Chapter 69

[Cordelia]

The sun had completely set before we had made our way back to the studio flat I share with Tilly. Or rather, had shared. There is nothing left to share now.

“Gone,” I choke as I struggle not to cry. “Gone, all gone.”

Atlas doesn’t interfere as I search through the remains of the rubble by the radiant glow of the streetlamp from across the street. It might be after 8pm, but it is never truly dark in LA, more of a perpetual twilight. The neon signs from a nearby billboard casts the ashes and soot covered beams in an eerie, ghostly green.

It doesn’t seem quite real. Just a few hours ago everything was normal, the way it had been for months. Even when I had disappeared, taken to that blasted island, everything remained where I had last placed it.

I was only gone for an afternoon. It was still so perfect when I left.

Blinking through tears, I see a shiny bit of metal gleaming in the ashy dark. It is so small I could have easily missed it, had my head not been turned in just t