The workshop became something between war room and research facility.
With the delegation's departure, the center of gravity shifted. No longer were Marcus and Anya working on theoretical improvements and experimental modifications. Now they were working on practical defensive systems that needed to be deployed across multiple settlements. Now every modification had immediate application. Now the work mattered in ways that went beyond abstract technical achievement.
"We need modularity," Anya explained, working through designs with Marcus and Sara—the young technician who'd committed to the training despite social pressure. "The barrier systems we've built work for Haven because we designed them for this specific geography. But the alliance settlements have different terrain, different resources, different population sizes. We need barrier configurations that can be adapted without requiring fundamental redesign."
Marcus studied the technical drawings spread across their workspace. "That means increasing complexity in the core generator but simplifying the peripheral formations. It means creating scaling parameters that operators can adjust without deep technical understanding."
"Exactly," Anya said. "We're not trying to turn every settlement into barrier engineers. We're trying to create systems that competent technicians can maintain and adapt."
They worked through the implications methodically. Each modification required testing. Each parameter needed validation. The work was slower than Marcus would have preferred, but it was thorough in ways that raw speed would have compromised.
Sara absorbed the work with impressive dedication. She'd moved beyond simply following instructions and was beginning to suggest modifications of her own—small optimizations that demonstrated genuine understanding of the underlying principles.
"She'll be capable of maintaining everything independently within two months," Anya reported to the council. "Maybe sooner if the current pace continues."
"What about Marcus?" Harren asked. "How is his condition progressing?"
"Stable," Anya said carefully. "But changing. He's more integrated with his power than before. The distinction between conscious control and autonomous response is blurring. He can operate at significantly higher capacity now, but with less conscious oversight of each action."
"That sounds dangerous," Harren said.
"It's different," Anya replied. "Not necessarily more dangerous. Just different. He's becoming more like the power and less like the human who has the power. But the human principles that guided his earlier actions are still present—they're just operating at deeper levels of consciousness."
Lysera began working with Marcus on resistance meditation.
The practice was ancient—drawn from traditions that predated even the oldest human civilizations. It involved creating mental structures that could resist external influence while maintaining functional connection to that influence. It was, Serath had explained before the delegation's departure, the closest thing to genuine defense against cosmic force integration.
"You can't prevent the merger," Lysera explained during their first session. "But you can create frameworks that allow distinct consciousness to exist within the merger. You create rooms in your mind. Spaces that remain yours even as the rest of your consciousness becomes Lilith's space."
They worked in the quiet hours before dawn, when Haven was mostly asleep and external stimulation minimal. Marcus would sit in meditation, his consciousness projecting inward to the strange internal landscape that the merger was creating.
What he found was both fascinating and horrifying.
The integration wasn't clean or organized. It wasn't simply Lilith's consciousness sitting alongside Marcus's consciousness. Instead, it was a gradual dissolution of boundaries. Regions of consciousness that had been distinctly Marcus were becoming something hybrid. Marcus-and-Lilith. Self-and-Other intermingled at fundamental levels.
But within that dissolution, Lysera was teaching him to create structures. Mental architecture that defined space as "human" even while acknowledging that the distinction was becoming increasingly arbitrary.
"The goal isn't to maintain complete separation," Lysera said. "That's impossible and would require rejecting so much of the power that you'd lose the benefits. The goal is to maintain enough distinction that you can make choices based on human values rather than purely cosmic design."
"For how long?" Marcus asked. "Until what point?"
"As long as you practice the discipline," Lysera said. "Months. Possibly longer if you're particularly disciplined. Eventually, probably not. But long enough to matter. Long enough to make a difference."
Harren restructured Haven's defensive positions based on Marcus's assessments.
The layout was completely different from pre-siege configuration. No longer concentrated defense at particular chokepoints. Instead, layered defensive capability throughout Haven that would make internal assault exponentially more difficult.
"We're preparing for siege penetration," Harren explained to the defenders during training sessions. "We assume that the outer barriers will hold, but we prepare for breach. We assume that internal assault is possible, and we ensure that defenders are positioned to respond immediately and effectively."
The training was intensive. Guards rotated through scenarios. They practiced response to creature breaches. They practiced response to organized military assault. They practiced adapting to tactical surprises and changing battlefield conditions.
Marcus worked with the defenders on understanding his capabilities and limitations. "When I broadcast Resonance-Inversion at full power, everything in approximately fifty meters experiences psychic domination," he explained. "Your nervous systems will be disrupted. You'll lose motor control. It takes roughly three minutes for recovery if exposure is direct. Longer if you're at distance."
"Can you control the radius?" someone asked.
"Theoretically," Marcus said. "Practically, the more controlled the broadcast, the less powerful it is. Full power requires full radius. At this integration stage, I can't really do pinpoint application."
"What about limiting it to specific targets?" another defender asked.
"That's possible but dangerous. If I make a mistake, I hit allies. It's a risk worth taking in actual combat, but in training, we stick to full radius broadcast so you understand the sensation and can begin adapting response protocols."
Mira's faction began openly resisting the defensive preparations.
They questioned why resources were being allocated to training that "assumed siege was inevitable." They suggested that the preparations were creating the expectation of conflict rather than preventing it. They insinuated that the "war mentality" leadership was adopting was unnecessarily frightening the community.
But their arguments were becoming increasingly hollow. The scout reports were clear. The threats were real. The defensive preparations were not just justified but essential.
Most of Haven's residents seemed to understand that. The vote on alliance might not have been overwhelming, but the community's support for defensive preparation was. People trained. People worked on reinforcements. People accepted resource allocation toward survival systems.
Even some of Mira's faction members participated, recognizing that whatever their political positions were, they needed the defenses to survive.
But Mira herself withdrew further. She stopped attending community gatherings. She spent most of her time in her quarters or in private meetings with faction members. She was, Lysera reported grimly, "planning something."
"I can feel it," Lysera said to Marcus during one of their meditation sessions. "She's beyond political opposition now. She's moving toward something more direct. I just don't know what."
"When will it happen?" Marcus asked.
"Soon," Lysera said. "Within weeks probably. Before the external threats arrive. She's running out of time to make her move internally before external pressure forces political unity."
Marcus's consciousness continued to fragment and reform.
The meditation practices were helping. He could maintain pockets of distinct identity within the larger merger. But the effort required was increasing. Each day, maintaining that distinction became slightly harder. Each day, Lilith's influence seemed to press more heavily, more persistently, more absoluteness.
He began noting changes he couldn't quite articulate. Decisions made without conscious deliberation. Actions taken without explicit thought. His hands moving to perform technical modifications before his conscious mind had formulated the intention to move.
It was terrifying. It was also, in strange ways, liberating.
The constant tension of maintaining separation was exhausting. If separation was becoming impossible anyway, perhaps accepting the merger was actually more peaceful than fighting it.
But then he'd remember Lily. He'd remember her small hand in his. He'd remember her simple faith that he could be more than what he was becoming. He'd remember the promise he'd made to Lysera to "try to remember" his humanity.
And the distinct consciousness would reassert itself. The framework Lysera taught him would strengthen. The human part of Marcus Hayes would refuse complete dissolution.
For now. For these weeks. For as long as the discipline held.