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he explained.
"Tech test. It was a bomb, or something like a bomb. I couldn't
tell you what it was for, only that we got sent in to clean up the
mess. It fractured space, turned this place to shit."
    "So the sky's not changing at all," she
guessed. "It's bubbles of different realities moving around at
random."
    "Yes ma'am… but not at random." He opened his
eyes again to find her studying him with an intent gaze.
    "So there's a pattern, and that's how you've
survived."
    He nodded. "Most died in the first few weeks,
but at least a hundred of us figured out the pattern. But that was
a year ago, and one mistake gets you killed."
    "I'm sorry."
    "Appreciated. But nothing you can do to
change it." He looked up, judging the sky. "Purple slice is next,
gotta tie ourselves up." In response to her asking look, he
explained further. "You gotta tie yourself up or you'll claw your
own eyes out, or worse. The trick is making the ropes escapable,
just not too quickly. Purple slice doesn't last long, but you don't
want yourself getting out early, and you don't want to still be
restrained when the brain-eaters come. That's the piss yellow. Not
pea-soup yellow like the flames' sky."
    "Brain-eaters?" She frowned.
    "Yes ma'am. And after that, the white… I hate
the white… that godforsaken Preacher…"
    "I have a better idea," she said, looking
toward the direction from which she'd come. "Why don't you come
with me, and we can both go home?"
    Yes. Say yes! Thinking to look up his file, I
quickly accessed and scanned what I could. He was twenty-two, and
from… that reality. Damn.
    "With respect, ma'am, I'm already home." I
heard a certain bitterness and resignation in his words. "And… I
have to be here for the black."
    "The black?"
    He remained quiet for nearly ten seconds,
long enough that I thought he wasn't going to answer… until he
snapped out of his own thoughts. "I have to be here for the black,
ma'am. I, uh… I…" He paused again. "I don't have the words to tell
you about the black, but I think you should go, if you've got a way
to get, before it comes. Guys are all dead, but the equipment still
works, and I gotta be here to use it when the black comes. I know
this place is hell, but there's a whole fractured world out there
full of my people, and I got to… I got to… I'm staying as long as
there might be one kid out there, or one family, or whoever, trying
to make it. Russian guy, too, and Yngtak lady, though I don't know
why she cares about us. I think she stays because of the black, and
what might happen to other places if we don't stop it each day. So…
I can't go with you. Sorry, ma'am."
    Throughout his bitter and hopeful speech, she
just watched him, her eyes a mix of disappointment and
understanding. "Alright." She looked up at the sky. "Do the flames
come back again today?"
    He recited practiced phrases out loud.
"Gravity, death music, shapeshifters, flood, flames, invisible
slicers, silver nooses, flood, flames, crazy, brain-eaters, the
Preacher, tree ghosts, flood, silver nooses, crazy, dream-stealers,
the black… nope. That was their second time already today. Come
back tomorrow."
    She grimaced. "I can't. I've only got a
single day here. But I need to talk to them - if I could just find
out where they came from, that'd point us in the right
direction."
    "Whaddya need living flames for?"
    "Some people I'm looking for went through
their world, or one like it," she replied cryptically.
    "Some people, eh?" He searched around in the
mud for a minute or two, before lifting a muddy red crystalline
shard. "Well, best I can do is this. It's a dead flame. But
careful, though, if it gets hot it'll come back to life."
    She took it carefully, and placed it in a
pocket. For the first time, I saw her smile. "Thank you."
    "Of course. All part of the job." He laughed
weakly. "It's just good to hear some English for once. Russian guy
talks over the radio sometimes; no idea what he's sayin', but I
think by now he just talks to talk.