Chapter 70: Chapter 70

Cadence was falling, and there was nothing in the world anyone could do about it. For all of their superpowers, their strength, speed, power, ability to heal, or make things fly, no one was close enough or could react fast enough to save her.

She hung in the air for a moment as Aaron watched, frozen, staring into each other’s eyes, before she started to plummet. He didn’t see fear there, though. Only regret—and sorrow. She’d taken it a step too far, pushed a little too hard, followed her instincts over the side of a cliff, and now, all anyone could do was watch and pray. Her mouth moved in a silent message before she dropped below the wall of rock.

The rest of his team seemed to be reacting at full speed whereas his feet, once they started moving, were failing him, dragging him closer to the ledge but not as quickly as some of the others. Whether it was the terror at seeing her down there and knowing she was beyond help or the fact that he hadn’t been there to protect her, he couldn’t say, but Jamie and Elliott both reached the ledge seconds before he did. Jamie didn’t slow at all, catapulting right after Cadence, either confident in his ability to heal himself or knowing Cass had him. Once he was able to, Aaron looked down and followed the Healer’s trajectory. It was evident by the way he was falling that Cass was actually lowering him. Aaron’s eyes searched the ground, not sure whether or not he wanted to see Cadence, and part of him was relieved when he couldn’t, though the tattered state of the trees directly below where she’d dropped from the horizon let him know where they would find her.

“I’ve got you, Aaron, if you wanna go,” Heather said in his head. He didn’t bother to glance over his shoulder to know she had moved and was close enough to lower him down. Cassidy may have said something similar to Jamie, or maybe he just didn’t have to stop and think about it the way that Aaron did. Blood, broken bones, splintered bodies—all of those things were clinical to Jamie under normal circumstances. Maybe the doctor could turn that part of his brain off and not think about who it was he was trying to put back together. Aaron didn’t think he was capable of the same.

But he would go. He had to. There was a chance Jamie had gotten there on time. He had to believe that. The fact that it was Daunator who caused her to fall would mean there was the possibility she’d already be gone before the Healer could do anything at all. But not going wasn’t an option, so Aaron took a step off of the ledge, not really caring if Heather caught him or not.

She did, and the ground approached at a much slower rate than it would have otherwise. When he reached the forest floor, he stood perfectly still for a moment, hearing Jamie’s voice in front of him, between trees with thick branches that hid the sight from where his feet met a carpet of leaves. Behind him, Cassidy, Brandon, and Elliott touched down. The little sister was sobbing quietly, and Elliott’s palm on Aaron’s shoulder felt like a sledgehammer, jarring him back into reality. He moved forward first, bracing himself.

Jamie was there, of course, a soft blue light emanating from his hands as he bathed her from head to toe in his powers. He was talking, saying something Aaron couldn’t understand, begging her to do something... anything. Cadence was so still, like she was sleeping. Her chest didn’t seem to rise and fall at all. Her hands were folded neatly over her abdomen, her hair tossed out around her shoulders. It reminded him of a photograph he’d seen a long time ago, one Cadence was familiar with, too. Right after Elliott had died, she’d mentioned it, while they were on top of the headquarters building in Reno.

"Hey, how about you get down off of that ledge before you pull an Evelyn McHale, huh?" she’d said, sneaking up behind him. He’d known it was her, though, knew she was worried about him. He’d been sitting there for so long, pondering the state of the universe, how he could go on without his best friend, wondering if he should utilize the Blue Moon Portal to bring him back, regardless of the consequences.

"I'm not going to jump," he had told her. "I'm probably not even going to fall."

"Probably not, but I really don't want to carry you around in a mason jar for the next six months while your body decides how to solve the Rubik's Cube formerly known as the Guardian Leader. Come on." She’d grabbed him by the arm and thigh, spinning him around so violently, he remembered warning her that she might just make him fall after all. A few moments later, he’d kissed her for the first time in a long time, really kissed her, let her know she was the only one he ever wanted to be with for the rest of forever. She’d broken up with Cale, they’d made love for the first time, and then he’d done something ridiculously stupid. But she’d been there to save him.

Now, she was the one who had needed saving, and he hadn’t been there to do it. None of them had. He should’ve known better than to leave her with Christian. He should’ve let the others handle the Vampires and went to her side. Of course, he logically knew there wasn’t anything he could’ve done differently. But standing there looking at her lying on the ground so still, so beautiful, it seemed like there had to be a way to go back and make things different so that she was still standing on the top of the mountain, victorious, after ending the most dangerous Vampire in the history of the world.

Jamie was doing chest compressions. The rest of the forest started to move around him again, and Aaron realized he needed to do something, anything, now. If there was a way to keep from losing her, or bring her back if she was already gone, they needed to find it. Running a hand through his hair, he stepped forward out of his memories and dropped to the ground next to her, ignoring the fact that his knees were instantly coated in her sticky, crimson blood. “Breathe for her,” Jamie said as he reached thirty, and Aaron’s instincts took over. He knew how to do CPR. Tilting her head back to open her airways, he breathed into her still-warm lips twice and then waited for Jamie as he pumped her heart for her. The doctor may as well have been counting in slow motion. It seemed like it took forever for him to reach thirty again. When he did, Aaron dutifully gave her two more breaths, willing her to start breathing again on her own. She didn’t.

