Gillian is the mountain lion. Mary is the hawk. Between them, both land and sky are a place where nothing besides rocks can live. This is the same time that things are thawing up as we come to split rivers and new grass, but we shouldn't have even taken this long, not according to the phone. We are so behind that we are behind being behind. We are running our own pace and like us, it is terrible. Malo.

Mary skids past us towards another bank. We've finally hit the area full of rivers, which makes my electric body buzz with panic as I step into it. The brown water eats our clothing, which I've rolled up, and I question not for the first time why we're all humans. It's the least convenient thing we could be right now, but there's Red at front, and Angel... ahh.

We are staying humans, but we'll be humans with short pants, even though it's still cold. Gillian pushes past me to meet Mary, with Damien behind both of them. I pat his back, and he almost jumps out of his skin. "Alex!"

"What, were you thinking about something?" I ask him.

"Always," he admits with a nervous bird-laugh. "Can I have the--"

"No," I say. "You'll have to let your ado-o-oring fans spend a moment without you."

"Actually, I wanted to check how much longer until we reach this little town? I think the name is... well, it ends in -dale... I think. I should check on that! The point is that I need to find out how close we are, since I promised I'd play there at an indie event." Damien smiles. "I think they think I'm the other Damien... won't they be surprised."

If I was drinking, I would have spit out my drink. Thankfully I was not drinking. I almost fall over, but this is besides the point. "Damien, what?" I yell.

Two watchful sets of eyes turn around and Damien almost pushes me over into the shallow creek water. "Well, I mean... it's not exactly like anyone knows, so no one can stop me," he blushes violently, then says, "I mean, they didn't, but you're being kind of suspicious right now. Would you mind... not doing that?" He keeps starting and stopping, his voice bucking pitches like a young deer frolicking, up and down, up and down... all those long limbs. What a catastrophe. This is a catastrophe.

"Okay," I say. Everything is not okay. Damien is absolutely crazy. Cuckoo. What are some other good words for crazy? Hm. He's... reaching Angel-levels here. Okay, that doesn't sound right either. "This is fine."

Damien rolls his eyes.

"Are you guys good?" asks Trace, from the front. Adaline has her arm. "You're making a real mess down there."

"Course we're good. Hurry up, dummies! We're so far behind the group that even Trace is making fun of us," Mary scolds us as we come out the other side of the tiny river. At least there are trees here. Apparently we're going to run out of trees soon, according to the map. The map is a few hours old, because we're in the middle of nowhere, but there's also a compass, which I have been using. The compass informs us that we are probably going the right direction.

Maybe we don't need anything. I don't need electricity or screens or a bunch of tiny lights to tell me where the coast is. We're retracing our own steps. I can feel them in my gut.

As we come up from the bank, back into the balding woods, Gillian asks, "And what was that, Damien?"

"Damien's probably going to... run away or something," Mary says, delighted malice flashing across her face. She grabs Damien around the side and draws him close to her. "Make sure to bring me with you when you ditch the place. Okay? Okay."

Gillian exhales. "They are right there. Do you want me to inform them of your treason?"

Mary breathes the next part so low that I can barely hear the threats. Her voice is the sound of knives entering and exiting flesh, a thousand little points designed to kill. "Oh, they can't make him stop materializing his little wood music boxes. They can't knock the breath out of his lungs, can they? And as long as that's true, Damien is going to want something more than this place. He's like me, deep down, and you hate that, don't you, Gillian? You hate that he's not a little do-gooder like you, but guess what? You and your dimwitted, black-and-white views of the world, are all completely wrong. You can't distinguish ally from enemy because everyone here doesn't fall in either camp, and it's going to make the little pea of a brain you have in there rancid."

Gillian's white teeth blaze in her mouth as her gums draw back. It's a predatory gesture, one that meets Mary's existing smile, but she's staring at Damien. Damien holds at Mary's side, his head squished against her chest. I stand somewhere in the middle, legs soaked with river water which seems to set me into the ground, like clay. It'll be hours before they're dry enough to move. I feel my phone buzz, which jerks my arms to life.

"Well?" asks Mary. She looks ahead to the others. Their discussion is loud enough to drown us out, and they're already halfway through the trees. They wouldn't give us half the freedom they do if they realized how bad we were, but they have no way of knowing.

Gillian bows her head. "Do you think I want him?"

Damien says, "I don't belong to either of you," but this is muffled by Mary pulling him in again. He pushes Mary back. "Mary, come on, please--"

"Yout both know that I'm right. Oh wait-- all three of us. If we can even count Alex as another person, instead of a phone with a face," she gives me a snide, confident look as she continues (what am I supposed to do? I can't handle her. I just nod because of course I do. Ay.), "Go tell them, then. Go tell them everything."

Gillian pauses, looking towards the group ahead with a dry, vacant expression in her dim eyes. "I will."

Mary stops.

"Later."

Mary nods.

"And even later?"

"Damien." Gillian takes Mary's arm and bends it so far backwards that the girl screams, although it sounds more thrilled than anything. Gillian surveys Damien coldly as he wrenches himself out. "Do you want to talk?"

"I-- no, not really. What do you want me to..." Damien trails off. "I can't tell you she's wrong. She's not. I love my music, and I don't really know if I belong here..."

Gillian throws him to the ground. It's so quick that it seems impossible Gillian, slow, turtle-speed, full-power Gillian, could have made such an action, but Damien's on the ground, crouched at the banks. Thick soil stains his face like blood.

