of us!⸃
⸂Then why didn’t they come back!?⸃
⸂Because the universe didn’t tell them to,⸃ Benny piped up. He still sounded confident—impressive, given he was the only homeless child in their group now—but it wasn’t lost on Emilia that he had tucked himself next to her. ⸂To trust the universe means to follow it, no matter what your heart says. They definitely wanted to stay, but if they’d stayed, they would have lost the confidence of the universe.⸃
Emilia closed her eyes and groaned as an argument broke out between Benny and the group, who were not impressed by his words. It would have been fascinating, listening to them argue—as previously noted, Emilia was really curious about the seeming lack of religion in this world, and the homeless children's beliefs did seem to lean into the religious, after all—if not for the fact that this wasn’t the time or place. They didn’t have time for this—nor for her to ask the thousand questions about religion and beliefs trying to rattle free of her brain. They needed to move.
They needed to decide what they were doing—where they were going.
Pulling out her handy dandy notebook, Emilia scribbled on it, “Ask Benny if he can lead everyone back to the others.”
Miira, the only one not actively involved in the ensuing argument, peered at the paper and nodded. Steeling herself, the girl stepped between the arguing parties to ask Benny if he could lead them.
Benny, who had been looking about ready to launch himself at one of the younger boys, straightened, eyes turning first to the notebook—though she was certain he couldn’t read it—and then to Emilia. ⸂Yes! I can do it! I can find them, I promise!⸃
⸂You can’t seriously be willing to trust this kid with our safety,⸃ Gale growled, glowering at Emilia.
“I will look a bit more. I can move faster without you. If I haven’t found them in an hour, or I hear your group having trouble, I will come find you. I can’t just leave Stephy to fend for herself,” Emilia wrote, holding the pad out for Gale to read.
The teenager continued glowering at the paper, but knew she couldn’t argue. No one wanted to leave Stephy out in the dark alone, but since they couldn’t find her… eventually, Emilia would have to give up searching—hope someone found her in the morning. Someone kind and helpful, hopefully. Emilia knew the terror that some people could be, however, and just leaving the girl alone to face their evil, without searching at least a little more…
Astra’s arms tightened around Emilia as Gale began trying to convince the others to go along with the plan to let Benny lead them. The boy himself had already turned, his energy reaching out weakly in search of some sign of which way to go. Honestly, Emilia was pretty sure she was going to regret letting the boy lead them. He might believe in the power of the aether—in the signs hidden within it and the universe—but he was young and his core weak. It wouldn’t take long for him to wear himself out searching for signs.
Mostly, Emilia was just hoping that she could send the group off in the general direction of the other group, and they’d magically find each other.
…
Technically, Emilia supposed that Benny and Sawyer’s aether reading was magic. She was hoping for the other sort of magic, the things just work out kind of magic… which might also technically be the same thing that their aether reading was? Trust the universe to guide you, so things work out?
Emilia stared into the middle distance as she contemplated whether they were the same thing or not. All things considered, the few, mostly superstitious beliefs that some Baalphorians had, most at least jokingly referring to occasionally, were pretty close to the beliefs that the homeless kids seemed to have.
Belief in the universe guiding your way, all your thoughts and intentions and hopes potentially being heard and written into existence.
It was probably a coincidence… or some visitor had brought their belief system into this world, and it had spread, at least among some of the population.
Benny’s energy caught on something, and he perked up. Fortunately, it was in the same direction that Emilia had last sensed the other group, and when dozens of eyes turned on her, expectant, she was able to confirm that that was also the direction she would have gone, were she leading.
⸂If this goes badly, I’m blaming you,⸃ Gale hissed as she gathered the group.
Benny and Miira took the lead, the girl quietly encouraging him. Her own energy was shuddering within her, attempting to reach out and do… something. Before their group had split, Miira had been interested in what Sawyer was doing, asking him and Benny questions about the process—about how he was doing it and what he was looking for. It was possible she was trying to put what she had learned to use now, but she could just as easily be attempting to follow Emilia’s own example and send her energy searching through the world.
Gale pushed her way into the centre of the group, arms full with two of the younger children, their eyes wide and afraid. Kelly took up the rear, quietly encouraging the few straggler children to get moving.
⸂Do you want me to take her?⸃ he asked, nodding at Astra.
The girl’s arms tightened further, her message clear: don’t make me leave you.
Emilia shook her head, quickly scribbling out a message to the preteen boy. “No, she won’t weigh me down, but take this.”
Kelly glanced at the message, eyebrows creasing. An outright frown broke out across his face as Emilia held out her {Blood Dagger} to him. ⸂You’re the one who will be alone.⸃
Emilia made a sign for more, motioning to herself. The boy nodded, accepting the dagger with an only barely shaking hand.
⸂I’ll keep them safe,⸃ he promised, which wasn’t something that should have been on him. He was a baby—they all were. None of this was fair to them, but it wasn’t something so simple that Emilia could just will it away. She couldn’t make herself a dozen people, each intent to meet the needs of each individual child.
All she could do was her best, and hope she wasn’t fucking up—hope the universe was guiding her correctly, she supposed.
“Well,” she sighed as the group disappeared into the darkness, the children who had been afraid of the dark tucking themselves closer to the others, “shall we get going?”
Astra tilted her head at Emilia, a silent question of “What?” before tucking herself back into her neck.
“Yeah…” she breathed out, looking around before choosing to backtrack.
The universe might not send those following it backwards, but Emilia had never been one for listening to authority figures.