The visitors' reports went public. Carefully edited, but the truth shone through: the "monsters" were cultivators, artists, children. Public opinion, which had been turning toward fear, hesitated.
The Ephemeral League's response was not what they expected.
Instead of denouncing them, the League launched a media campaign called "The Mortal Soul." Documentaries about the beauty of fleeting moments: cherry blossoms falling, children growing up, elderly hands holding. Philosophers debated on networks: "Does meaning require an endpoint?" Religious leaders spoke of souls calibrated for specific durations.
It was clever, Kael realized. They weren't attacking Longevos as evil, but as... incomplete. As missing the essential ingredient of mortality.
In New Alexandria, the Compact watched these broadcasts in the communal halls. Elara, now four, watched a particularly poignant piece about a baseline woman celebrating her hundredth birthday, surrounded by generations of descendants.
"Why are they sad?" Elara asked Lin.
"They're not sad, sweetheart. They're celebrating."
"But they're crying."
Lin hugged her. "Tears can mean many things."
Elara thought about this. Then she said, "We should have a celebration too. For remembering."
So they did. The "Remembrance Festival." Each Longevo and Bridge-Born shared a memory of their baseline life. Thomas told of teaching his daughter to ride a bicycle. Erika described the smell of her Stockholm apartment after rain. Pierre recalled the taste of his mother's crêpes.
Kael shared the memory of his last normal day: the weight of his lunchbox, the joking with coworkers, the plan to meet friends for drinks that never happened because the building fell hours later.
As he spoke, he realized something. Those memories weren't fading. They were becoming more vivid, each sensory detail preserved in perfect clarity. His mind wasn't just remembering—it was curating.
After the festival, Aris came to him with new scans. "Your neural pathways are reorganizing. Memories are being indexed, cross-referenced. It's like... you're building a library of experience."
"For what purpose?" Kael asked.
"For the long road," she said. "You're not just storing memories. You're integrating them into wisdom."
Meanwhile, Lin's work with Anya's husband bore fruit. Using plant compounds and targeted gene therapies, they halted his cancer's progression. Not a cure—but decades of remission. The news, when it leaked, caused a different kind of upheaval.
Baselines began asking: What else can they do? What diseases might they cure? What knowledge might they accumulate over centuries?
The Ephemeral League shifted tactics again. Now they warned of dependency. "Don't trade your humanity for their medicines," the ads said. "The price is your soul."
But secretly, quietly, messages began arriving at New Alexandria's encrypted channels. From doctors. From researchers. From parents of sick children.
The Compact faced a new dilemma: help and risk being seen as overlords, or refuse and let people suffer.
The Council of Circles debated for days. Elara, allowed to observe as the first Bridge-Born, listened quietly. On the third day, she spoke, her voice small but clear in the large chamber.
"Mama says we're bridges," she said. "Bridges are for crossing. If we don't let people cross, we're just walls."
The simplicity cut through the complexity. They would help—but with conditions. No secrecy. All treatments open-source. No quid pro quo. And always, the patient's choice to know the treatment's origin.
The first clinic opened at the surface airlock. A simple structure, staffed by Longevos and baselines who had joined them. They treated cancers, genetic disorders, age-related degeneration. And with each treatment, they shared the science behind it.
Kael, watching from a observation platform, felt the world shifting. Not with explosions, but with quiet acts of healing. The Ephemeral League protested, but their voice was growing shrill against the calm competence of the Compact.
One evening, as the first snow of winter dusted the surface, Kael stood with Elara at the Skywell's top, looking up through the prism array at the stars.
"Papa," she asked, "will I live as long as you?"
"I don't know, sweetheart. Maybe not as long, but longer than Mama."
She thought about this. "That's sad."
"Why?"
"Because I'll have to say goodbye to Mama first. And then you'll have to say goodbye to me. And then you'll be alone."
Kael picked her up, holding her small, warm body. "I'll never be alone, Elara. I'll have all the memories of you. And of Mama. And of everyone."
"Like a library?"
"Like a library," he agreed.
"Can I help build it?" she asked. "The library of us?"
He looked at his daughter—this perfect blend of two worlds, already thinking in terms of centuries, of legacy. "You already are," he said.
Below them, in the mountain's heart, the Chronopolis thrived. Around them, the world wrestled with what they meant. Ahead, centuries stretched, filled with both promise and peril.
But in that moment, under the cold, clear stars, holding the future in his arms, Kael felt something he hadn't felt since before the beam fell: peace. Not the absence of conflict, but the presence of purpose.
They were building. They were healing. They were remembering.
And they were just beginning.