In all the things we tried during those early days of our work, I had always Held doubt as to the possibility of success. My rational mind could not fathom why muttering words and making strange shapes with your hands might allow you to channel some esoteric energy to change the world around you.

But she believed, and that was enough to keep me there.

We worked together. Spending our evenings on strange and alien research. We had no family, though not for lack of trying, and that was why we worked as we did. She wanted a family and I wanted her happiness.

The first time we achieved some repeatable result, the pair of us had celebrated for days. Our bodies fused as our shadows held hands and danced. We bound ourselves together in ways that most people didn’t believe were possible and because of it, we stood apart.

I believed, but we were still just the two of us.

She was pregnant when we tried to open the gate. She miscarried, lying on the basement floor. I wanted to hold her hand, but I was struggling to keep something black from walking out of a shadowed corner. By the time it was gone and I was sure she was safe, she had fainted. Her shadow was hiding underneath her.

I carried her to bed. Washed her body; changed her clothes, and mopped up the blood that was staining the concrete.

It wasn’t long before she disappeared.

The state called me, telling me that she was in the hospital. Telling me that she had attacked a free clinic and that she was now restrained. I sat in silence as she raved about what they were throwing away. I watched as my shadow tried to hold hers, but her own darkness punched and kicked at mine. I was holding her hand, but watching as her heart disappeared through a door I hadn’t closed. Part of her walked away and I wept.

I watched the long, dark shape reach out of the corner. I thought about leaving, about having my shadow hide from whatever it was, but I couldn’t. It grabbed my shadow and dragged it away as she took her final breath.

The color drained out of everything as I felt the cold begin to cover me. My final words were a prayer, to a god I didn’t worship, begging him to let us be together again.