AN: Yeah. Seven months. I know, and I am sorry. To put it shortly, finishing school, vacations, and sitting for my CPA exams (which I am still in the process of doing) got in the way. It all nurtured the worst block I've experienced in a long time. But hopefully we're back. Just so you know, yes - I do intend to see this story all the way to its end regardless of how long it takes.

Also as a side note, THIS STORY TURNS THREE YEARS OLD. AND STILL ISN'T FINISHED. YAY.

Goosebumps crawled an eerie trail down his spine, and he refused to turn. He stood in the darkness, listening to the heartbeats behind him. Those quiet breaths. That smell.

There was no use in playing dumb. And besides, he wanted his answers now. "I never really was talking to Kyra, was I?"

"That sorceress is lying."

"It didn't make sense to me that they would trap themselves in here with you, but now I think I see."

"They—!"

"Don't tell me how people work," Oslan interrupted, finally turning. He saw Kyra standing in the doorway, but the shadow cast from the light behind her kept him from seeing her face. "Because you're not a person. Never were. All you did…" He took a step forward. "… Was kill her. And then you imitated her."

Kyra took a few steps back. Out of the darkened threshold, her face returned to the light. "I'm not dead!" she insisted desperately. "Not like he is!"

"He?"

"The one they pulled from the river—the one from Gelibol! If you saw him now in the underground chamber where they keep him, you'd see how death has rotted away his flesh and dried out what remained. As what lived within him. But I—I'm still alive! I didn't kill anyone!"

Underneath the sound of her voice, Oslan could hear the beating of her heart. Her skin still held a healthy glow, not like the dried, wrinkly hide of a draugr or any other corpse made to move again. Her eyes, full of spirit, focused on his cat-like ones. But there was that smell of dampness and mildew. Oslan remembered the words of the sorceress in the megascope and thought of the black sludge that had bled from the guard's nose.

'I need to talk to the sorceresses,' Oslan thought. 'Have them tell me exactly what they've done.' But the thought of walking back outside—into a city full of people with skulls filled with… that thing—unsettled him to the core. "Kyra," he said, keeping his voice steady. "Move away from the door. I need to leave."

"Where are you going?"

"Let me go." His eyes darted to the wall. The shuffling of feet converging towards the second laboratory could be heard coming from outside.

"Are you going to try and kill me?" Kyra asked. "Just like they did?"

"I just want to talk to them."

"They'll kill you!" Kyra cried, her voice growing shrilly with fear. "They're nothing but exterminators! Look at what they've done! I am just as much a being of life as they are, but they want to kill me only because they don't understand what I am!"

"Do you?" Oslan challenged.

The girl hesitated. "What do you mean?"

"That body you're in—you weren't born with it. That voice you're speaking with is borrowed. No, that's far too kind. You stole it. And what did you do to the living being that used to be there?"

"The body is still alive."

"I'm not talking about the body!" The witcher walked forward, pushing Kyra back with every step. "And the very fact that you don't understand is why—."

A window in the hallway rattled. Oslan's eyes shot to it just as something struck it again. Glass shattered and the wooden paneling of the blinds crashed through. Sticking through were several arms, their skin shredded and ripped from the glass and splinters. The coppery scent of blood filled Oslan's nose. Sunlight poured in from the open wound of the window, and faces quickly filled the space. To Oslan, they looked just like townsfolk, though their eyes were filled with hysteria.

"Don't kill me!" they shouted, and it almost sounded to Oslan as though it was a single voice he was hearing. "Don't let them kill me!"

The ones closest to the window began climbing through. Jagged teeth of broken glass rimming the window frame dragged through their skin, and it astounded Oslan how little it affected them as they continued to pour into the building. The one closest to the witcher—another town guard—marched towards him and pointed an accusatory finger.

"You said it!" he snapped. "You said you would free us!"

Now wasn't the time for combat, though by the looks of it, conflict was storming straight at him. Oslan took a step back, worried the guard would try to swing at him. "That's what I'm doing," he replied. "What is everyone—?"

"You were going to hurt her!" a woman behind the guard snapped. She looked to be a, ordinary, middle-aged housewife apart from the rage and fear on her face. "It was clear in your eyes!"

He had been confronted by angry mobs before—people driven to rage by fear and lashing out at the closest thing they could turn into a scapegoat. Often times, that thing would be him—the nonhuman. The witcher.

