I'd walked with the whole crew up to La Lune, the Gate leading back to Vancouver. The weather had turned slightly chilly, and what deciduous trees were around had slowly started to turn colour.

"I'm going to miss you guys," I said to the group that were leaving. "Send me emails, eh?"

"Oh yeah," Jack replied, gesturing at the clear box on that side. "So weird, only you could make inter-dimensional texting, Alyx."

I smiled gently. I didn't want to say the other part out loud. I wonder for how long.

Hugs were had all around. Over someone's shoulder, I caught sight of the Gate itself. That day, I couldn't see anything strange or unusual going on. No fuzzy pink space, no creepy face. I wondered if something triggered it, or if it was just like the weather: some days clear, some days pink tunnel, and on an orange alert day, a creepy face.

"It's too bad none of us ever got magic to work like you wanted, Jack," Jen said. He nodded glumly.

I gave Dad an extra hug.

"Be good, kiddo," he said to me, ruffling my hair like he'd done since I was young. "Adelle, are you sure? Especially after what happened, I get worried about you staying longer."

Mom put an arm around my shoulders.

"That's exactly why I am staying a little longer," she said to Dad. "Anyway, I have unfinished business here. There's been a gaping, Lucy-shaped hole in my chest for decades. I need some closure."

Dad nodded, looking resigned. "And you, MacKenzie, I'll pick you up with Adelle?"

"Yes. Thank you, Mr. Covington," she replied. "Keeping Alyx safe is why I'm also sticking around. To make sure there isn't a second try."

"I appreciate that," he said.

"Okay, everyone," I said to the group. "Last train to Earth departing. Everything is ten times faster here, so wait one minute between each of you, and then move away on the other side as soon as you can. Let's nobody have any sci-fi horror events today!"

I tried my best to emulate a certain colonel's safety briefing, but I'm not sure I really hit the mark.

"Whoa, is that a thing?" Jen asked, sounding suddenly nervous.

"Eh... I don't really think so," I replied. "But like... you might end up ramming each other out of the way on the other side. Let's just be safe."

One by one, they stepped up to it, waved to me, and then walked through. I watched to see if the face would make an appearance, but there was still nothing out of the ordinary. A nagging suspicion blossomed that it was me that attracted it.

I couldn't help some last minute science, though.

"Just a sec," I said as Jack walked up to it. I scooted around to the giant boulder the Gate stood near, which left a sliver of the Gate's backside visible. "Okay sir, come on through," I said, doing my best to imitate airport security waving someone through a metal detector.

He shook his head, rolled his eyes, and waved to me.

I wanted to know what it looked like from the other side of the Gate. After all, as I'd found out the hard way, you could be partially on either side of a Gate.

I half-worried that it would be like those stories about a two-dimensional creature watching a three-dimensional one pass by: a strange animating slice of the latter, suddenly appearing, shifting, then shrinking. I'd be watching a rolling x-ray of Jack's insides as he walked through, at the point where he stopped existing in the Shanaclair side.

I'd worried for nothing: Jack was mostly a blur as he went through.

After all, I thought, the space between worlds, and time zones, is a gradient inside that tunnel. I'm pretty sure the x-ray is what I would've seen without any time difference, but the whole was decelerating as it went, thus the blur.

When I walked back over to the front side of the Gate, Dad was giving Mom a hug and a kiss. He turned around to wave to everyone remaining: me, Síle, Mom, MacKenzie. Then he, too, faded through the arch, the last to go.

I'd turned my phone back on for the occasion. I'd taken pictures with everyone, and then...

All good? I texted Dad.

We had to wait a few minutes for a reply, which I used to double-check all of the cables and the solar panel. I also took the opportunity to pull email and download all of the data that had been gathered.

We're out, the text came back. Good luck!

Around mid-October, Fleuve Clair received its first real snow. I felt honestly delighted, having spent most of my life in Vancouver, where it mostly gets cold and rainy for many months and not much else.

I gathered up a snowball from the grass of the park and turned to toss it at Síle, but she'd waited for an optimal moment to throw, as I was distracted.

"Ugh!" I yelled as it hit me and went partially into my coat. But she was falling into the trap of my distraction, because I'd already floated a snowball up to a nearby roof a minute ago, using low-powered wind magic by way of quiet humming.

When I judged that she was in just about the right place and stationary for her next ammo gather, I whistled something that sounded like a bird singing, and the snowball went flying, hitting her on the shoulder.

"Boooom!" I yelled.

"Oww!" she yelped. "No fair using magic!"

