Chapter Text
Ava thought about being dead. A lot.
She didn’t know how much time had passed, or how long it had been since she had passed through the portal to this timeless place. She had spent some time unconscious, she knew, because when she woke up again she had been all healed. No sign of any divinium anywhere near her.
Then, she had met Reya again, who had been both awe-inspiring and completely useless. Reya had explained that she was the one who had healed Ava and saved her life. Reya had sat on a throne in a grand hall guarded by Tarasks, surrounded by rows and rows of hooded supplicants. Adriel had been one of those supplicants, once, and Reya was clear that she had only healed Ava because Ava helped her get rid of him. And now they were even.
Ava had, of course, asked to be sent back. And it turned out that Reya couldn’t open the freaking portal. Only the Halo could, and the Halo was inside Ava now. Using the Halo’s power to open the portal while it was inside Ava would kill her.
So, Ava was stuck. And Reya was completely useless.
Reya had blasted her out of her grand hall after Ava had used one too many choice words on her. And Ava had wandered the desert since.
She didn’t get thirsty or hungry, though she did get tired. When she got tired, she would just stop and lay down on the sand. She rotated between closing her eyes, or staring at the thin silvery swirls that passed for a sky around here, until that got too much and she would just get up and walk again.
Through it all, she thought only about one person.
“Be free,” Beatrice had said.
Ava couldn’t help but laugh the first time she recalled that. She laughed and laughed in the endless desert, tears streaming freely, both completely healed and utterly broken. She no longer needed to eat or drink, and she could just… continue, as Dr Salvius had promised for this realm.
Yet, she was completely alone, and she had no way of getting home to the person she loved.
So Ava thought about being dead, a lot.
She wished she was more like Beatrice, who always had at least four knives hidden on her person at any one time. Maybe then, Ava could test the limits of this realm and see if she could actually kill herself and end this torture.
She had thought about forcibly opening the portal with the Halo. But even if she somehow figured it out, she would likely end up going back as a corpse, and Beatrice would be devastated. Ava couldn’t do that to her. She would rather Beatrice live with the thought that Ava was somehow in some sort of heaven. Free, like Beatrice had wished.
And so Ava wandered the endless desert, and methodically went through all of her favorite memories of Beatrice. Part of her knew that it would only be a matter of time before she would go completely insane, and she didn’t want to forget.
She didn’t want to forget the months they had spent in the Alps. The time they had spent talking in bed at night, with beams of soft moonlight hitting Beatrice’s face just right, in a way that had taken Ava’s breath away the first time she saw it. Waking up to the sound of Beatrice puttering around the kitchen, making breakfast and fondly exasperated at the way Ava dragged her feet in the mornings. Beatrice’s strong, callused hands on Ava’s skin as she corrected her form. Her hand on Ava’s as she helped Ava with her penmanship. The feel of Beatrice’s soft cheek on her lips when Ava worked up the courage to kiss it.
Of course, there was the kiss too. Ava had only wanted one last moment of selfishness before everything went down. She had been caught by surprise at the fierceness with which Beatrice had kissed her back. She had felt Beatrice’s love for her, had known in her heart what it was. She didn’t need Beatrice to say it out loud, or to kiss her back. But Beatrice did.
Beatrice did, and that memory was what sustained Ava through her endless walk. If there was an end to this desert, if there was the slimmest of chance that she could get back to Beatrice alive, she would take it.
Maybe time passed, or maybe it didn’t. It could have been days, might have been years. There were no days or nights here, just a neutral gray under the silvery sky.
She talked to herself. She talked to Beatrice. Who fucking cares.
Until, impossibly, Beatrice talked back.
“Ava,” her voice made Ava stop dead in her tracks, “come back to me.”
Ava knew it wasn’t a hallucination, because Beatrice didn’t sound gentle or fond, the way that Ava had imagined her talking back. Beatrice’s voice sounded strained with pain, and desperate.
“Bea?”
“Ava?” There was a hopeful note to Beatrice’s voice now, though it was laced with pain. “Come back to me, please!”
