He wanted to lie, wanted to tell her everything would be fine, that anchoring the phoenix was dangerous but survivable. But Sidney deserved the truth.
“Your great-great-grandmother attempted to anchor a partially corrupted phoenix,” he said. “She survived, but the corruption left permanent damage to her abilities. Scars, essentially. Places where her electromagnetic sensitivity was destroyed, and other places where it became hypersensitive to the point of causing pain.”
Sidney absorbed this information without visible reaction. “How corrupted was the phoenix she tried to anchor?”
“The journals don’t say specifically. But based on the description, maybe thirty or forty percent.”
“And our phoenix is at seventy-five percent, maybe more.”
“Around there. It’s hard to tell how fast the corruption is advancing just by looking at it.”
Sidney glanced over at the sleeping creature, its contaminated fire casting twisted shadows on the trees all around them. “So I’m going to be exposed to twice as much corruption as my great-great-grandmother. And she was permanently damaged.”
“That’s the most likely outcome.” To hell with sounding calm and scholarly. His voice rough, he went on, “Sidney, I can’t ask you to do this. The cost is too high.”
“You’re not asking. I’m choosing.” She met his gaze with steady eyes, a ghost of a smile touching her full lips. “My mother and grandmother are trapped on the other side of the portal. If I don’t anchor this phoenix, they’ll be cut off forever. It’s not a choice — it’s the only possible decision I can make.”
He wanted to argue, wanted to find some way to change her mind. But he knew Sidney well enough to understand that her family’s safety would always outweigh her own.
She’d already lost too much. She wouldn’t lose them, too.
His laptop screen went dark as the battery died. Ben closed it and set it down on the ground, then moved back to Sidney’s side. She leaned against him immediately, fitting into his arms like she belonged there.
“We should rest,” he said. “Both of us. We’re going to need every bit of strength we have.”
A small frown touched her graceful brows. “I’m not sure I can sleep.”
“Try anyway,” he replied. “We’ve got maybe eight hours at the most before we have to move, and you need recovery time.”
Faced with those incontrovertible facts, Sidney didn’t bother to argue. Instead, she shifted so she could lie down again, and Ben stretched out beside her, one arm around her waist. The unicorn watched them with approval, and the phoenix slept on, its corrupted fire a steady pulse in the darkness.
Ben tried to sleep but couldn’t. His mind kept turning over the information from the journals, looking for something he’d missed. Some detail that would give Sidney better odds, some technique that would reduce the risk.
He came up empty every time.
Sidney’s breathing had evened out, which suggested she’d actually managed to fall asleep. Ben envied her that ability — to shut down in the middle of a crisis and rest. He’d always been the type to lie awake running through scenarios, calculating odds, trying to control the uncontrollable through sheer force of analysis.
It didn’t help. It never helped.
The grove was quiet except for the spring’s gentle bubbling and the occasional rustle of wind through the trees. Starlight filtered through the woven branches overhead, creating patterns of light and shadow across the ground.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. Ben pulled it out carefully, trying not to disturb Sidney. He’d kept it in a hardened case that had protected it from the EMP — one of the few pieces of electronics that had survived.
A text message from a number he didn’t recognize.
Ben. It’s Morse. Don’t reply. DAPI establishing perimeter around forest. Estimate 40-50 personnel. Rosenthal arriving personally at 0800 with “enhanced containment protocols.” They’re building something at the northern facility — looks like dimensional stabilization equipment. I think they’re planning to create an artificial portal. -RM
Ben read the message twice, a cold sensation going through him that had nothing to do with the damp chill of a Northern California night.
An artificial portal. DAPI wasn’t just trying to capture the phoenix or study its abilities. They were planning to weaponize dimensional travel itself.
If they succeeded, they could create portals anywhere. Deploy shadow creatures as weapons. Access other dimensions and whatever resources or threats they contained.
It would be the ultimate military advantage. And it would require understanding phoenix fire on a fundamental level.
That was why they’d let the phoenix suffer for weeks. They needed to understand both clean and corrupted dimensional energy. They had to document how phoenix fire interacted with reality, how it burned and transformed and bridged worlds.
They’d engineered this entire crisis as one massive experiment.