But this—Oslan had never experienced before. The crowd in front of him wasn't just a crowd. It was… he wasn't sure, and he didn't have the time to think it through in that moment. The soles of his boots scraped against the laboratory floor as he slowly receded from the crowd. So many eyes stared at him, but it was almost as though he held the gaze of only one being.

"Back up," Oslan ordered, his voice taking on a threatening growl. "Don't corner a witcher."

Warnings never worked in times like these. But Oslan gave them all the same, only so he would feel better once he was forced to punish those who didn't heed.

But here, at his words, the crowd suddenly stopped. Astounded as he was, it made Oslan even tenser. And then the guard spoke again.

"You promised to save us."

"I will," Oslan replied. "And to do that, I need to—."

"Kill them."

"I won't." He saw the eyes harden, and continued, "I'd die trying, and there'd be no one left to set you free." His stare drifted out to the broken window. Out in the distance, the sorceresses' tower loomed. "I'll go to them—peacefully—and talk them into taking down the bubble. And then…" He looked out to the sea of eyes, feeling his skin crawl as he did. "You'll be free."

There was a pause—silence as his words were judged. And just when the tension seemed to trickle away, there was a sudden shriek.

"He's lying!"

Oslan couldn't see where Kyra was. The crowd obscured her from his sight. He had no idea what made her scream out, nor what had made her come to that conclusion. What worried him, however, was that she was right.

They acted all at once—terrifying, unnatural uniformity. But before they could advance too quickly on the witcher, Oslan threw fire from his fingertips. And just like he had seen before, they were terrified of it. They writhed, screamed, and fell to the ground as though the flames had touched them even when it hadn't. It was the brief opportunity Oslan had hoped for, and he was out through the broken, bloodied window before any of them had awoken from their spells of terror.

But the streets were not safe. As soon as Oslan's feet touched the ground, he saw doors fly open and the streets quickly fill with that single being behind several eyes. As they advanced on him, Oslan drew his sword. Even then, he couldn't bring himself to lift it as he met gazes with the person closest to him. It was a boy barely scraping his adolescence years—nothing more than a child. And despite what he had just seen, Oslan could view the boy as nothing else but a child.

The steel in his hand remained lowered as the witcher pelted down the streets. He weaved and ducked and strafed, dodging those who lunged at him or came at him with household weapons. His eyes were focused on it—the one thing he could see in the distance. His feet pounded against the pavement. His quick breaths rattled in his own ears. Once he reached it, he would be—.

A cry escaped his lips as the air was pushed out of his lungs. The soles of his boots left the ground as something barreled against him. Though Oslan kept a tight grip on his sword, the sky and ground melted into one as his head hit the ground.

Whoever had tackled him seemed to be just as dazed from the impact. However, Oslan could feel the weight of his attacker press over him. A hand squeezed over his throat.

As soon as the halves of his vision came back together, Oslan realized it was the face of the mayor over him. How different he looked now compared to the man he had sat with by the fire—he'd become downright animalistic. Inhuman. There was something black coming out of his nose.

"You said you would free us."

Oslan felt the grip on his neck tighten. But the mayor was—or hadn't been—a strong man. And to a witcher, he was even weaker. Taking the mayor's wrist, Oslan wrenched it away. A forceful shove knocked the man aside. Oslan quickly pushed himself up onto his feet, throwing a glance over his shoulder at the mass catching up to him. But as they pursued him, they began to slow. Oslan knew why.

You'll not be able to get in. We had a couple guardsmen try—spells killed them on the spot.

He barreled towards the tower, each pounding step bringing him closer and closer. Oslan hoped to every god of every religion that the sorceresses were watching their front door. He hadn't run across a damned city turned hostile just to get blown up by a hex.

"I'm not one of them! I'm a witcher—Oslan of An Skellig from the guild of Bear!" Gods, please don't let this be his last moments—running at full speed towards a tower while shouting at it. Whatever was guarding that front door wasn't going to be stopped by the measly Quen he'd enveloped himself in.

But, as he ran, Oslan saw movement ahead of him. Though the vision of it bounced with his hysteric gait, he saw the door open just wide enough for him to fit through. It was a wordless invitation—an urgent beckoning. And just as Oslan burst through, the door slammed shut behind him.

Then, from outside came an explosion. Oslan felt the acrid stench of charred earth and flesh strike his nose almost immediately. A hurried pattering of feet followed, telling him those who had stayed back from the range of the spell were now retreating.

Gasping for breath, the witcher dropped down to lean on his knees. From the sides of his face, the dark blond locks that had been loosened from his braid framed his view of the floor. Then, slowly, Oslan, lifted his head.

