"It could be the dome-world."

"What?" John asked moving forward.

I shrugged. I wasn't sure what had happened to move the focus from me to Garcia. But I felt strongly it was a decoy. That there was a greater goal. And somehow I was in the middle of it, whether I wanted to be or not.

Jade had been pretty quiet through all of my speech and I was disquieted by it. We needed a little time together before the meeting tonight.

I was so glad that my vacation was over and she wouldn't be spending anymore time with Brett.

Brett, who'd kept his distance until now said, "You know, you're putting Jade in the middle of dangerous shit all the time, Hart."

I frowned and Jade said quietly, "Please Brett, don't." I watched her put her hand on his bare arm and his face rippled with an emotion I didn't like.

Comfort, intimacy... and something else.

Ownership.

I moved closer to him and Jade restrained me. "What is he talkin' about Jade?"

Blood was boiling, simmer but a memory.

She shied away from my anger a little and I looked at her, really looked at her. There was a tightness around her eyes that hadn't been there before.

Was I the cause of that? No... it had to be Howie. Living with that whacked out family was taking its toll on her. Jade had a hand on both of us and I could feel the pulse of Brett through her. My energy had saved Jade but used him, I got a sense of his feelings.

A touch of Death was all it took.

It wasn't good. His eyes met mine, the challenge was there. And so was something else. While I'd been fighting off the chaos of my life and how it'd morphed into something else, my anger had evolved, progressing along with the circumstances as they'd presented themselves.

Brett, whose life had not changed, had achieved two things I hadn't mastered as well as he.

Patience and maturity.

He'd gotten older and I hadn't noticed it. He'd quietly stayed on the sidelines, waiting for his opportunity. When I'd used his life essence to save Jade, I'd inadvertently put them in closer alignment. It had worked seamlessly for his goals.

My eyes widened with the epiphany.

Jade got the trudging mire of my thought process and I hers, it was impossible not to, we were that in tune with each other.

I looked down into her face and she met my stare. "You don't want to go tonight?" It wasn't really the question I wanted to ask. It was the question I could.

She shook her head and tears fell. My eyes found Brett's.

"Gettin' cozy with my girl, Mason?"

He shrugged. "Things are calm around me, Hart. Dead shit doesn't creep out and hit everyone between the eyes. She doesn't get hurt..."

I flinched and he saw it.

"You don't feel protected with me?" I asked, wrapping her hand in mine.

She was silent for so long I took that as her answer but she surprised me with, "I know you'd protect me. But I want to not need it, Caleb."

She let go of Brett's arm and tucked her black hair behind her ear. Something I was so used to doing I was stunned by her doing it instead. I opened my mouth to respond and she whispered, "I don't want to need it," she repeated. It hit me like a brick wall, all the oxygen getting sucked out of the room.

Jade was breaking up with me.

My rock. My touchstone. My life. The girl I loved more than anything.

I looked at the hollow between her collarbones where the dreamcatcher necklace had been, now lost because of the inter-dimensional travel.

I couldn't breathe, I took my hand off of hers. There was no way she needed to know how badly I hurt right now.

Like evisceration.

She let me. "I'm sorry, Caleb, I just can't do this anymore."

Jonesy came up behind me, his hand going for my shoulder. I was numb, I could hardly feel the pressure of it as he cupped it. I knew my parents and Gramps were off somewhere in the periphery but they didn't interfere.

Dimly, I was aware that I wanted to puke again.

Jonesy said in a low voice of rage, "That was fucking cold, Jade." His eyes moved to where Brett stood behind her.

Her gaze met Jonesy's and she caught a sob in the back of her throat before it could become a wail. Brett came up behind her. "Let's go, Jade."

I began to shake with rage and Clyde was just suddenly there. He grabbed me when I would have killed Brett. I could taste his death like blood on my tongue. It sung all around me and I knew every dead thing within a mile awoke, the tight-wire of my emotion on the same frequency as theirs.

And I don't mean kinda wanted to kill him.

Like. Really. Dead.

"No, Caleb. Hear me. Not here, not now."

His death essence flowed over me and soothed me, as my bones felt like they were starting to slide out of my skin, a fissure without end.

My eyes burned to cry. They bulged with the pressure.

But it wasn't tears of sadness, it was tears of rage.

I tried to break away from Clyde and he strapped me against his chest like a second skin. I watched Brett open his car door for Jade not three meters away, the sun touching her black hair with blue highlights as it shone in the sun.

Jade reached up with her small hand and gripped the top of the door and as her hoodie sleeve slid backward, I saw an angry welt revealed on her beautiful, coffee-kissed skin.

Star-shaped.

CHAPTER 16

I was numb.

And that was all.

My friends were all gathered in the hideaway waiting for Garcia to come.

Clyde had never left my side, Gale's eyes, full with sympathy stayed on my body. Maybe if she took them off of me I'd just shrivel up and blow away.

Push me over with a feather.

Jonesy had said that last to Jade then turned away without a backward look. When Brett's car had pulled away, he'd dragged me to mine. Jonesy had taken my thumb and pressed it to the lock.

"I'll drive, Hart," he said, studying me with eyes that were never serious.

They were grave now.

"Yeah, okay," I exhaled and inhaled. Just breathing. Just being.

John stepped up behind him. "I'll ride with you guys."

Jonesy nodded and I got settled beside him as he drove, his hands out of place on my steering wheel, maneuvering the way to the hideaway with ease.

With practice.

We got out, the others weren't there yet.

