Waking up feels like surfacing from the bottom of a frozen lake.
I gasp, my lungs pulling in the sharp, antiseptic air of the deep medical lab. My left arm is completely numb, a dead weight resting on the sterile sheets, while my right hand grips the edge of the mattress so tightly my knuckles are white. The pain isn't localized to my shoulder or my ribs. It is a diffuse, blinding static that crackles behind my eyes and vibrates in the marrow of my bones.
"Her neural pathways are severely inflamed," Margot says softly. She is standing over me, her face pale, her silver-streaked hair escaping its bun. "The telluric feedback from the London stabilization wasn't just a physical shock. It was a planetary resonance. When you pushed your emotional state into the global network, the earth itsel
