I watched in disbelief as the Vyx's Network drifted away from us. In seconds, the labyrinth and the Tower of Light faded into the stormy dark, leaving Ileene, Mr. Himichi, and myself marooned on an island of fractured maze.

I cupped my hands to my mouth and yelled. "Suisei! Suisei!"

My cries echoed without effect.

Then, a wave of dizziness hit me, and I groaned.

Ileene yelled. "Dr. Howle?!"

I staggered, pressing my back against the wall of the corridor.

"What's happened?" Mr. Himichi asked.

I stared at where Suisei had been. "He's gone."

"Can't you bring him back?" Ileene asked.

I shook my head. "You think I haven't tried?"

For a third time, I closed my eyes and focused. But there just wasn't anything to bring back! "When I said, 'He's gone,' I meant it. Suisei's spirit isn't with me anymore."

Ileene's agitation rippled through her dark, auburn bangs, breaking up the lightning bolt patch's neon green. "How can you be so sure?" she asked.

I stared at my hands. "It's just like when I transferred souls to Ibrahim and the others. I can feel a pocket of absence inside me where Suisei's spirit had once been."

"What does this mean?" Mr. Himichi asked.

"I think…" I swallowed hard and stared at the darkness around us and below. "I guess it means Suisei is now Archived, just like the Treefathers."

"Is that even possible?" Mr. Himichi said.

I tugged at my bow-tie. "It's either that, or his spirit winked out of existence once the severance was completed, and he's now gone forever. But since I really, really don't want to believe that is true, I'm going with the former." I ran my fingers through my hair, scraping my fingernails against my scalp. I cursed. "Fudge! Fudging fudge!"

"Genneth…" Mr. Himichi said.

I stepped away and shook out my arms. "Imagine what the Vyx will do if they find him," I said, turning around to face them. "They already have one Sword! Angel-knows what they'd be able to accomplish with two!" I shook my head. "I have to get him back."

My to-do list was getting larger with every passing second: keep my family from getting absorbed by a wyrm other than myself, stop &alon from absorbing Kléothag's power, stop the Vyx from using the Lodestars, free myself and the other wyrms from &alon's grasp, find this EUe guy, find the Sword of the Angel, and now, rescue Dr. Horosha.

Fate must have only just noticed my desire to help others, because it sure was going overboard to compensate!

"Since we're no longer connected to the Network anymore," Mr. Himichi said, "to rescue Suisei, you'd need to enter the Network a second time, right?" Mr. Himichi asked.

"I'd like to think so."

"But aren't we there now?" Ileene asked.

"No," Mr. Himichi said. "Remember what the Treefathers told us. The labyrinth was being disassembled as part of the Vyx's severance protocol." He glanced at me. "The Vyx module Genneth linked with to get here has been cut off from the Network. What you see here us must represent the part of the Network corresponding to our module's mind."

"It's all alone now," I muttered.

"Why would they do that?" Ileene asked.

"Because the module was infected, and turning into a wyrm, no less," I said, "why else? They've got a hive mind. Severance is their way of implementing triage. As for us, it's like we've been mooching off someone else's internet connection, and when they were kicked off the network, so were we."

"So… what now?" Ileene asked.

"Now… I go back to my body, I guess." I crossed my arms and sighed, and then, closing my eyes, reached out to my body. This time, I had no difficulties. It worked like a charm. There was a sense of blurred movement and rushing water, and then…—

—Oh God, I was a wyrm again. (Well, mostly-wyrm.)

Talk about a shock to your system! Returning to my body felt like fast-forwarding through my transformation from the beginning. The contours of my self-awareness were reshaped in real time. My neck, butt, and belly elongated to ludicrous lengths, a distressing experience that made me shake my arms out, only to remember that one of my hands was still rhizomatically intertwined with the wyrmy bits of the Vyx ship's control panel.

Guh.

Before I even opened my eyes, I had to remind myself that my legs weren't numb or paralyzed, they were just gone. Sure, having arms strong enough to tear through steel like paper was nice, but I didn't agree it was quite worth being forced to slither for the rest of my days.

I opened all four of my eyes. The soft, sleek silver interior of the Vyx ship felt a lot more ominous now that I associated its aesthetic with the AVUs, which were frankly terrifying.

Their screams of "ERADICATE! ERADICATE!" still echoed through my mind.