“How?” Ava looked around wildly. She couldn’t pinpoint the direction Beatrice’s voice had come from. “Where are you?”
“Focus on me—“ Beatrice groaned in pain, and Ava gasped. “Focus on me!”
“I am! I am!” Ava focused on nothing else but Beatrice.
“Focus on us,” Beatrice said again, her voice louder this time. “Everything we shared. Everything we — we feel for each other.”
Despite Ava’s desperation, she couldn’t help but smile a little sadly at that. Did Beatrice mean their love for each other? Ava didn’t blame Beatrice for not being about to say that out loud. She knew how it went against everything that Beatrice had devoted her life to for years and years.
Ava took a deep breath like Beatrice taught her, and focused on her love for Beatrice. Her need for Beatrice to be safe and happy and loved.
Something caught her eyes, and she turned to her left. A swirl of silver and blue was growing in front of her. Her eyes widened — it was a portal!
“Come home, Ava.” Beatrice’s voice came through the portal.
Ava didn’t hesitate. She ran forward and jumped right in.
Everything went black.
*
Ava opened her eyes, and saw a boring white ceiling. She blinked, feeling tears in her eyes as she smiled. After all that time in the desert, this boring white ceiling was the most beautiful thing that she had seen.
“Ava, you’re awake!”
Ava turned, and saw Camila jumping a little in excitement, swinging Ava’s hand up and down a little as she did.
Ava chuckled. “I am. Glad to be back.”
Ava pushed herself up, noting that her body felt like her own, even if she did feel more tired than she had ever been in that desert. She wiggled her toes just to be sure, and felt a small weight in her heart lifting when she confirmed that she could still move all of her body. The halo hummed gently in her back.
Camila threw her arms around Ava once she sat up, and Ava returned the hug as tightly as she could.
When Ava pulled back, she looked around the room properly for the first time. This looked like one of the guest rooms in Dr Salvius’ mansion. It was startlingly familiar.
She had a million questions, but only one top of mind. “Where’s Beatrice?”
Camila’s face fell, and Ava felt her heart sink. Her heart started beating faster. Beatrice should have been here. Ava knew that she would want to be here.
Camila turned away to pick up something from a writing desk by the window.
“Camila?”
“Beatrice wanted me to hand you this,” Camila said, not meeting her eyes. She held out an envelope.
Ava took it with shaky hands. ‘Ava’ was the only word on the envelope, written in Beatrice’s neat script. It reminded Ava of a similar letter that she had left Beatrice.
“I don’t understand,” Ava said, trying to ignore the thundering in her ears, “what is this? Where is she? Is she okay?”
Camila had tears in her eyes, which only increased Ava’s worry. “Please, Ava, she asked that you read this before I say anything else.”
Ava felt tears in her eyes now, too. Camila didn’t answer her questions directly. Ava wanted to ask again, wanted to brace herself for something terrible. But she knew Camila, she knew Camila could stand her ground, and Ava couldn’t waste any more time.
Her hands shook when she opened the envelope and pulled out a letter, and she had to blink hard a few times to focus on Beatrice’s handwriting.
Dear Ava,
If you are reading this letter, it means that our plan has succeeded, and I have gotten what I wanted — to bring you back home. Please know that I will be happy and at peace no matter what happens to me.
I’m sorry that you have to come back to this. I know you said that you want me to live my life, and I did try. I went back to the Alps and lived there for a few months, getting reacquainted with Hans and the regulars at the bar. I hiked and swam and read and watched plays and did all the things that I thought I might enjoy, or that I thought you would.
It wasn’t the same without you though. When Dr Salvius contacted me about a way to bring you back and for her to get to Michael, I couldn’t say no.
She had warned me that the process would come at a cost, possibly irreversible, possibly fatal. Trust me when I say that I had thought long and hard about this. I know you wanted me to live. I know you would be mad if I give up my life for yours.