The interior of the tower was dark, but his eyes had already adjusted. The room he stood in seemed to be a small foyer. A pair of plush, embroidered chairs stood leisurely at the sides of circular wooden table holding potted flowers. The dim, cozy atmosphere felt wildly bizarre given Oslan's rapidly racing heart and adrenaline that still remained after the chase. The damp stench of whatever had leaked out of the mayor's nose haunted him still.

Then he heard footsteps—light and steady. Likely belonging to a woman. Oslan straightened up just as she entered the foyer from a dim hallway. A sorceress. He could tell right away. And given the context of where he was and everything he had heard, it wasn't hard to guess.

She regarded Oslan for a second, and he her. There was something familiar about her, though the witcher couldn't pinpoint it. The sorceress's light brown hair was tied back in a simple ponytail. Her blouse, frilly and light blue, was of a style that women typically wore with a corset. But the sorceress wore none, letting the light material billow loosely around her frame. Its crumpled texture told Oslan that the blouse had been worn for several days in a row.

"Did Gloria send you?"

Oslan didn't like the hope he saw in the woman's eyes.

"No," the witcher replied heavily, forcing himself to watch that hope dim. "Lan Exetor did. She wanted to know why her sister city was encased in a bubble."

The sorceress looked down. Maybe she would've appeared ashamed if she hadn't already looked so weak from disappointment. "And did you find your answers?" she asked. "Out there?"

"Pretty much," Oslan replied. "I know what's been done to this city, and the people in it. I know it only has one fate left, and I think you know that too."

"We never meant for things to turn out like this." And from the way she spoke—that calculating, authoritative manner, Oslan suddenly realized.

"Those crystal logs—that was you in them. You're the head researcher."

"I was," the sorceress replied quietly. Her arms dropped. She lifted her chin, reclaiming whatever feeble strength she had left. "Lilibet Hayden of Vintrica. Now come—let's not just stand about here in the front. You look like hell. A meal, perhaps?"

Her sudden hospitality came at a surprise. Oslan was tired, and he knew it wasn't long before his body would be yearning for food. But there was something that kept him from accepting the offer.

"Exactly how much do you have left rationed?"

"Enough," Lilibet replied firmly as she turned, clearly unwilling to accept the witcher's concern. "Like I said—no use standing around. Follow me."

Oslan followed her down the hall. It was short, and the open archway at the end provided a view of the spiral staircase. As they passed through the archway and ascended the steps, Oslan looked up. The stairwell rose up to dizzying heights. The pointed ceiling above was partially made of glass, allowing plentiful sunlight to illuminate this central part of the tower. The bright streams reaching all the way down to where Oslan stood, coupled with the architectural beauty of the black metal stairwell swirling up through the tower like a thin, elegant ribbon, were enough to put the witcher's mind at ease.

He trailed loosely behind Lilibet as they climbed higher. Looking out, he saw various doors built into the rounded stonework around them. But the railing provided no opening to reach them, and even then the space between the stairs and doors was too far for even him to leap. Had he not been in a sorceresses' tower, he would have asked the obvious question.

They were almost a third of the way up the tower now. It was here where Lilibet stopped. She delicately tapped the railing with a hand, and immediately it folded down. Pale bricks hopped from the walls and built and impromptu path from the stairs to the door. Even before the makeshift bridge was completed, Lilibet was crossing with confident strides. Oslan, on the other hand, hesitated. It was only when the last brick found its place that he moved. Part of him was worried that the bridge would simply collapse under his first step. But as he planted a boot down, he found it as sturdy as solid ground.

Lilibet afforded the witcher a quick glance as she reached the door. Opening it, she prompted, "Quickly now. Those paths don't last long." That sent Oslan hurrying across. Lilibet held the door open for him. Passing through, he caught the scent of something charred like burnt flesh. It was faint, telling him that the smell was days old. Still, age could not hide it from his witcher senses.

"Diona," Lilibet called out from ahead of Oslan, "it's a witcher."

Hurried steps told Oslan someone was coming to meet them. "Is it…?" a voice sounded from just beyond one of the doorways.

"No," Lilibet interrupted quickly. "It's a Bear."

"Oh." The faint trace of disappointment in Diona's voice made Oslan wonder whom she had been expecting in his stead. It no longer surprised him to find a sorceress that had grown attached to a witcher and vice versa, given their similarly twisted fates. Kozin and the late grandmaster were just two close and personal examples.

