Agent Moonlark

Chapter Thirty Five

Keefe

"Do you think she'll be alright?" he asked Physic quietly, wringing his hands nervously. It was a week after the battle, and Sophie was still healing.

Physic looked at him sadly. "I don't know how she'll take the news." Her hands cupped Sophie's face gently.

Keefe sighed. "She's strong. But I don't know what I'd do if I was in her place. To wake up and realize..."

His companion shook her head. "I don't know what I'd do either."

Sophie

There were voices. One of them was a bit deep, lacking its usual lilting lightness. The other was serious, a tinge of sadness to it. They were conversing, and they sounded so familiar.

Her cheek felt like it was on fire. It was burning so much, like acid was eating away at it. She whimpered, and felt a hand on her face, with the gentleness of a mother.

With a gasp, she awoke.

***

There was something about everything that seemed different. Everything in the room was blurry, and her vision seemed...narrower. She blinked, wondering if she needed glasses.

The hand on her face withdrew. She blinked again. It was Physic, who was smiling at her. The cautiousness lacing her features, however, gave Sophie a bad feeling. That look was the same look everyone wore when they had bad news to tell.

Immediately, Sophie panicked. "Did we lose?"

"No," the first voice, the one devoid of its usual joking tone, said. Keefe sat down on the edge of her bed and enveloped her hands with his own. "They lost."

Sophie sat up, noticing in the back of her mind that she had to turn her head to see Keefe. "Then what's wrong?"

Was there another death? Did Agent Gisela escape?

"Sophie," Livvy said, like Sophie was made of glass. "Squall didn't make it."

Sophie swiveled her head around. "What?" Her voice was faint. Suddenly, she wondered where Dex was. Was he with his family, grieving over the loss of their mother? Were they alright?

No. That was a silly question. Of course they weren't alright. They had just lost Juline. And Forkle.

She curled up in a ball, unable to believe it. So many were lost. Mitya, Forkle, Juline.

"And..." Keefe started hesitantly. "That's...that's not all." He hung his head. "Sophie...when my mom scratched your face..." He looked away, biting his lip nervously. "Your eye, Sophie...it didn't make it."

That explained why she felt weird.

Keefe

He saw her face slacken in shock, then her lower lip tremble. Her left hand reached up to touch her scarred cheek and her pirate-themed eye patch over her right eye.

"Oh." She sounded distant.

Livvy gave Keefe a nod, then waltzed out of the room, leaving with only a sympathetic glance directed to both Keefe and Sophie. Once the door shut, Keefe wrapped an arm around Sophie's waist.

"I'm sorry," he apologized. "I'm so sorry." He was crying.

Sophie closed her eyes - wait, eye. She took a shaky breath, then hugged Keefe tightly, murmuring that it wasn't his fault and that she would survive. Because she always did.

"I'm glad you're alive," she whispered, subconsciously reaching up to feel her eye patch again. She twined her arms around his neck, burying her head in his shoulder.

And at that moment, he was amazed. She had just found out someone close to her had died and that one of her eyes had been damaged beyond repair, and here she was, comforting him.

So he looked her straight in the eye, and asked, "Foster? When we've recovered, would you want to-"

She kissed his cheek, cutting him off. "I'd love to, Keefe."

Dex

He had been talking to Fitz when Granite came, looking a bit awkward. The member of the Collective shifted on his feet, and said, "Dex? Could we talk to you really quickly?"

Dex glanced at Fitz, who nodded his encouragement at the shorter boy. So he followed Agent Granite over to a room, where the rest of the Collective was sitting. As well as a one-eyed Sophie.

"Dex," she choked out, her finger tracing the edges of her eye patch. "I'm sorry about your mother."

The thing was, even Sophie couldn't say anything to make the loss seem smaller. There were no words in the world that would magically make him feel better. But he just nodded and responded with, "I'm sorry about your eye." They had all lost something or someone.

His best friend offered him a tight smile as her hand fell from the eye patch to her other eye, where she started tugging at her eyelashes.

Agent Blur stood up. "Sophie Foster, you are aware of our plans for you?"

"To become part of the Collective?" she asked, an eyelash fluttering to the ground like a raven's feather. Dex squirmed a bit in his chair.

"Yes," Agent Wraith said. "You are to take Agent Forkle's place."

Sophie said nothing for a moment. She maintained her stoic expression before finally answering. "I could never replace him."

Granite leaned forward in his chair, gray cloak falling off his shoulders. "Agent Moonlark, we ask not for you to replace him as Agent Forkle. We ask for you to replace him as a member of the Collective."

"Excuse me," Dex piped up, "but why am I here? This hardly seems relevant to me." Normally he wouldn't have spoken so bluntly, but seeing his mother's chair so empty struck a chord in his heart.

"Of course," Agent Blur said. "Excuse us for not explaining to you beforehand why we have summoned you as well. We wish for you to replace your mother's spot on the Collective."

Dex sucked in a breath. He saw his mother's empty chair. He saw her eyes, beckoning to him, encouraging him. He saw her legacy.

He accepted.

Keefe

Who would have thought? The Moonlark and the Lodestar.

And that's a wrap. Yay! I'm done. I'm sorry if this was rushed, but at least I'm not making you guys wait any more. But wait! This isn't done yet! I'm gonna write a bunch of bonus scenes and cram them into a chapter! :D

You don't have to wait around for that. But I was hoping to write more about the Basiles, so....

Thanks so much for 900 votes and 23k reads! 

Repost Author: And that's it! Credits to the original author! I love you all for being so patient with me! Maybe I'll make a sequel if you can get more reads and votes for this story? Anyways, I'll follow up with the extra scenes soon.