With Suisei's story told in full, the only thing left for me to do was what needed to be done.

Well, that and one more thing.

I recentered my consciousness back in my body, where I lay outside the Hall of Echoes, near the entrance. It had been a little less than fifteen minutes of real time since I'd last inhabited my body.

I left Suisei in the movie theater in my mind. I gave him control over it, letting him shape it into whatever kind of afterlife he desired.

After all he'd been through, he deserved it.

In the end, I had to agree with him: he'd been right to tell me his story in the way that he had. I was familiar with the location where he'd buried the Sword. Even without my perfect recollection of everything I'd ever done, I would have recognized the coastal region where he'd landed as part of the stretch of Highway 1 on the other side of the Trenton Gulf, near Southmarch.

The fledgling spines dotting down the middle of my back twitched with anticipation.

The Sword was buried in Southmarch's sandy beaches, within a stone's throw of the Lass' last stand. It was almost poetic.

Had I downloaded all of Suisei's memories at once, I would have fixated on the Sword to the exclusion of everything else. I might even have gone off the deep end, daring to dream that the Angel's power could set things right.

But it couldn't, because Azon couldn't.

He was dead, after all.

I wondered how Pel and the kids would react when I told them we'd be going on one last road trip.

It was time for me to go.

The first order of business? Figuring out how to drive my car without feet or legs.

Turning around, I slithered out onto Garden Court Drive. The old street's sett pavement felt quite nice as it slid beneath my underbelly.

I went up to Brand and Merritt, who lay coiled not far from the Hall of Echoes' entrance.

I gave them a little salute.

"Well," I said, "it's time for me to head out. I… I'll see you soon, okay?" I mustered a shy smile.

Merritt started to slither up to me, her body language clearly worried. I raised a hand to calm her. "Don't worry, Merritt. You'll find me. Just follow the sound of my sonata."

I mean, when I finally finished transforming, my head would basically be a biological clarinet. I bet I'd be able to sing both the clarinet and piano parts at the same time!

I wanted that to be cool, and though it probably was, I couldn't shake the feeling that it was also pretty darn freaky, too.

Ah well, just another part of wyrm biology, I guess.

As much as I wanted to tell Brand and Merritt about the Sword, it just wasn't worth the risk. I'm not sure I would be comfortable telling even my family.

At this point, you never know who or what might be listening.

Speaking of which…

"Brand," I said.

The burnt-red wyrm turned to me and gave a short toot, almost certainly asking me: "Yes?"

I reached out with my claw, offering him my hand. He gripped it after a moment's hesitation.

"There's someone who'd like to see you."

In all the chaos since our misadventure in Lantor, I'd forgotten something very important: Mistelann Skorbinka.

The ill-fated Odenskaya mycologist had recently taken up residence chez Genneth. Before he or I had known Brand had become a transformee, with his last breaths, Mistelann had begged me to convey his unrequited love for Dr. Nowston. Granted, I had followed through with that last request, but, now, I was in a position to do far more.

Dr. Skorbinka's spirit appeared before me, in a fine-looking suit. There were tears in his eyes.

"Mistelann," I said, "it's time."

"Thank you, Howle Genneth," he replied.

All six of Brand's eyes widened in surprise.

Brand and I clasped our claws together and briefly linked, during which I transferred Mistelann's spirit to him. I broke the link as soon as that was done, and Dr. Skorbinka's spirit vanished immediately after.

Then Brand slithered over me, coiled around, and gave me the wyrmliest of hugs, squeezing tight.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

I returned my friend's embrace, and then we parted ways.

It was time to save my family.

Making my way down the street, I approached the entrance ramp to the first floor of the garage. When I was about halfway there, heard a voice speak, artificially loud. TV-sized consoles' screens blinked awake all around us, through the many broken walls and windows of the surrounding buildings. Half of the screens were broken, be it part-way or fully, while the smattering selection of the hospital lights that hadn't been broken or burned out flickered as the consoles oligopolized the lion's share of electrical supply coming from WeElMed's back-up generators.

"Brothers and Sisters," the voice said, "people of the Holy City. I bring you good tidings!"

I recognized the voice. And it wasn't just me.

A spirit stirred within me. I let her rise to the surface and manifest at my side.

Ileene Plotsky.

When I'd first met her, she'd been a drooling husk of a person, trapped in a wheelchair she'd never escape. Through turns, her spirit shed its brainwashed shell like the dove robe she'd worn, and now, she was a young woman again: blue-eyed, auburn haired, with a neon-green highlight jolting across her bangs. She wore a light blouse and the gentlest-looking jeans I'd ever seen, a perfect match for her softly sprightly young womanhood.

It warmed my heart to see how far she'd come, though the terrible urgency in her stare tempered my relief.

Of course she would understand what was wrong.

Ileene's lips curled in disgust as she looked at the console screen beside her. "Eyvan…" she muttered.