Diona came from around the corner. She nearly matched Oslan in height, though the witcher was admittedly a tad short for a Bear. Still, Diona was nearly half a head taller than Lilibet. Even then, the head researcher's appearance remained relatively kempt—her hair was tied up and kept in place with pins. Diona's loose, messy hair and the way her shoulders sagged underneath her crinkled clothes told Oslan of someone who had given up hope a while ago.

"How did he even get in?" Diona asked.

"Vintrica," Lilibet answered. Her voice was grave.

"Ah," Diona replied lightly. With a tired hand, she brushed her hair back from the side of her face, running her fingers through the locks before letting her hand drop. "If that's the case, why didn't they send sorceresses in? Why a single witcher?"

"Seems like Sabina had trouble with Lan Exetor," Lilibet said. "They saw sending in a neutral party as the only compromise—without having to fly at each other's throats, of course."

Diona gave a weighted sigh. "Politics."

'Am I just decoration here?' Oslan thought. 'And Lilibet—didn't realize she'd gone through my head. Not sure when; could have been while she was leading me here. And with my medallion reacting to nearly everything in here, I would've hardly noticed. Still, why am I not surprised?'

"He needs rest," he heard Lilibet say, "before he helps us. Tell Morgan to have a meal prepared for…" Her words trailed off as she turned an inquisitive gaze to the witcher.

"Oslan."

"For Oslan," Lilibet finished. Diona's eyes flashed from him back to Lilibet.

"I hope this means we'll find a solution soon," she said softly. "There's not much left." With that, Diona turned and left to do as the head researcher had ordered.

The lengthy exhale through her nose told Oslan that Lilibet had stifled a sigh. Then, she continued to lead him down the short hall, turning the corner that Diona had first appeared from. There, they entered some kind of study—from what Oslan could judge from the desk and walnut bookshelves. At Lilibet's beckoning, he sat down in one of the two armchairs positioned by a window. The sorceress sat across from him. Now settled, Oslan asked, "What do you mean by helping you?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Lilibet gestured out the window. Behind the glass, Oslan could see the city and the warped reflections of sunlight off the walls of the bubble. "Believe me, we'll suffocate before this parasite does."

"Then why trap yourself in this mess in the first place?"

"And risk Lan Exetor—no, the entire continent?" Lilibet kept her face turned towards the window, the sunlight glowing pale on her fair skin. "As soon as we discovered the spores had gone airborne, we had to quarantine the city immediately. There was no time for any of us to alert Vintrica or even evacuate." Oslan saw her eyes drift upwards, following the bubble as it obscured the sky. "And we had to make sure the shield could block magic—I knew Gloria would try to send sorceresses in. We couldn't allow anyone else to be drawn into this mess."

Lilibet's eyes quickly shifted down. "Look at them," she noted. Oslan did as she said. To his surprise, he saw the ground littered with… bodies? "They haven't died," Lilibet clarified. "They're entering back into a hibernation state—trying to slow their hosts' metabolism to conserve energy and air. They were like this for days after we sealed the city." Leaning back into her chair, the sorceress crossed her arms over her abdomen. "Silence—what once was one of the most thriving cities in the north was reduced to just that. In all my life, I'd never seen anything like it. Just silence and stillness.

"And then, all of a sudden, they started moving again. Morgan was the first to notice—she called us all to the window to look. I never thought the sight of bustling streets would frighten me so. None of us knew why they had suddenly woken up."

Oslan remembered that eerie ripple he had felt while atop the city wall—that feeling of something stirring as though he had wandered a little too close to a beast's den.

"And shortly after the awakening of the city, what do we hear—a voice calling out, calling himself a witcher." Lilibet finally turned away from the window to look at him. "We had two options before you came to us: meet our fates in this city while ensuring that this vile parasite does the same, or try to exterminate every spore in the city. None of us were too fond of the first choice, but the latter is easier said than done."

"Why's that?" Oslan asked. "You all are sorceresses, aren't you?"

"You seem to misunderstand, witcher. Yes, we are sorceresses. No, we are not gods. To eliminate every single spore—you have to understand, there must be billions upon billions of them in the air right now. Unseen but present. Even the space between you and I is thick with them. They fill your lungs with every breath you take, and you best thank your witcher upbringing for the mutations that keep you from being reduced to the things that lay out there." With a soft sigh, Lilibet reached up and gently pressed her fingertips to her temple. "To clean out the air, while eliminating the hosts at the same time, would take a great amount of energy. And heat. So much that we wouldn't survive the endeavor either. And faced with that, I was looking at death for my team and I no matter what."