In an act of sheer stubbornness, I dove back into the Network, just to see what would happen. The entry process happened far more quickly this time around, and when I opened my eyes, I was standing on the lonely labyrinth island I'd just left, staring out at the darkness churning down where the island's cliffs vanished from sight.

I shunted myself back into my body with a sigh, and then began the unpleasant task of updating my secondary consciousnesses about what happened.

Existing as multiple copies of myself simultaneously was already weird enough, but having to deal with an information discrepancy across those different selves was just plain freaky. For my own sanity, I just dissolved my dopplegangers back into myself. The cognitive strain vanished once I had.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

As for what to do next, the answer—like everything else these days—was nice and loopy: I needed to find another Vyx transformee, ideally one of the modules (the flower-ships), or perhaps one of those aegises that the Treefathers had mentioned: those man-machine hybrids.

It was anyone's guess as to which of the two was more likely to kill me.

From within his corner of my mind—seated on a bench in a Munine tea garden, with a good book in hand and a box of chocolate biscotti within reach—Mr. Himichi asked a question: "Assuming you can find another transformee module to link with, what's to stop the anti-virus units from attacking you all over again?"

"I can try not using my mind-world powers," I said. "Maybe that will keep those jerks from finding me."

But I couldn't be sure. It was just an educated guess, after all.

Pushing gently—very, very gently—I peeled myself away from the module's control panel, uprooting all the extensions of my body that had grown into it. Alas, this brought up the darn thing, and ew…

"Angel's breath!" I cursed.

It was like pulling the placenta out of a woman after birth, only my hand was the placenta. Shuddering, I shook my hand, snorting out spores as the reticulated, finely branching awfulness receded into my flesh. The sounds of my distress burst around me like fireworks. Little creaks and crunches shot out from the ship's walls, rippling across my ear-eyes' sound-sight.

Looking around, I noticed the ship's transformation had progressed. Wyrmflesh took root on the walls, branching out in space-filling fractals. Strings of fungal flesh crisscrossed beneath the ceiling, taut as tendons. If I stared for a moment, I could see biomass trickle down the tendons, thickening them as they passed.

It had me wondering how much time had passed out in the real world while I'd been away. I checked my mental clock.

Fricassee me! It had been several hours!

What about Pel and the kids?!

I slithered out the back of the spaceship without a moment's hesitation, down the exit ramp and onto the muddy ground. Terrified that something might have happened to the L85—and, with it, my family—I stuck my neck out around the back of the ship, swaying my head left to right as I looked around.

There it is.

I sighed in sporey relief. My car was right where it was supposed to be. Judging by what I could see through the driver's side window, Pel seemed to be asleep, though I'd need to get closer to be sure. I pushed off the ship's ramp with the end of my tail and slithered forward around the ship's hull. The mud squelched beneath my underbelly.

Gosh, that felt slippery.

And then, out of the blue…

—Heh, I chuckled inwardly. Blue.

It was not a happy chuckle.

Princess Fungus had decided to grace me with her presence.

"Look who's here," I said, soft and flat. A funerary woodwind chorale would have been livelier.

She stepped out from in between the trees and came to a stop on the stretch of wet earth between them and the riverside. Fungus blossomed around from the ground around her, and in her wake, churning the earth beneath her bare feet.

&alon really did look the part of a princess. Her nightgown was now a glittering, starlight raiment, as was the astral tiara atop her head. Her hair and eyes were burning sapphires, and her wings brought that metaphor to life. The six of them folded against her back in repose, feathered in cerulean flame.

Looking up at me, she floated off the ground and hovered close. Grief and longing seeped out through the cracks of her fey demeanor, not that she did much to hide her feelings.

I slashed my claws through her. It didn't do anything—her form briefly rippled, like water in a pond—but I already knew that would happen. I did it because I wanted to.

It wasn't like the worlds she destroyed had gotten that privilege.

"Where did you go, Mr. Genneth? I couldn't find you!"

Gosh, she really was concerned about me.

"What do you mean, where did I go?" I said.

She clenched her fists. "I saw your body, but you weren't in it, you—"

I barked. "—Can't you just leave me alone!? Haven't you done enough damage already!" I thrashed my tail, flinging mud.

Like my claw strikes, the mud flew through her without effect.

"You're the only one who understands me! Everyone else has always been so mean to—"

"—Because you deserve it!" I thumped my tail on the ground. Mud and fungus squelched and crunched. "The Vyxit are trying to destroy you, and I agree with them!"

