Coldbrook

2

Tommy had spoken to Jayne as Sean had dragged her through the breach, reminding her of the years they had been together, good times and bad. She’d laughed and cried with him, raged at him and made love with him, and most of those memories had not involved her churu. Coming through at last, she had been sad to leave Tommy behind, but in a way she never would. He had saved her life and whatever she did from now on was testimony to that.

‘Want me to carry you?’ Sean asked.

‘Want me to carry you, old man?’

‘I’m fifty-two!’

‘Yeah? And?’

‘I’m not old.’

‘Look old to me. Bit of a beer gut there. Greying hair, thinning on top.’

‘I am not!’

‘Quiet!’ Moira was a few steps ahead, and she’d turned to scold them. They’d all been warned to walk in silence, and the children seemed to be doing it better than those adults who’d come through. Perhaps it was a game to the kids, but Jayne wasn’t sure. Maybe for those so young, survival and adaptability to change were instinctive.

They walked slowly, mostly as a concession to Jayne. The people from Gaia looked at her with a combination of awe and fear, and she wasn’t certain she’d ever get used to that. Sean had already stopped trying to persuade her to take Drake’s cure. When Marc is done, she’d said. He’s the main man now. They both knew to expect hard times.

As they topped the first rise and she could see further, a wave of pain washed over her. She gasped, and Sean held her arm.

‘Will you look at that,’ he said softly.

Jayne sighed away her pain, and saw another world that she might call home.