I quickly slithered over to the console mounted on the wall next to the entrance ramp. Heat and spore corrosion deformed the console's plastic casing, and the screen was cracked in two of its four corners, but, despite that, it worked well enough, especially considering the circumstances.

Vitriol coiled on Ileene's face. It was perfectly understandable. After all, it had been Eyvan, her erstwhile lover—and card-carrying member of the terrorist group the Innocents of the Mountain—who had driven the ice pick into her brain that had lobotomized her into a human vegetable.

"The plague has been vanquished!" Eyvan said. "Thanks to the glory of God, we've banished this evil! We have a cure!"

My first thought was: how the heck is he broadcasting to so many consoles simultaneously? But then, scrutinizing the screen, I noticed what his surroundings were. Both anxiety and recognition kicked in almost immediately.

Eyvan was at the Melted Palace, where Verune and his cult were, and where Pel, Jules, and Rayph were. He stood on the Lassedite's balcony, overlooking the basilica. Not even the end of the world had been able to hamper his flawless fashion sense, bland though it was. His clean clothes—white, buttoned up shirt, dark slacks, and unicolor tie—barely contained the ivy-like growths of hyphae beneath his skin. The filaments had reached up one side of his face, passing around his eye like a hand.

Ileene turned to face me. "That's…" She shook her head. "He's at the Melted Palace, isn't he? How is he broadcasting to so many consoles at once? Hell, how is broadcasting at all?"

I groaned. "He must be using the Lassedite's emergency broadcast access."

This was yet another reason why religious leaders shouldn't have been able to hijack (inter)national TV.

And then things got worse, though, considering Eyvan was at the Melted Palace, I should have expected that.

"His Holiness, Mordwell Verune, the Lost Lassedite Returned, Leader of the Last Church has come to save us all," he said.

"So," I said, "that forksicle is working with Verune, is he?"

Outside of video games, I was generally against violence, but Angel's breath, I was going to enjoy gouging this jerk's eyeballs out—slowly, though. Slowly.

"Brothers, Sisters," he continued, "the Divine Beasts have gathered. They are here, in the Melted Palace. It is Convocation without end."

He was clearly trying to sell something.

Ileene stared at the screen.

"Friends, come to us," he said, beckoning with a wave of his arms. "Come to us. Come to the Melted Palace. We will help you. We will save you. Those who believe, come to us. You will not perish, I promise you. You will have everlasting life."

Then the message began to repeat itself.

Turning, Ileene glared at me.

"He's lying," she said. "It's a trap."

"Obviously." I nodded, bobbing my upper body in agreement. "Verune is completely insane—possibly clinically, too."

Really, the lack of effort here was nearly insulting. They might as well have put up signs saying: Come to the Melted Palace. We are hungry, and are going to eat you.

I shook my head. "Something isn't right here. Why are they doing this? It makes no sense. It's stupid."

Ileene shook her head. "Dr. Howle, I'm worried people might believe him."

"They wouldn't possibly—" I said, starting to rebut her, only for my train of thought to crash into cold, hard reality. "—Fricassee me…"

"What is it?" Ileene asked.

I remembered the aerostat footage Nurse Kaylin had shown me. "They're gathering people—humans," I said "And the only reason they'd do that is if…"

Suddenly, I heard Ani call my name: "G-Genneth?"

It sounded like she was looking for me.

"Genneth!" she said again, this time with the certainty of having found me.

She'd come out of the Hall of Echoes.

I slithered up the street toward where she stood. Not too close, though; I didn't want to expose her to my spores.

"What's going on?" she asked. "What is this?"

I could hear a commotion building in the Hall.

I looked off into the distance, in the direction of the Melted Palace.

"Nurse Kaylin showed me some aerial footage of the Melted Palace," I said, "shortly after Verune took up residence. People were flocking to him in droves, and that was almost two days ago!"

I really didn't want to think about what the city center looked like right now.

"What?" Ani said, alarmed.

"Yeah," I nodded. "It doesn't bode well." I turned to some of the wyrm-trees scattered around the Garden Court. "Verune's cult lost quite a few of their transformees. He probably wants to replace them."

Revulsion contorted Ani's face. "You don't mean…?"

I nodded again. "Food for his army, and plenty of souls to harvest."

"He's preparing for war," Ileene said. She walked along the sett-paved street, toward the ruins of the Internal Medicine Building. "That's what the Innocents always did. They stockpiled as many weapons and supplies as they could get their hands on."

"This is bad," I said. "This is really bad. We barely made it through their first attack, and even then, that was only because we had Andalon on our side. With her now AWOL…" I looked Ani in the eyes. "I don't know if we'll be able to protect people from Verune and his wyrms."

I raised my hand to try to fidget my bowtie, but then stopped, remembering my hands were no longer built to do that.

Ani clenched her fists, only to wince in pain. She grabbed her injured shoulder, but only for a moment. After that, she shrugged off the pain, determination burning in her eyes.

"Well, we have to try," she said. She looked left and right. "Where's Heggy?"

I had a bad feeling about this.

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