But the thing is, I have lived my life, Ava. I might have lived a life with many restrictions, self-imposed or otherwise, but I had traveled the world, read countless books, mastered languages and martial arts. I had built a family with my sisters in the OCS, and found a purpose. And I found you.
It pains me every time to think about how you were robbed of so much. I want you to have it all. I want you to see the world, to check off all the things you have on your bucket list, to be loved by the sisters who had loved me.
I know you wanted me to live, and I want you to know that I have. Now I want you to have the same chance I had.
I don’t know what will happen to me. Frankly, I hope the process isn’t actually fatal. I wish we could have more time together. But even if I don’t make it, please know that I will be happy and at peace, knowing that you are home, and that you will live.
Please live your life and be free, Ava. You deserve to.
I love you.
In this life and the next, and all the ones after,
Beatrice
Ava gasped, the final lines blurring into a mess as tears fell from her eyes. She gasped and gasped, feeling as if she was choking on thin air.
Camila was close, rubbing Ava’s back as she tried to get her breathing under control. She couldn’t stop shaking even as she grasped Camila’s arm, dropping the letter to the other side of the bed.
“How is she?” Ava croaked.
Camila had to take a breath, ignoring the tear tracks on her own face. “She’s on life support.”
Ava felt her world tilt out of balance. “What—what the fuck does that mean?”
“It means that machines are the only things keeping her alive right now,” Camila explained, fresh tears falling unattended, “she’s been in a coma for two days. Since you came back through the portal.”
Ava would have fallen back on the bed if not for Camila’s hand on her back. “Is she… is she going to wake up? What did Dr Salvius say?”
Camila shook her head a little. “We don’t know. Dr Salvius went through the portal when it opened. She’s no longer here. But she had assigned a team of doctors in preparation for this. The doctors said there’s still a chance that Bea would wake up.”
There was a chance. Ava took a few deep breaths, focusing on that thought. Beatrice was alive.
“Take me to her.”
“Are you feeling okay? You just woke up—“
“Camila, please,” Ava pleaded, tired and strung out and absolutely terrified at what she would find, “take me to her.”
Camila searched her gaze for a moment, and nodded. She helped Ava stand, which Ava was completely unprepared for. Her legs were wobbly, and she could feel fatigue weighing her down. When Camila suggested a wheelchair, she agreed for the sole reason that it would get her to Beatrice faster.
Camila pushed her down the hallway, and into the makeshift infirmary.
Ava heard the beeping of multiple machines before they even entered the door. When they did, Ava almost stopped breathing at the sight.
Beatrice was lying on the hospital bed that was tilted up slightly, with what looked like a breathing tube strapped to her face. There were many tubes that snaked out in various directions from under the patient gown she was wearing, connected to the row of machines behind the bed. Her right arm was wrapped in thick bandages from her shoulder down to her fingers, though her left arm was hidden under the blanket. She was so pale that it looked like the only colors on the bed came from her long black hair that fanned out on the pillow.
Ava couldn’t help the whimper that she let out, her hand over her mouth.
Camila wheeled her to the left side of the bed, and Ava leaned forward immediately, looking for Beatrice’s hand underneath the blanket. Her hand was pale and dry, with another tube connected through the back of her hand. Ava closed her hand around Beatrice’s fingers instead.
“Bea,” Ava croaked, and broke down.
Sobs wrecked through her body, and she planted her head on the side of Beatrice’s bed. She barely felt Camila’s hand rubbing her back as she cried and cried and cried.
Beatrice did this for her. Beatrice knew that she would pay a heavy price to get Ava back, and she did it anyway. And now Ava was back, and machines were the only things keeping Beatrice alive.
What was it all for?
Why was the world so goddamn cruel?
Why let Ava escape that endless hell only to come back to a world with Beatrice lying on a bed like this, barely hanging on to life by a thread?
Beatrice made Camila give Ava the letter first, so that Ava would know that Beatrice was happy and at peace.
But what about Ava? How could she ever be happy and at peace, how could she live, if Beatrice never woke up?
Ava kept sobbing, and only the beeping of the machines answered her cries.