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Daisy hasn’t let go of Jon’s hand for days. Actually, she has no idea how long it’s been. She can barely remember what a day feels like. It could have been an hour. It could have been a month. Until he came, she couldn’t remember what it felt like to move. She knows now: it feels like pain and crushing and terror and dirt. It feels like having no way to move and moving anyway. It feels like screaming muscles and bleeding skin and never having enough air to breathe.
It feels like hope.
Daisy can’t remember the last time she felt that. Hope. Has she ever? A lot of before is blurry, smeared over, like a window covered with dust and grime, but she knows she never felt the need for hope. What would be the point of it? Hope leads you a merry dance, always bright and beautiful in front of you, but you can never touch it, never grasp the edge of its white and sparkling dress, and the paths it leads you down grow darker and twistier and bloodier until you can barely see it. Better to let it pirouette on ahead, so far in front that you don’t see it any longer, don’t even remember it used to be there.
Hope isn’t a silver figure in a shining dress any longer. It’s a thin, warm, flesh and blood hand grasped so tightly in hers that sometimes she’s afraid she’ll break those fragile bones and yet she never lets go. She only holds on tighter. Better broken than gone.
They crawl on. Sometimes Daisy thinks the way is getting easier, that there’s a little more air to suck in, that her ribs are being squeezed a little less hard, but the moment she wonders, the crushing, unrelenting depth presses back down and they have to stop and wait and the only thing that stops Daisy from despairing is Jon’s fingers in hers, holding on just as tightly as she is. Sometimes they have to wait a long, long time before they can start moving again.
She wonders, at times, whether he really does know the way. Maybe the coffin has caught him, too. Maybe it’s letting him have his little attempt at escape before it forces him to give in, to submit. Daisy had thought, for a long time, or perhaps a short time that felt like a long time, that if she was just strong enough, clever enough, persistent enough, she’d find those stairs again, that all she had to do was try.
She’d understood in the end, though. The coffin doesn’t let people go. That’s not what it’s for.
Ahead of her, Jon gives a stifled little cry. Her name. His hand tugs on hers, hard.
“Uh,” she says. “I’m… I’m here.”
“I… I can…” He’s still pulling on her hand. She drags herself forward another inch. Two. “It’s… it… it’s closer.”
“What is?” she says. Her thoughts are sluggish, as pinned and crushed as her body.
“My anchor.” Right. Yeah. She remembers him talking about that. Didn’t really understand it. “My… the… a rib. I can… I can feel… I know the way.”
He pulls her forward again, his fingers bruisingly tight around hers. Does he really know the way? A rib? Really? But she follows anyway. She won’t let go. She scrabbles with her free hand at the dirt, pushes with her feet and elbows, works her way along the tiny, hot, airless crack in the earth.
An odd feeling against her hand, the one holding Jon’s. Cooler. The movement of air. Her heart jumps.
“What?” she croaks. “How?”
“I don’t…” Jon says. She can feel him moving, still pushing forward ahead of her, the bone and muscle hope of his grip still strong. “It’s like my… my link is… stronger.”
His hand slips. Daisy’s stomach turns over.
“Slow down,” she pants, heaves herself forward to keep pace with him. Her ankle catches on something. “I… I can’t…”
“Don’t let go,” Jon says, and his hand tightens around hers once more. “Come on. We’re close. This way.”
It seems to take forever. Daisy wrenches her ankle free, finds her head and shoulders emerging into a space that’s… it’s not wide, but there are a few inches of give, now. She can hitch herself onto her elbows, push up against the… what is that? It’s flat. Earth cascades down on her, but it’s not the same stone and compacted dirt she’s been struggling against for so long.
“Here!” Jon says, and his voice is suddenly right against her ear. He’s pressed up against her, but he’s heaving at the ceiling, too. “Here, come on,” he says. “Push.”
“I… I am,” she gasps, and she is, although she’s pitifully weak. Even with Jon’s help, she can’t… she doesn’t, honestly believe that they can, and then something gives again, properly this time, and she’s rising disbelievingly to her feet. Cool, fresh air surrounds her, and she would collapse back to her knees if it weren’t for Jon’s shoulder under hers, his arm around her.