"I know, I know," I replied, grinning. "I'm just trying to practise."

"Oh, okay, if that's how it is," she said, leaving it hanging ominously, but not for too long. She pulled a tiny set of pan pipes from her pocket and started on an Irish-sounding tune. The snow in front of her, the full blanket of it all the way down to the grass, started to vibrate and rise, coming together into an enormous snow boulder. I could see her spell, but more importantly, I could feel the wind from it, and I felt suitably impressed.

I knew what she planned to do with it, and the wicked grin in her eyes dared me to try to stop her.

But we were, all of us, deceived. Mom and MacKenzie had said that they didn't feel like getting cold out at the park, but they snuck up on us and hit me and Síle with a snowball each.

Síle's snow boulder fell to the ground, making a little pile, before she could send it at me.

"Oooo!" Síle growled in mock anger, and then we all went for the snow with our gloves. It became a general free-for-all at that point. I was surprised to see Síle use one of MacKenzie's Aikido stances to deflect a snowball at one point.

Eventually we were all breathing hard and tired.

"Hey, anyone want porridge?" Síle asked. "I found a really nice place in Rual Tallane last week."

"I wasn't really joking about the cold," MacKenzie said in English, laughing.

"I thought to check on you both, and inquire about dinner," Mom said, back in her old fashioned Clair. "But some delivery would not be remiss." She winked. "Starberry and oatmeal for me, I think."

"Surprise me," MacKenzie said, back in English.

Language whiplash...

It took us some time to stomp through the snow over to Rual Tallane, one of several merchant alleyways in Fleuve Clair.

There were people out and around using shovels with paper wind seals attached, and they looked almost as useful as snow blowers back home, if a bit slower. Sadly, they hadn't made it to Rual Tallane. I tried to peek into the aether weaves and figure out how they worked, but I didn't want a repeat of that awful levitation spell event a month ago. No ceiling to stop my flight here. It might end up being more painful on the way down this time.

"It's over here," Síle said, pointing at a window a few down, drawing me back to the present.

"How can I help you ladies?" an older man with salt and pepper hair and beard asked us through the window, one of several windows in the side wall of one of the buildings making up the alleyway.

I stared at the menu. It seemed that oats and wheat were on the menu for porridge bases, as well as barley. No rice, though. For toppings, blueberries, starberries, moon melon, beef, chicken, green onions.

I nodded. Mom had the right of it.

"I'll get MacKenzie's," Síle said, practically reading my mind.

"Okay," I said to the man, "two starberry with oats, please."

I reached for my coin purse, and he saw my arm markings. His eyes lit up.

"Oh!" he said. "Pleased to make your acquaintance, Fí-Réalta. I'm glad you've come. Business has been tougher with the farms out east needing alignment."

"I hope I can help, but I'm still early in my training," I replied. "I wouldn't want to make it worse. Where out east?"

I handed him the coins.

"These oats come from Champ Doré, out past An Gleann," he replied. "They've had unreliable weather."

Síle came forward. "Champ? I hadn't heard that they had trouble. I'm from An Gleann, and we have family in the plains. Can I get one bowl of wheat with blueberries and melon, and one of barley with beef and onions?" She handed him coins, and then he returned change to both of us.

"Oh, An Gleann, I see!" he replied to her as he worked. "Well, it would be a kindness, Fí-Réalta, if you could mention it to those consoeurie fellows. I'll have your bowls in just a second."

We strolled around the nearby shops, looking in the windows at clothes, musical instruments, and more.

"No one has mentioned any sort of Starweave work to me," I said, feeling puzzled. "I'm sure it's dire enough that I should go do it if I can."

"Maybe they figure your training is more important," she responded to me.

"Okayy," I whined. "But I was able to do the Midsummer thing."

"I don't know," she said. "The guild plays those cards close to the chest."

"Well, I'm going to ask about it tomorrow," I replied. "It's my responsibility, so I should have some say on when I take it up. What are they going to do, say, 'We don't actually need a Fí-Réalta after all'?"

"Maybe you should ask Danna?" Síle suggested.

I was silent for a moment. "If I knew how."

"Here you go," the man called from the porridge shop. "If you could bring the bowls and lids back to me later, I'd appreciate it. I can reuse them."

"We will," I said with a smile. "Thanks!"

"The food is going to be cold by the time we get back," Síle said as we left the alleyway. "This is something where you should really try a bite or two, hot from the restaurant. Here, there are some tables over here."

"Tables that also look really cold," I replied, "and are covered in snow."

"Where's your sense of adventure?" Síle asked with a big smile.

[---]