“Oh—” Even muffled, Levi’s voice was unmistakable, as was the bland disappointment. “You’re awake.”

The camera dipped further, framing the military crest tattooed over her thigh, and Ella sunk back into the pillows as Bunny's growl came down the speaker. “Damnit, Lev. You scared me stupid!”

“How about I go get another three whiskies from the bar down the road, and you’re asleep when I come back? Then I can scare you—”

Bunny cackled, and the camera swerved back up to her face. A grin brightened her features where she gazed off to the side, broad and genuine with her dark eyes catching on the lamps. “Save it, jackass. I’m on the phone.”

Footsteps cluttered across the room. “Who’re you talking to, Lettuce, darling? Is it one of those pathetic save the world types you keep picking up? Is there another set of balls I need to cut—”

Ella burst into laughter and put her mouth close to the speaker. All that bitterness across her tongue vanished, swallowed by a saccharine flood familiarity. “Hi, Six. Me and Jack miss you.”

The steps quickened, and a moment later, Levi eased down beside Bunny, threading one arm around her waist and sinking his teeth lightly into the round muscles over her shoulders. Against her umber skin, the whiteness of his teeth glistened. His pale eyes trailed over the screen, a smile pulling his lips wide around the soft bite.

Ella smiled back, a soft, doey feeling curling up in her chest. She spoke in nothing more than a whisper, tilting her head with it. “Hi, Six.”

Levi released Bunny’s shoulder, and Ella caught the edge of her shiver as Levi leant in toward the camera, a slow, honeyed smile on his lips. He could be right there, sinking in beside her in the dark.

“Hi, Princess.” His murmur was even like ice cubes through the speaker, ones packed full of sweetness. “Has Jack stopped crying yet, or do I have to leave?”

Bunny smacked Levi, breaking Ella's held breath. Her berating shout rattled out the speaker grill, and hissing, Ella scrabbled for the volume button. But she didn't scroll the volume down quick enough, and Jack, with a series of mutters and complaints, stirred awake.

And he woke with tears already huffing through his breath, dew in his grey eyes. It glistened under the blue glow of the phone screen, the cold glow sinking between his lips where they drew back from his teeth.

Ella’s heart twisted, a vibrant ache that drew together her ribs and surged in a tight urge to her palms. He didn’t deserve this – it was all she could think as she curled in closer to him, twisting the fingers of the arm he lay on through the bleached locks of his hair. After all he went through, all they all went through, he didn’t deserve to have the one person who’d already broken him once do it again.

“Jack…” Ella brushed the back of her knuckles across his cheek, careful around the tautness of her phone still clutched in her hand. Bunny and Levi’s bickering muttered out the speaker, but hazy-eyed, Jack didn’t flinch from it. “Sorry I woke you, baby. Six and Bunny are on the phone.”

Jack nodded, a desultory motion pushing his face deeper into her shoulder. Headlights trickled over his hard features, cast up from the road below, and that trawl of light pushed weary illumination into the hollow corners of Jack’s face.

A sigh slipped past Ella’s lips, and she caught it pressed into a kiss against Jack’s temple. Where had all that life gone? That rugged Jack verve? “Do you want me to hang up?”

“Nah, s’cool.” A slur strung Jack’s words together and glazed out his grey eyes as he blinked hard and twisted his face away from her chest. “Lemme—Lemme see—”

His hand closed around her wrist, large and strong and easily closing over the whole of it. Jack didn’t have hands like Ella or Levi or Cain  – his hands wore the scratching marks of hardness – callouses and scarred knuckles and broken nails – and the way they scraped over her skin made her toes curl and blood sing. Smiling, she brought the phone around to face them and scrolled up the volume.

Levi’s face filled the screen, the edges of his grin creamy with lamplight. “Jack, darling. You’re not about to start crying are—”

Jack slapped the phone, nearly knocking it out of Ella’s hand. The way he bared his teeth was almost like his grin. “Fuck you, Lev. I still remember you crying when I died, you twat, so don’t gimme that shit.”

With a flick of his fingers, Levi leant back into the sofa, Bunny’s phone held at arm’s length. It clashed dreadfully against the purple leather jacket he wore, but didn't make his sprawl any less precisely artful. “Oh please, I had ash in my eyes. Tell me someone who wouldn’t cry at that wasteland. Meanwhile, you’re here sobbing like a little baby in my sister’s—”

Bunny’s voice echoed through, tinny and distant. “She ain’t your sister, Lev. You mess.”

Levi’s tongue flickered over his lips, eyes sliding off to Bunny. “I never should’ve told you that.”

“Like we couldn’t guess. That girl’s white as cream crackers.”

Levi rolled his eyes and tipped his head back, moving the camera up above him. “Regardless, if you start crying over your ghoulish little delight taking a—”

This time, Jack’s blow to the phone nearly knocked it out of Ella’s hand. She hissed, snatching it back from him as he jerked up, making another grab that missed by miles. This time he didn’t have the almost grin. Just blue light drenching the heavy muscles through his chest and shoulders, and something like dark thunder echoing through his face.

Ella reached for him. “Jack—”

“You fucking shut your pussy little mouth, cunt,” Jack snarled at the phone. Tension in him thrummed against her skin, but Ella’s chest tightened most at the smile that curled over Levi’s lips. “Don’t you fucking speak about him like that.”

Levi raised his eyebrows, biting his lip as he splayed further across the sofa. “What’re you going to do, Jack? Should I put the collar on, hm? Do you think Cas—"

Jack lunged for the phone, clumsy, elbows driving at Ella’s ribs, and in a quick motion, Ella hung up the call and dropped the phone onto the carpet. A hoarse, raw scream tore from Jack’s throat where he sprawled across her, a weight pinning her to the bed. He drove his fist into the mattress, again and again and with a third time, he burst into tears.

Sighing, Ella phased out into the Between, plucking back a curtain on the veil of the world and slipping into the cold haze behind it. She only stayed there for a moment, just enough to push through the muddiness of where Jack’s contrary aura pushed the Between narrow and thin, before phasing back in to kneel beside him. Tears wracked him, and Ella’s chest keened,. A rough knife that tore flesh as it slid in between her ribs.

“Hush, baby.” Ella wrapped her arms around Jack’s neck, squirming in close to him so she could kiss him and rake fingers through his tangled hair while he wailed. “It’s okay, Jack… I’m here. Hush…”

She'd almost quieted him again when a slice of cold light pierced the murk.

On the floor, the screen of her phone lit up.