"What the! Gillian!" I yell.

"I expect better from you," she says.

This finally gets Red's attention. He walks back, ready to engage (but what could Red do anyways? Drag him apart with his hands? The man has soft, soft hands. Don't ask me why I know this) and kneels down by Damien. "Gillian, down. What happened?"
"The usual," Gillian says. "You should be watching both of them, not Angel."

Red's eyes soften. "Don't worry about Damien and Mary. I'll worry about them for you. Would you feel better if you went up with Dylan and watched Angel? We're going to have to make some shifts up front anyways, but your vigilance would be incredibly appreciated, Gillian. You've always been a steadfast member of the team."

"You are not taking me seriously," Gillian says, her face as blank as a dead fish's. She turns across the group, at last coming to me. "Alex?"

All of my hairs stand behind. I have licked an electric cord. "I think she has a point," I say. "K-kind of? Maybe there's some kind of compromise we could come to, or..."

"Alright. I think I've got a handle on this, now. Gillian, come with me." Red extends his hand, and Gillian grabs it, eyes downcast.

She follows him away, and Mary smiles as wide as she can. I turn, flexing my hand, and at last manage to punch her in the face.

Damien steps back. Mary steps up. We watch each other and she cracks her kneck as hard as she can. "You don't want us to leave either, do you, Alex?"

"You're a bad person," I tell her. "That's all. I don't like bad people. Bullies."

"Who cares about me?" she asks. "That's a ratoricle question, by the way. I care about me. Maybe you should too! We live together. The point is the journey, though. I came along because I thought we were finally going to move forwards, but the only direction we've moved is further away from the point, and It's not interesting, Alex! It suuuuuuuuucks! Damien wants to be someone different. Do you blame him?"

"Do you want to be someone different?" I ask.

"Nah, I'm perfect. That's not the point," Mary says. "It's not a very good story if you don't learn anything, right? So let's learn something. Let's make mistakes."
I can feel her presence around me, like a hand around the mouth. I know I couldn't fight her if I wanted to. She's thrown me across fields, valleys, forests, you name it, my body, no matter what form it takes, it goes right down. Mary's just like that. Overpowering. So much better than me that we don't even have to make a comparison, because a comparison implies there's a scale that fits both of us on it. I manage to mumble, "We make plenty of mistakes," because she does.

"Nothing bad ever happens," Mary says.

"Red almost died," I say, "That's... the worst thing that's ever happened to us."

"No it isn't. He's the warden. He's just a whitejacket who has one of our faces. Bet that's true. Really true. Bet that's why he doesn't have any powers. I wanna leave just to mess with him."

"Then why haven't you?" I ask.

Mary's eyes are cold. "That's the worst thing, Alex. The very, very, very worst thing. All this time and I don't know."

We don't have anything to say to each other. I could say, "maybe that's because you're a coward" or I could say "Good". I could say "we wouldn't care if you did" and I could say "I don't think you know that Red has no powers, and neither do I, so maybe don't assume things". I could be honest and say everything, but I keep my mouth shut, and she keeps looking at me, knowing everything.

She spits on the ground. Takes Damien. I follow in the middle, surrounded by no one, watching Mimsy leer at us through the bushes. That night, I shock a dead bird on its way home. Its body is so still and it smells like ash. That's my fault. I'm just as powerful as Mary. I am a force, like she is.

If I made a run for it, what would I tell the man?

The others would be lost in the middle of nowhere forever.

They need me.

They need the phone.

They need me because I can run the phone.

Gillian plucks the feathers off the bird and Damien flinches at each movement. The others are eating something Kali caught, except for Elle, who isn't eating. Angel, Trace, and Adaline, are over in the big group. Now the only little group is us, and really it's four groups of one person. Maybe Damien and Mary are a unit.

Gillian stands. I follow. She settles far away from the others, keeping Mary in her vision. Her eyes are flecked with flame.

"You wanted to talk?" Gillian asks.

"Oh, um, yes, one second, I don't know where all my words went. I'm going to have to gather them up," I say. "They're real rowdy. You know how it is, with uh, words. You don't talk much either right?"

"You talk often," Gillian says.

"I just wanted to say that if anything happens, I am on your side. I'm on the group's side," I tell her, putting a hand on her shoulder.

She sniffs.

"What are two people in our group who aren't... alllllll over each other, but they don't hate each other?" I ask.

"Adaline and Damien," her eyes slide away from me.

"Okay, but they're in different little group units. I'm talking people who talk regularly but are completely neutral to each other. By neutral I mean they like each other. They just don't kiss and make out a bunch. I feel like there has to be someone."

"Adaline and Trace?"

"They're definitely not neutral."
"This is a waste of time," Gillian says, rising to her feet.

I grab her arm. "I want to be like that. Like we used to be, before this."

"Were we anything?" Gillian asks. "I don't think so."

"We were tools. Together!"

"We are still tools. I am currently operational. You can not help me with this purpose, you do not need my protection, and you get in the way. Is that understood, Alex?"

"Are you going to.... I'll do something about Mary! I will! Really!"

"Stop talking, Alex. Mary is my business."

"She could be our business!"

"Please stop holding my arm," Gillian says. Her voice is low as smoke. I can hear it yawning.

I let go. Gillian turns, and her hair flashes ginger about her neck, catching the light of our fire and theirs. She looks through the darkness, as if it doesn't affect her, and into the light, as if that, too, means nothing. Instead, she catches Mary in her peripherals, and nods. Mary nods back.