Starlight

XXXX: Starchild

Well, here we are.

Thank you so much for reading along all this time. Your comments, votes and messages have been more affirming, comforting and encouraging to me than you could ever imagine.

I haven't included videos of the songs that I've used as my titles. Seeing as this is the last chapter, I thought I would change that. Starchild is a beautiful song with very fitting lyrics, and I've had it chosen as the last chapter title for months now.

Enjoy.

___

The starlight I see is a billion light years old,
A ghost, just like the rest of us.
Nothing I see is here anymore.
But I will transcend,
And vomit this loser out of me -
I will become the next big thing.
I will light myself on fire.
It's time to get out of bed,
And be the starchild I can be.

- Starchild, Ghost Quartet

xx.xx

They looked the same. The houses and apartment buildings, the offices and restaurants, the coffee shops.

At a first glance, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Hatchetfield hadn't changed at all. But that wasn't true. Like any town, its real heart was in its people, and they were most certainly not the same anymore.

Even those who remained alive were infected in their own way; they were infected by their grief, their guilt, and the knowledge of the things they had done.

They turned the corner, the stolen squad car's tires screeching. There it was: the Starlight theatre. A ragged hole was torn through its roof, the whispers of a song within, faint but threatening. Curtain call approached.

Robbie shivered at the sound of it. She was a bad liar; she daren't look at Henry for fear that her frightened eyes would give away her plan.

Gradually, inch by inch, Emma slowed the car to a halt. Silence hung over the group like a weighted blanket, muffling their words, their breathing heavy. They knew what was going to happen next. No one wanted to say a word to acknowledge it, or to hasten its arrival.

We all know that death will come for us at some point, but we tend to keep him at arm's length.

That's what Robbie did, anyway. And on the rare occasions that she did let her mind drift to that inevitable curtain call, she'd imagined death to come for her sweetly and quietly, as a friend, not as an enemy, at the end of a long life.

The reality of what Henry was prepared to do, just to try to stop this thing - to go out in a scream of flame and a rush of crumbling brick - felt like some faraway fever dream. She caressed his hand, trying to push the fear and the guilt and the horrendous pain that was yet to come from her too-busy brain.

The group's silence allowed her to live in that state of willing disbelief for a few moments, but Henry soon broke that spell.

"It's time to go," he murmured, shifting in place ever so slightly. To her, it felt like the ground was giving way underneath her. "I need to do this as quickly as possible."

"Do you want us to wait here, Professor?" Emma asked, her voice thin as tissue. "We can wait here, so you're not alone while you... Y'know. A-And... Well, if you make it out of there, you'll need a ride back to your place, right?"