The deep medical lab at the Blackthorn Academy smells of antiseptic, ozone, and the faint, metallic tang of fear.
It has been forty-eight hours since we severed the Juan de Fuca waveguide. The tectonic plates have settled. The acoustic ping from the Mariana Trench has ceased. By all conventional metrics, the immediate threat of the Formless has been neutralized.
But the air in the lab is freezing.
I stand in the doorway, my arms crossed tightly over my chest. My left arm is in its carbon-fiber brace, the nerve damage flaring with a dull, rhythmic ache in the chill. My ribs are heavily taped, protesting every shallow breath. But the physical pain is entirely eclipsed by the cold, hard knot of terror in my stomach.
In the center of the room, Asher sits on the edge of the examination tabl