Confused, she tilted her head to the side. "The Wyxwhat?"

I pointed at the ship. "The 'meanies' who hunt you! The Silver-Shinies are called the Vyx, and the people inside them are the Vyxit."

She stammered in disbelief, wings flaring. "Wh-what? You, you—"

"I just traveled through their Network, &alon. I saw their superweapon: the Lodestars. I don't know if it's enough to destroy you, but they certainly think it can, and I can't say I'm not rooting for them!"

"If they kill me, you'd die!" she yelled, agitatedly flicking her wings. "All the wyrms would die—and the peoples inside 'em, too! Why would you want that?!"

I gestured at myself. "Maybe because it would be better than this?"

"I gave you the Para-dicey place! I gave all the wyrms so many nice things! All the nice things!"

"Tell me, &alon: how many wyrms take care of their spirits the way I do? The way I taught wyrms to?"

Her expression turned distant. "Uh…" She looked downward in dismay. "Not a lot."

"Good grief, even your Paradise is bogus!" I shook my hand at her. "I don't want to even begin to think about what they've done to the souls in their care."

I shuddered at the thought. One Letty was bad enough. But countless numbers of them, of wyrms who made the spirits in their care into their playthings, into the targets of their abuse and the subjects of their wicked whims? It was beyond the pale.

"You murdered us and our world, and for what? Paradise? Your paradise is just the slavery of other people's nightmares and dreamscapes! It's a hell of our own making, and you're the one that enables it. We're your prisoners, don't you get that?"

"You can do anything you want!"

"Can I leave?" I asked. "Can I choose to have nothing to do with you, ever again? Can I bring the souls of the dead back to life? Can I return my world to the way it was? Other worlds?"

"N-No," she said, "but—"

"—And what happens if I don't want to be your prisoner, &alon? What happens if I don't listen to you, or if I try to set my souls free?"

She nodded. "Yeah, that's why I never made wyrms goldy-eyed before. Before, I waited until the wyrms had come home and bee-hayved before I let them be goldy-eyed. 'Cuz otherwise, they wouldn't listen."

"Then why'd you do it in my world?"

"Because of you, Mr. Genneth! We were doing stuff and having fun and everything was great! I wanted to do that! It kept it safe, for you! Please, Mr. Genneth, don't make me do that to you. Don't make me do it."

"I might just take you up on that offer one day," I said. "Maybe it will put me out of my misery!"

She wept. "No! No!"

I crossed my arms and turned my head and neck away from her. "This conversation is over, &alon. Now if you don't mind, there are people in this world who are actually in need of saving—ourselves included."

She stuck out her arms in frustrated despair. "Mr. Genneth!"

For a moment, I glanced at her, and then I made a point of turning my head away. I had two, big cold shoulders for her, right here.

"Mr. Genneth!" she pleaded. Her cries grew softer and softer. "Mr. Genneth! Mr.… Mr. Genneth…"

But I didn't budge.

Sometimes, you have to be tough with children, as much as it might hurt.

I kept my back to her until I finally felt her presence depart. Even then, though, it was only a partial departure. I could still sense her watching over me, like an eye in the sky.

I looked up to the day and muttered under my breath as I slithered over to the car. "Keep dreaming."

I made sure to use the back of my finger as I tapped on the L85's hood, rather than the claw tip. I didn't want to accidentally poke any holes in it.

Pel coughed and groaned. She turned her head to face the window.

"I'm back," I said.

"Dad…?" Jules rubbed her eyes.

Fungal filaments were beginning to encroach her corneas.

Jules nudged her brother awake, and then leaned forward and gently shook her mother by the shoulder.

"Mom… Dad's back."

&alon was already climbing up my wife's chin. Stains on the lower front portion of Pel's shirt and the undersides of her sleeves told me the skin underneath was beginning to rot and ulcerate. Pel winced as she stirred.

The pain must have been indescribable.

I turned away.

I couldn't bear it. Angel! And they weren't even ripe yet!

How much more of this would we have to endure?

There had to be some way to ease their pain. If only there was a hospital nearby…

"Genneth…?" Pel asked, tired and hoarse.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to sob my pain into the earth, and entomb it there forever and ever.

What remained of my lips quivered with emotion. "You'll never guess what I've just been through."

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