Page 54 of Remnants: Disruption
My heart falls a little further at the loss of a potential ally in all of this.
“So, I assume Percy knew of this?” they ask, gesturing to me.
Her name strikes a discordant note in my mind. Like a non-existent word being used in a sentence.
I shake my head slowly, meeting Blair’s eyes.
“That was indeed a new development. And was an issue up to the very end.”
Blair’s mind connects the pieces almost at once and they nod.
“I imagine you don’t want to talk about it, then?”
“If I’m being honest, Blair, I don’t know what I want right now. You piqued my interest with the text and that’s really the only reason I’m not at a bar right now testing how much my body can take.”
Blair chuckles darkly, but nods again. “Well, I think you’ll find this bit interesting then.”
They stand from the chair across from their desk and motion me to follow them through the morgue. We pass what looks like a recently completed autopsy with the usual smatterings of goreand blood. Then Blair pushes open a pair of double doors to reveal the large cuboid frozen storage.
Blair passes the first dozen or so before stopping at a one. They reach down and pull it open, and then the bay beside it.
I recognize Mara and Malachi immediately.
“When you used your Communion on these two,” Blair begins, rotating the wrists of both bodies, “the markings lit up.”
I nod, not yet following their train of thought.
“Notice something?” Blair asks glancing up at me.
Both corpses look fairly unchanged. There’s some notable surgical scarring along their neckline but—
The marks.
“They’re gone?” I whisper out, my brain not comprehending how it could be possible.
“I don’t know when it happened, but they’d been there before and disappeared sometime after you Communed with them.”
“I could only Commune with Mara,” I mumble, looking down again at the two unmarked wrists. The skin, though pale, held no sign of tattoo, brand, or anything remotely physical.
“And with Malachi?” Blair prompts.
I look around the room and find the nearest corner holding a shadow where the light from overhead didn’t quite reach.
Malachi Blackwood stirs from the blackness, his amorphous form solidifying enough to make out his height and features.
“It hurt,” I say, watching Malachi’s malevolent grin.
Blair stares down at both bodies, seemingly missing my stare down with the spirit.
“Do you believe in an afterlife, Blair?” I ask, turning back to the doctor.
They frown up at me, eyes shifting like they’re reading information in their brain.
“Why?”
“You said I’m the first to ever have Death Affliction, right?”
Blair tilts their head side to side, obviously considering their words carefully.
