The Dresden Files/Codex Alera is copyright Jim Butcher. This story is licensed under the Creative Commons as derivative, noncommercial fiction.

Chapter One

She was tiny but fierce, and she was kicking my ass.

"Murph!" I said, "That's not even fair! You're cheating!"

"Quit being a whiny ass, Dresden, and take your medicine."

We both made a few more moves, and my character got shot. Blood spattered on my side of the screen, and DEAD popped up on my hud.

"Jesus, Dresden, how is it you defeated a literal pack of Werewolves, and you can't last fifteen minutes in Arena of Combat?"

"Look," I said, throwing the controller down. "In order to play these games with you, I've had to basically give up magic. You know what that's like, Murph?"

She shrugged, "my every day?"

"Your everyday minus maybe an arm or a leg, perhaps."

I tugged at the collar around my neck. Butters had created a gizmo that nullified my magical field so I could take part in electronic society. I think he did it in self-interest after I poofed his latest supercomputer when I bumbled in without warning a few months ago. With the Covid-19 outbreak, Murph and I had been on an extended vacation, alone together in her little house, and we decided we'd try it sans-magic so I could finally use the microwave without causing it to explode.

"Stop being a baby, Dresden. I won fair and square. You can't use magic in a video game anyway."

I nodded, crossing my arms and clenching my jaw. It just wasn't fair. She, Butters, Billy, and all the rest had a lifetime of experience growing up with electronic devices.

"Wanna watch a movie?" She said, sliding next to me and putting my arm around her. She fit nicely. We fit nicely together. It was nice to have such long arms that could completely reach around her and pinch or caress any part of her at any time.

It was nice.

I smiled and leaned over, kissing her softly on the lips. "That, or we could…"

"Jesus, Dresden, are you perpetually horny?"

"Hey, I have a lot of time to make up for." I used my long arms to great advantage to caress certain body parts I knew she enjoyed caressing. I kissed the side of her neck.

"Mmmm," she moaned softly, leaning into me.

I inhaled her perfume, her essence. We had been together for almost a month, alone in the little house. We rarely went out, only to get grocery staples, otherwise sheltering in place like the rest of the country.

Luckily, the supernatural world seemed to be on something of a break too. No ghosts had been haunting, no werewolves had been turning, no ghouls had been…ghouling…the world seemed to have hit the pause button, and I could hear birds chirping in the morning in the middle of Chicago again.

She turned and took my face in both of her hands and kissed me deeply. I liked kissing. I especially liked kissing Karrin Murphy, formerly of CPD. She had the most kissable lips in the history of kissable lips.

We were just about to retire to the bedroom, both of us working ourselves up to a full ardor when the doorbell rang.

"You expecting anybody?" Murph said in a husky voice, as she panted softly.

"No," I said, breathing a little heavy myself.

"Fuck, this better be good."

I got up off the couch, trying to arrange…things…so as not to be too evident.

"Make them go away, and I'll meet you in the bedroom," Murphy said, with a little glint in her eye.

I knew that glint, she wasn't going to be wearing much when I went into the bedroom, and I grinned. "Sounds like a plan."

She bounded off the sofa and down the hallway as I walked to the door and opened it.

A young woman stood in the foyer. Tall, she had long blonde hair, light blue eyes, and was wearing a white blazer, slacks, and a blue blouse. She stood, looking at me for a moment.

"Can I help you?"

She opened her mouth. "H…h…" she stammered, then tears filled her eyes. "Harry?"

I frowned. "Yes?"

"It's me, Harry." She stepped up to me, throwing her arms around me and giving me a full-body hug. "Susan."

"Wait; what?" I said, pulling away from her.

"It's me, Susan Rodriguez." She tried to hug me again, but I held her at arm's length.

"The last I saw Susan, she was Vampiric, Latina, and… dead."

"I know, Harry." The woman backed up a step. "I promise it's me. Do your soul gaze, then you'll know."

I touched the collar around my neck. "I can't at the moment. No magic. Thanks for stopping by, though." I started to close the door.

"Harry, it's me!" The door closed, and I walked down to the bedroom.

"Who was it?" Murphy said.

"Some crazy. Said she was Susan." I started to take off my clothes.

I was halfway to being undressed when the doorbell rang again.

Murphy got up this time. "I'll deal with her." She put on a robe and walked out of the room.

Susan had been my…well, my ex-girlfriend. We'd been very close, so close, in fact, Margaret Angelica Mendoza had been borned. But Susan had become a half-vampire and long story short, I'd been forced to kill her on the altar of the Red Court, thereby murdering every Red Court vampire in the process in a giant uber spell.

Murphy didn't come back. I could hear them in the living room, murmuring. Murphy's voice was a bit strident.

I sighed. This was not how I wanted to spend my isolation. I tugged my sweats back on, and pulled a t-shirt over my head and walked out into the living room.

"Please, Harry!" The woman said. "You have to believe me!"

I sighed. "Look, lady. I don't know who you are, or what rock you came from but I suggest going right back—"

"Is this your summer home in Zurich?"

"Hah." I said…" Very fun—" I paused. Something about that line rang a bell. The first time we were going to go out on a date, a minor demon showed up and spoiled things. I had used that line when she asked if it was my apartment—

"Susan?" I said, my heart suddenly starting to pound in my chest.

"Police having you put in overtime, Harry?" She said, glancing at Susan. And it was another line from our almost first date.

"Murph, get this thing off me. I need to soul gaze her."

"But Harry—"

"Murph!" I said, pulling on the collar.

