The morning sun peers spitefully down over my last day on earth. My rose-tinted sunglasses block out the worst of it, but still, it's a shame. Seattle's beauty shines brightest under the cover of clouds. On days like that, the greenery looks even greener, and the city lights gleaming off the wet pavement are like an ephemeral window into another world.
But not today. Under the glare of the unfiltered sun, the magic cringes back into the shadows.
My port out isn't until early afternoon. That gives me a few hours in the city to do all of my favorite things before I never see any of it again.
I go to Pike Place first. Yeah, it's full of tourists and touristy things, but I adore it. I can't help myself.
It's one of the first places I remember enjoying as a kid. Back then, I was immediately enchanted by the grungy, labyrinthine quality of it. All the different sounds and smells and colors. A veritable troll market where vendors hawk shiny, silly things and mongers throw fish.
And of course, I love its proximity to the sound.
I stop at my favorite little hole-in-the-wall bakery for red bean buns and bao and my favorite overpriced coffee shop for a mint mocha. Then it's off to my usual spot to look out over the water and eat.
While I chew, I can't help but wonder if my mother ever sat on this same concrete bench or somewhere like it, drinking in this same view as she dreamt of returning to the sea. To the Aether Realm. Over on the grass, a busker with teal hair begins playing "Moonlight Densetsu" on their violin. Not bad. Wiping the last bits of pastry off my lips, I say goodbye to the Salish Sea. But just as I'm turning to head to my next stop, the book store, my phone vibrates.
Anxiety grips me, and I freeze on the spot. Forcing myself to breathe, I reach one trembling hand into my jacket pocket and pull it out. Then I turn around and fling the phone into the sound.
Fuck.
I regret the move immediately. I'd have had to abandon it before porting out anyway, but I should have at least kept responding to Sean's texts. Acting like everything was normal. "Just out shopping for a bit. Be home in a few."
Now there's a chance he might start to worry. And if he says something to my father...
I drag in a deep breath, exhale in a long sigh. I can't let myself think about that. The important thing now is that I get straight to the aetherport. Once I'm past security, it'll be harder for him to get to me.
Not impossible, but harder.
Weighing my options, I end up hopping a bus. I'd have preferred to walk all the way up to Capital Hill, but that's not a luxury I have anymore.
Though I'd promised myself not to, I dwell on my mistake the whole ride up. I'd planned everything so carefully. Put so much work not only into applying for the position on the other side, but hiding the fact I was doing it from my father, my keeper, and everyone under their influence. If all that comes crumbling down because of one moment of blind panic, it'll break me.
I don't snap out of it until the bus comes to my stop, but by then I'm shrouded in a sense of dread too heavy to shrug off.
The aetherport is crowded today—more than I've ever seen it. I've never crossed the threshold myself, of course, but it's a great place to come people watching. The most interesting thing about it is how the human people make more of a spectacle of themselves than the inhuman ones they come to gawk at.
They discovered the portal over Seattle seventy-six years ago, well before I was born…but I still know the stories. Capital Hill was a very different place, back then. The Nova Needle changed it. It changed the whole city. Now, it's hard to imagine a time before its glyph-covered, ever-rotating ring didn't loom over it all, dwarfing the structure that inspired it.
The line to get through check-in and security curls almost all the way around the outer circle of the ground level. It moves quickly, but not enough to ease my nerves. I practically chew a hole in my lip waiting for my turn. The person ahead of me—an aetheri with small, bat-like wings and bluish skin—takes particularly long, having packed well-beyond the weight limit. By the time I'm finally up, I could swear my heart's pounded a dent in my ribs.
A machine scans my fingerprint and ticket, while another weighs my backpack. I feel a spark of relief when it comes in under seventeen pounds. I won't have to leave anything else behind.
That spark flares brighter with my first steps past the gate into the passengers-only platform. Just a few more hours, and I'll be as free of my father as it's possible to be.
While still alive, at least.
Too anxious to sit—and worried it'll make me easier to spot—I wander the platform in a slow circle. I'd love to stop at one of the little bars to get a drink, but I'm a year too young for that on this side of the portal. The last thing I need right now is more coffee, but it's the only vice readily available, so coffee it is. Another mocha, iced this time.
After about an hour of walking and sipping, though, my shoulders begin to ache from the weight of my backpack, and my feet aren't thrilled with me either. Grudgingly, I sit down and bury my face in a fantasy novel. It's a definite page-turner, and I'm pretty sure I'm in love with one of the characters. But even so, my attention keeps drifting to the crowd. Looking for warning signs.
On the fifth read-through of the chapter's third paragraph, I finally manage to calm myself down enough to process what I'm reading. The story carries me away, leading me by the hand for a time before sweeping me off my feet. I'm so transported, in fact, that only distantly aware of a black-uniformed employee coming through a door to the side of the main gate to speak to one of the gatekeepers.
But when that same black-uniformed man begins to circle the platform, scanning the crowd, I take proper notice. Bringing the book closer to my face, I let my hair fall forward to hide the rest of it. Trying not to be too conspicuous in my effort to be inconspicuous.
"Erin Bianchi." my blood goes cold as my name blares out from the PA system. "Erin Bianchi. Please approach the lift for departure. Erin Bianchi."
I cringe. What the hell do I do? Even if I run for it, that guy will stop the conductor from letting me go if I'm the one he's looking for. And, let's face it, of course I am.
A tangled array of distasteful options and half-formed ideas resolves itself into something resembling a plan. Standing—casually, I hope—I head off along a path that could lead either to the restrooms or the lift. Uniform's attention is on me immediately, but he hesitates. As he starts straight for me, I speed up, veering towards the conductor where he waits at the gate just outside the portal elevator.
Pulling my ticket from my pocket, I thrust it out ahead of me. The conductor, an older man with silver and black hair, whips out his scanner wand. It flashes green.
"Enjoy the journey, Miss," he says as the glyph-etched doors slide open.
"Wait!" The uniformed man is all-out running for the gate now, gesturing at us to stop. But the conductor just narrows his eyes a tad, flashing me an unreadable look before waving me through.
Confused but grateful, I practically toss myself forward into the lift.
What the hell was that about? Whatever the reason, I wish I had a chance to thank him…though not for letting me through. That would have happened one way or another, even if the last thing in the world I want is to use the Voice again. To do the very thing my father's used me for all these years, but for my own gain instead.
But I was willing to, if it had come down to it.
The doors snap shut, and my final glimpse of Earth is the reddened face of Uniform Man as he glares at me from the other side of the gate, furious and powerless. I wonder how much Sean had promised him.
The elevator begins to lift. Slowly at first, but picking up speed. Moments later, it pierces the threshold. Reality warps around me. Dizzying fractal patterns in colors my mind can't comprehend whirl around me, spiraling ever outward and inward at once. A million voices, songs and sounds intermingled and broken and brought back together ring in my ears. Everything's cold and hot and prickly and soft at the same time.
And then it all stops.
I'm through.