A crowd had gathered at Cadence’s feet, spectators stacking up between the trees. Hannah was doing her best to keep them all calm, he could feel it now, but the sounds of quiet sobs still broke through the consistency of Jamie’s counting. Aaron couldn’t pull his eyes away to look at any of them but knew Cassidy was standing to Jamie’s right, Brandon’s arms around her, tears streaking her face. Elliott was near Cadence’s boots—her favorite pair, the ones Aaron had gotten for her just a few weeks ago, a birthday present. A “because I know you’d love them” present. He could hear their mutual best friend muttering under his breath, some sort of prayer mixed with every curse word he’d ever heard. Jamie reached thirty. Aaron breathed. Cadence didn’t.

Her IAC hadn’t stopped working until she was already on the ground. He could’ve fallen with her, seen what she was seeing, if he’d wanted to. He hadn’t. Now, it was off, completely black, not a message of goodbye, though he’d seen her mouth moving as she fell and knew in his heart she was apologizing. She had nothing to be sorry about; she’d been doing her job. He was the one who had failed her, the one who wasn’t there when she needed him.... Maybe he would’ve had time to say something to her while she was plummeting through the air if he’d been able to function, but he hadn’t sent her a message either. Maybe acknowledging that she was untethered might mean their connection was broken, too.

“Thirty.”

Breathe. Breathe. “Cadence, breathe!” Sending her messages did no good when the light wasn’t on. “Come on, Cadence. Please, breathe! I can’t do this without you. I can’t do anything without you. Breathe! Damn it! Breathe!”

“Cass, you got anything? Anything at all?” Elliott asked, the desperation in his voice mirroring the emotion Aaron felt seeping into his pores.

He glanced up then, tore his eyes away from that beautiful face to look at her sister, praying she’d have something to say. She swiped at her tears. “No,” she said, shaking her head, but there was more. He could feel it. “It’s only... something... else.”

“What do you mean?” Elliott asked.

“I don’t know,” Cassidy admitted. “I can’t describe it. I’ve never sensed it before. It’s like... a conscious mind with no thoughts.”

Aaron felt hopeful for a moment. Was it possible Cadence was still with them but wasn’t fully capable of thinking yet?

“It ain’t her, though,” Heather said from behind Elliott. “I can feel it, too. But whoever it is, it ain’t Cadence.”

“No, you’re right, it’s not. But it is weird....”

His hopes shattered, Aaron dropped his eyes back to Cadence’s face, no longer interested in whatever it was the two Hybrids were picking up, until Jamie’s “thirty” came out even more remorseful than the last one. Aaron breathed for his broken wife and then looked at his friend. Even if he wasn’t an emotional empath, he might’ve been able to detect Jamie’s shift in disposition. His sorrow wasn’t just for Cadence, all of a sudden. It was for... someone else.

Reality hit him hard, hard enough to knock him backward onto the forest floor, a stunned silence taking over his countenance again. He stared at Jamie in disbelief, waiting for some sort of an acknowledgment. But the doctor was too busy counting, too busy making Cadence’s heart beat—keeping Aaron’s baby alive. Cadence was pregnant—with his baby—a baby that would only stay alive as long as its mother’s heart was beating, as long as there was oxygen in her blood....

“Breathe, Aaron,” Jamie demanded, and then he remembered that he had a job to do and sat back up to do it, although Jamie might as well have been reminding him that he also needed oxygen to function. He did as he was told, blowing two breaths into the body that housed the two most important souls in the universe and then stared at the doctor, willing him to answer the unanswerable, willing him to say something so that he didn’t lose his mind.

It took a moment for Jamie to acknowledge that Aaron knew who it was Cassidy and Heather were sensing. Whether it was because he was tied up or because he didn’t know what to say, Aaron couldn’t be sure, but when he finally spoke, continuing to pound on Cadence’s chest as he did so, his explanation was guarded. “She just found out. Right before we came here.”

“She knew?”

“Yes.”

“You knew?”

The Healer nodded. “Twenty-nine, thirty.”

Aaron breathed twice. Then waited.

Jamie got to fifteen before he could speak again. His voice broke when he did. “She didn’t... think you’d let her come if you knew.”

“I wouldn’t have.”

There wasn’t anything else for Jamie to say, so he didn’t, except for the counting, the counting that started over twice a minute and never stopped. He reached thirty, and as heartache from two centuries ago welled up inside of him, Aaron pressed his lips to Cadence’s mouth and breathed twice. Tears stung his eyes, but he refused to let them fall because acknowledging their presence meant giving up. And he couldn’t do that, not again. Not this time. He couldn’t do any of it again. He said as much, a quick message to the doctor across from him. Jamie said aloud, “I know. Me neither,” because he loved Cadence, too. Not the same way, but he loved her.

They all did. All of these people crowding around, those who had known her for as long as she’d been a part of the team, those who’d met her in person for the first time earlier that day, they all loved her. Every single person in the ravine was praying to whatever power they believed in that the Hunter Leader would open her eyes. Across the globe, as messages were sent, as people watching the hunt realized what had happened, prayers and well-wishes, hopeful thoughts and crossed fingers, every positive vibration in the universe was coming their way on the wings of thousands of Hunters and Guardians who wanted nothing else in the world but for Cadence Findley McReynolds to take a breath and open her eyes.

She didn’t. It had been six minutes. Jamie’s desperation was starting to fade into despair. He said thirty. Aaron breathed twice. Cadence Findley McReynolds lay on the ground completely still, a beautiful tragedy.