She sighed. "Well, kneel down, you big oaf."

I knelt, and Susan pulled the hair back at the nape of my neck and pressed a combination of buttons to allow the collar to slip off. Immediately, I felt the presence of magic again, and I inhaled deeply, feeling the power of the earth, the air, the spirits around me. It was like breathing again, as if I were taking a breath on a mountain top in Switzerland. The sweet, sweet feeling of power in all it's glory.

I looked over at the woman, and we met eyes. It all came rushing back. Her passion, the motivation to go, to do, to act. It was always what drove her forward, digging up stories for the Arcane, stories of the supernatural, and then she had become part of the story when she'd been bitten by Bianca St. Claire a vampire of the Red Court. By confessing my love to her, she'd been able to stop her blood lust and I could feel how that had hit her, my love, that confession. It held her like a beacon of light in the darkness, driving her to join the Fellowship of St. Giles. Her pursuit of righteousness led her to South America, where she fought Red Vampires to save children. He saw the first, and only time they'd made love, bound by the Sidhe rope it had again held her monster at bay, and led to our daughter, Maggie.

I blinked away tears as I pulled my gaze from her.

"Well?" Murphy said.

"It's her," I said, walking over and sitting down on the sofa. The console game gave a high pitched squeal then belched out smoke.

"Dammit," Murphy whispered. "We just got that."

I couldn't wrap my brain around this. Susan was alive? How? When…"How?" I said.

"May I sit?" She indicated a chair across from me.

"Of course," Murphy said, a little too loudly. "I'll go make coffee…" then she mumbled something I couldn't hear, stalking off into the kitchen.

Susan sat primly on the edge of the chair, tucking her skirt over her legs. "Apparently, there were irregularities with my death. Or so I was told."

I rolled my eyes. "You too?"

She glanced at me. "Wait, when did you die, Harry?"

I shrugged, long story. "So…irregularities?"

She nodded. "Yes. I got to this weird place, and this train was going to just run over me. Someone pulled me off the tracks just in time.

"Carmichael?"

"Who?" She looked at me with a strange expression on her face. "No, it was actually my Nana Concha."

"Your Grandmother?"

She nodded. "Anyway, Nana Concha took me through this weird city, I didn't even recognize, and told me I was…En Medio Puesto. The middle place."

I nodded, remembering. "Right."

"She took me to La Oficina, where someone…"

"Amitiel?" I said.

"Yes! How did you know? She took me to the Editor, but she wasn't really the Editor, she was like…oh, I don't know…"

Murphy came back in with a tray holding three coffee cups. She set them down on the coffee table, then handed Susan and me a cup each. She took a cup, then came and sat next to me on the couch, purposely pulling my arm around her before taking a sip.

"She was actually the mother of someone I knew. A former editor. She had passed away from cancer years ago, but…anyway. She said I couldn't be sent along yet, that I needed to "Atone for my sins."

"What does that mean?" I said, taking a sip, with my non-Murphy holding hand.

"Right?" she said. "I asked her, but the Editor said she didn't know, but that she could send me back wherever I wanted."

"And you chose Chicago."

Susan shrugged, taking a sip of coffee. "Well, I didn't know where else to go, or who else to reach out to, Harry…" she gave a look at Murphy.

"It's been a while since Chichen Itza, Susan."

She nodded. "I figured as much when I woke up in this body. I'm only seventeen. It took me a few days to figure out how to catch an Uber, and then we had the whole Covid lockdown, and my mom wouldn't let me out of the house."

I chuckled at that.

She shook her head, her pretty face flushing red. "Anyway, but now I'm here, and I don't know what to do."

I stared at her. At this pretty blonde woman, girl really, who held the spirit of my dead…fiance? Girlfriend? Baby Mama? I started to tremble a bit, and I realized I was on my way to a full-on meltdown. I had so many emotions mixed up with this woman, with what had happened, with what I'd been forced to do, I didn't know how to react.

Murphy sensed this and looked up at me. "You need a moment, don't you, Dresden?"

I swallowed past the giant elephant that had decided to use my throat as a resting place. "Yeah."

Murphy got up. "Look, Susan, or…whoever you might happen to be right now."

"Jessica Finch."

"Okay, so should I call you Susan or Jessica?"

She shrugged. "Probably Jessica since that's how everyone really knows me."

"Okay, so look, Jessica," Murphy emphasized the last word someone harshly. "You can give us contact info, right?"

She nodded. "I have a phone."

"Right. So, you don't know what happened after…well, what happened. Harry has been through a lot, and he needs some time to process."

"I can speak for myself, thank you, Murph."

Murphy nodded and held up her hands.

"Uh…Jessica…I…uh…"

"My point exactly. You go back home, and Dresden and I will have a good think, and then we'll make contact with you again, okay? You can't stay here, considering this virus, and…well…"

She looked at me with an expression that probably meant something to another woman.

"Of course." Susan/Jessica stood up.

"Give us a bit, and we'll give you a call, okay?"

She nodded. "The uber is waiting for me, anyway."

"Perfect," Murphy said with a tight smile. She escorted Susan to the door.

"Bye, Harry. Let me know when you're ready to…you know, talk, or whatever."

"Uh, yeah. I will." I said, but I could already feel the floodgates of emotion starting to spill.

Murphy bid her goodbye, then closed the door.

She came over to me, again finding her way under my arm, not saying anything.

We sipped our coffee for a moment or two.

"Oh my God," I said, and the dam finally broke.

I wept.