John unfolded his lanky body from the Camaro, his eyes meeting mine.

The Js and I stared at each other. John shook his head. "Don't do it, Caleb. Not over Jade."

Jonesy's voice popped into my head, bros before hos man, bros before hos...

I shook my head. I knew there was something inexplicable going on, but it didn't change the reality of where I was at right now.

Jade was no longer mine. It didn't matter if it was a Graysheet plot, or whatever the background of the reason, she'd made up her mind.

I looked up at John, who had me by three inches. "She's got that mark, John."

His brow wrinkled at my words. I waited while he digested that fine morsel.

"Oh shit," he said dejectedly.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"What? ya bozos... share the shit!" Jonesy yelled, breaking my apathy like a stone skipping on a lake, each ripple causing me to awaken.

I blinked as Clyde stepped into the circle. He had quietly exited Gale's small smart car. Just like Mia's.

How'd he fit in there anyway? I thought randomly, my mind a sluggish tide of mud-bound quicksand, slow... sucking me in.

His eyes met mine and he said something that blew me away, "Jeffrey Parker will help with this, Caleb."

"Who?" I asked, not remotely getting it.

"He's right, you know," Jeffrey Parker said, showing up out of the border of trash that was two stories high.

I didn't ask how he found us, how he traversed the gate, the fence. I knew. My eyes went to the zombies. They stared back at me and I smelled their death.

"They smell. Your zombies smell," I told him and he nodded.

"Yes."

I waited then he said, "I have too many to keep them perfect."

I leaned forward. "They're draining ya?"

He nodded. I didn't know how many I could raise and have it be a problem. Right now, my problem was not doing it. I didn't even want to think about what would happen if I did let my power unravel.

I got a sudden visual of my mom's crazy yarn unraveling like it would when she'd crochet those ugly blankets. Unraveling without end.

Without purpose.

I shook it off.

Jade was with Brett. She had a star-shaped mark like my crazy judo instructor had.

Like Queen Clara.

Like Garcia.

Things were not looking up. Parker was here with his zombies and my life was dissolving in front of my eyes.

Clyde stood not one meter from Parker and something struck me, a deep resonating musical note had been struck, my chest tightening painfully, the breath coming tight in my throat. Gale came forward.

"We were going to tell you, Caleb. We just didn't know how," she said nervously.

I looked at Parker, then at Clyde. The zombie he'd never killed, never interfered with. I suddenly knew why. Parker was AFTD like me, Clyde was technically dead. They couldn't hide the fabric of their biology.

They were related.

Parker said, "I see you've figured out my secret, Caleb."

I gave accusing eyes to Clyde. He shook his head. "I did not know that I had a descendant who lived." He combed fingers through his hair, his eyes the exact shade of Parker's.

"How does this whacko shit happen?" Jonesy asked, incredulous.

Uh-huh, that.

Parker tried to reason with a situation that didn't make sense. He opened his mouth to say something and I backed away.

"I know what this means, guys. I know." My eyes searched theirs.

Clyde stepped forward. "We are kin."

Yeah. But there was something more. When I touched on it I recoiled, my opinion set about Parker.

There was no way, it couldn't be.

"Did you ever wonder why this zombie responded first? Out of the entire cemetery? Why Clyde and no other? When your gift was new... untried?" Parker asked, allowing me to fit the puzzle pieces together.

They floated in my mixed up brain, fried by the emotion of the day, the grief of losing Jade an open and seeping wound.

Raw.

"I'm related to you both," I whispered.

"What the fuck?" Jonesy roared.

Right.

"Okay... wait a second..." John began.

Parker held up his hand. "We don't have much time. We need to get you back to Clara's world."

I was reeling. Why?

He saw the standing question on my face. I couldn't stop thinking about the connection.

"Ask yourself this, Caleb: now that you've saved the sphere-world, how would they get to you, prevent you from interfering? How would they get rid of you without the blame falling on their hands?"

I thought about the marks appearing on Garcia and Jade.

My eyes snapped to Parker's. I whirled where I stood and reached out, grabbing a J in each hand and tore their sleeves up.

They bore star-shaped marks, identical on each, manifesting opposite, one with pale skin, the other, dark.

"Holy shit, they're taking my friends out." My mind furiously turned around those that were important to me.

Gramps.

Mom and Dad.

"My parents!" I yelled, turning to the Camaro.

Clyde grabbed me and held me. "Do not. Listen to Jeffrey's plan. It will allow this to stop, put an end to their manipulation."

Nothing would stop it. I shut my eyes and screamed into the still air of the dump. The dead rippled in response to my raw emotion, a call impossible to ignore.

Then I felt a hand on my shoulder and cool water poured through me, soothing my distress.

The dead settled.

I opened my eyes, wrapped in the arms of my dead, I met Parker's eyes.

"You stopped them," I said, my voice shaking.

"Yes."

"Why are they doing this? Why are they hurting my friends, my family... Jade."

"If you're distracted enough, you'll die. You'll snap, lose control, do something so irreversible, they'll be forced to use deadly force to stop you. The Precog has foreseen what you'll be and the future does not include Graysheets, as you call them."

The rest of my friends showed up, filing down the dirt road of trash, the sides like heaped hills of decay. Long-forgotten.

Alex clenched his fists. "What the hell is going on here?" He moved toward Parker, all contained strength in motion. And the two zombies stepped forward to meet his purposeful charge.

"No," Parker said.

"Alex," I croaked out, the enormity of the situation making speech almost impossible.