The private chambers beneath the sanctuary were dead quiet. The thermal braziers flickered low, casting long, dancing shadows across the basalt walls.
Kyle sat alone on the edge of the stone dais, his head lowered, his bare hands resting motionless on his knees. The weight in his chest hadn't diminished after leaving the throne room; if anything, the cold silence of the lower chambers only amplified it.
Lapidot's words rang in a endless loop inside his head, overlapping with the quiet, devastating declaration of the Spire elders.
*Shed your inner skin... you think you are making choices... what do you actually remember about the vision you saw when you first received the system?*
Kyle squeezed his eyes shut, plunging his consciousness inward toward his core.
'Snow,' Kyle called out silently.
'I am here,' Snow's voice responded, returning to its crisp, familiar clarity inside his mind now that the spatial interference of the celestial presence was gone.
