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Liam was gone. Maybe dead, maybe elsewhere. It was kind of hard to tell with him. Renee sat motionless in her seat on the shuttle remembering the time she had taken him up to the Mothership for a burial in space. In spite of every odd being against it, he returned. Augur had just told Street about another time Liam had cheated death, when the Taelons rounded up Resistance members to use their psychic energy, Renee found herself only half listening to the story. She had heard it before and it did nothing to reassure her. Liam had cheated death so often it was not hard imagining that it had finally caught up with him.
"Renee?"
That was Street speaking. She put a hand on Renee's shoulder and tried to look sympathetic.
Renee mustered a confident smile, but saw that Street was not buying her show of strength. Still, Street backed off and Renee retreated again into her thoughts. All she wanted was to go home, take a hot bath and face her feelings with a glass of the good whiskey she inherited from her father. She wanted to feel the amber liquid burn down her throat and cry until she collapsed.
They had to put down not far from the volcano, smoke was still visible on the horizon, the shuttle was almost out of energy. Augur made a global call to someone who would pick them up, Renee heard their conversation and mentally noted the lack of enthusiasm in the hacker's voice. He had known Liam since birth and had cared for him like a younger brother, but Augur was somehow able to cling to the hope that Liam still lived.
"Do you think he could have survived?" Street whispered to Augur.
Renee could almost heard the man shrug. "Liam's not like us, Street. If anyone could survive being in there, it would be Liam."
Renee wished she could be so certain. She had only recently climbed out of the black pit of despair from Jeff's death that filled her waking hours, now she was thrown back into the abyss. Worse this time because she no longer had Liam to keep her from spiraling into full blown depression or to remind her to keep breathing.
"I know." Street said. "It just seems so unreal."
Renee bit her lip to keep from laughing. "Now there is an understatement if I ever heard one," she whispered. Unreal, maybe Liam was still alive. It seemed unlikely but he was a man capable of doing the impossible. As much as Renee wanted to embrace the hope of his survival and turn heaven and Earth upside down to find him, she angrily pushed that thought away. No decisions now. Wait and see where the dust falls.
"When will you contact get here?" Renee asked, trying to sound matter-of-fact and professional. The raw emotion in her voice betrayed her.
Augur gave a noncommital shrug. "An hour, maybe more maybe less."
Renee nodded. A few hours, then she'd be home. Then she could fall apart. Renee forced herself not to make any decisions until she had the chance to put herself back together again.
Then a part of a rhyme flitted through her mind.
All the kings horses and all the kings men could not put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
If Liam was really dead it would be a long time before she was even all right.