A week later, she received a second letter from Babylon. It was shorter, simpler, more concerned; he’d gone by her apartment and hadn’t seen her, the landlord had said she was gone, he had called her and she hadn’t answered. Her States phone sat blank on her desk, far out of range of Verizon’s cell towers. She couldn’t receive his call any more than she could receive a message from outer space. He still signed it with yours, always, and referred to their possible destiny. Meant to be? The aftershocks of a cosmic big bang that forced Avalon and Babylon together, pressed them so close that their atoms combined--it was a romantic idea. She read the paper once, twice, again as she waited at the table for Jacob.

The trip to her Wonder was scheduled. Or, the trip to the seashore was scheduled, and there would hopefully be no need to involve anyone higher than Jacob and herself; five kilometers was a little over two and a half miles, well within her teleportation distance in Destiny City. They had no idea what defenses Avalon might have from intruders, though, and that was where the stumbling block lay.

“We can get a General-Queen here to lend you a boost,” said Jacob over a pint, “but they’re all based in London, or in Paris, they’re not exactly accessible and I don’t want to bother them over this.” Over a traitor, was the subtext, and for all that it wasn’t written she still heard it clear as day.

She nodded over her beer. Her mind is no more on what he’s saying than it is on the state of elections in Middle Eastern nations--she is thinking, Until then, I’ll look for you tomorrow. I love you. He was looking for her. He missed her. He wanted her to come find him, but she was stuck half a world away, on the other side of an ocean so deep and so vast that she could not surmount it even if she was careful and sparing with her teleportations. She wanted nothing more than to see him that night.

Instead, she got home and settled herself at the fold-out desk that holds her laptop and her notebook. She traced the password onto her computer screen, and when she was done, opened up an email client.

Quote:
To: finn.derouen@destinycityu.alumni.edu
From: grivers@gmail.co.uk
Subject: Miss you

Finn,

I’m sorry I didn’t tell you this before, but I’ve been reassigned. To England. I knew then, but I didn’t say. I suppose I still wanted it to go away. It didn’t, but I had hoped it would. So, I’m sorry.

I’m fine. You do sound like a lovesick dork. I’m technically here to be an adjunct and a student for a doctorate in English pre-modern literature, but what they really want me to do is to go back to Avalon and give it to them. There’s a very big part of me that is scared that I will become broken, like Alkaid, if I do as they want me to. But I am more afraid of dying.

I love you. I’m not annoyed. Please keep writing.

Love,
Vanya


She looked at the letter. It was short, and sweet, and made no mention of anywhere she was or what she was doing. Her mouse icon hovered over the ‘send’ key, and then--she clicked discard.

It was safer if he didn’t know, and all she needed to do to secure her place back at home was do this, and then she could return to him. That was all she wanted: to go home. To go home to him. Yes.

If only.