“We’re out,” she says, blinking hard against the bright lighting of the room they’re in. It doesn’t matter, though, that she can barely see. She knows. “We’re really out,” she says. I can’t believe…”
“Um,” Jon says.
“What?” she says, her stomach sinking. She shifts, getting more of her weight on her own feet, and it’s only then that she registers all the voices, the tape hiss all around her. She squints, trying to see. “What is it?”
“Tape recorders,” he says. His voice is fainter, now, like this is a real shock to him. “Must… must be dozens of them.”
The door opens, and Daisy automatically turns towards it, although the light is still too dazzling for her to see who’s entered. She knows the voice, though. She knows it brighter than the fluorescent ceiling light, warmer than Jon’s hand in hers, stronger than her weak, wobbling legs.
“Jon, you stupid idiot!” Basira cries. “What did you think…”
She stops, and Daisy has to smile.
“Hi.”
“Oh my god,” Basira says.
And then something slams into Daisy and she stumbles backwards, only Jon saving her from falling. Her back hits the wall and something… Basira, it’s Basira, her face right in front of Daisy’s, blocking out the ceiling light, one strong hand coming up to pin Daisy to the wall by her throat, the other grabbing for Daisy’s free hand and slamming that up against the wall, too. Daisy’s knees sag, and for a moment, the only thing holding her up is Basira’s hands.
“Who the fuck are you?” Basira snarls.
Jon’s there, then, trying to interpose himself between them. Basira doesn’t let him, blocks him with her body, but his hand is still in Daisy’s, his bony fingers digging into her. She clings on and gets her feet under her again, but she can barely breathe. She doesn’t close her eyes or look away from Basira, though.
“It’s Daisy!” Jon cries. “Basira, stop it! It’s Daisy!”
“Daisy’s gone,” Basira says. “Whoever… whatever this is, it’s not her.”
“Basira, for god’s… you were getting information about the coffin! You wanted her out! You… you said you had sources!”
For the first time, Basira turns her head to look at him. Daisy’d almost forgotten, in there, what Basira was like. How alive she is. How strong. How utterly sure of herself. She’s missed it, god, she’s missed it. Even with Basira’s hard, relentless hand pinning her against the wall, cutting off her air supply, Daisy can’t feel anything but deep, desperate relief.
“And you know what they told me?” Basira snaps at Jon. “Nobody comes out of that thing. Nobody.”
“A-and you can just trust these sources of yours, can you?” Jon fires back. “There’s no chance they could possibly be lying, or manipulating you, or just plain wrong?”
“There’s…” Basira’s mouth shuts. She looks back at Daisy. Her hand loosens slightly, just enough to let Daisy start gasping in breaths. “I just think it’d be pretty stupid of us not to check.”
“I’ve…” Jon shakes his head. He hasn’t let go of Daisy’s hand. “Believe me, it’s her.”
Basira stares into Daisy’s eyes, for long, long moments. Daisy doesn’t flinch, doesn’t look away. She should say something, she knows, something that will show Basira that it’s her, she’s real, she’s still the same Daisy.
Except that she doesn’t think she is the same Daisy.
At last, Basira lets her hand drop. Daisy takes a deep breath and lets it out again. Looks at Basira, and then at Jon, and then at Basira again.
“Yeah,” Basira says. “All right.”
And then she smiles at Daisy, quick and sharp, and Daisy feels her knees sag again.
“Yeah?” she says.
“Yeah.” Basira holds her hand out. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
There’s a moment, when Jon’s let go of her hand and it’s in the air, making its way towards Basira’s, where she feels weightless and unanchored, as though she’s in freefall, half a second away from smashing into the ground.
And then Basira’s hand has replaced Jon’s. Her fingers immediately curl around Daisy’s, strong and protective, and she pulls Daisy from the room.
Daisy follows, of course. Where else would she go?