"So," Oslan said, "how does my arrival change things?"

Footsteps approached. Lilibet stood. "We'll talk more later," she told him. She left the chair and headed to the door, which opened. Another sorceress, whose black hair was cut short save for her swooping bangs, stepped in with a bowl cradled in her hands. Oslan was greeted with the welcoming scent of fragrant broth.

"Morgan?" he guessed as the sorceress set the bowl in front of him. Curls of steam rose from the lentil stew and fogged the spoon that was perched on the bowl's edge.

"Yes," Morgan answered.

"Can I talk to you for a second?"

The sorceress, who had been wiping her hands on the skirt of her dress, paused. "About what?"

"The people outside. I need to know more about what happened when this whole thing started."

Morgan's pale green eyes flicked to the window. "It's… not a pleasant subject," she admitted. "I better let you finish eating first."

"I've got a strong stomach," Oslan insisted. "Besides, time is a precious thing we don't have much of, wouldn't you agree?" The sorceress responded with a sigh that told Oslan he had won. She lowered herself onto the opposite armchair. Leaned forward, she had her clasped hands resting on her lap while her eyes focused on some nondescript spot on the table.

"Maybe… if any of us had cared a little bit more, we could've—."

"Don't," Oslan interrupted. "There's no room for that kind of sentiment at this point. It'll do nothing but eat you away."

"I know," Morgan replied softly. The sorceress paused.

"When did this all start?" Oslan prompted. "This research on spores?"

"We didn't start out caring about the spores. All we focused on was finding out what had happened to the man from Gelibol."

"Gelibol," Oslan repeated, remembering her words from back at the abandoned laboratory. "The one from the river."

"How…" Morgan's eyes reflected slight wary. "I thought that was confidential. How do you know?"

"One of the—," Oslan quickly tapered off as he quickly sought for the right word. "One of the… ones outside mentioned him."

"I… see."

"So the man from Gelibol is brought here. Dead on arrival." It was another thing Oslan remembered. The witcher slowly recited his thoughts into words as he worked to piece things together. And all the while, he watched Morgan carefully as she did him. "With the hopes of understanding what killed him." Oslan's brow suddenly furrowed. "That thing—it killed him. Why is Orchyn different?" Although doing so brought from within him a deep pain, he recalled Kyra's face. It had been so full of life. A soft, feminine face framed by locks of black hair.

Just like…

The witcher broke his train of thought off with a sharp clearing of his throat. His amber eyes returned to Morgan's, using the pale green to anchor himself back to the present.

"I can't claim to understand it," Morgan admitted. "Even after decades of researching it. Perhaps because it's just too different, and I can't open my perspective wide enough to embrace the possibility. To think that something like mold is able to… to think."

There was a lull, and Oslan knew Morgan was waiting for him to give any indication that he agreed with her. And he would've, had those words not rung in his head.

I'm as much a being of life as they are, but they want to kill me only because they don't understand what I am!

"A year ago was when the signs first appeared. People began reporting headaches. It started with the communities closest to our tower. Lilibet figured it was due to the proximity they had to magic and our equipment. She had us strengthen the inhibitors around the tower. And all of us were too absorbed in our work to notice that the headaches still kept coming.

"And then… well, a few months later, the first cases of madness began. More and more townsfolk crowded around the tower. Guardsmen. Even the mayor's personal aid. They insisted that magic had inflicted the madness on them and demanded from us a remedy."

"What kind of madness?"

"Some claimed voices in their heads. Thoughts that were not their own. Some even called it possession."

"And those thoughts were caused by…?"

Morgan's thin eyebrows knitted in a look of concern. "How does a simple bit of mold make thoughts, Oslan? It simply… it just simply can't."

"Your continual referral of it as 'simple mold' is why you can't understand," the witcher stated. "It latches onto the brain. What's to say it doesn't learn through what it attaches onto?"

"Do you honestly believe that it can do that?" Morgan asked. "Why, isn't that just… madness?"

"Look to your left—through that glass. There's naught but madness outside. And madness is how this all started." Oslan leaned forward, resting his elbows onto his knees. His cat eyes held onto the sorceress's with a tight grip. "If those people out there are all 'dead,' if there's nothing left but that thing, then how is it that this thing is able to speak its host's language? Recall their memories?"

"Memories?" Morgan echoed faintly.

Oslan's clasped hands tightened. "I spoke with someone out there. She… acted completely normal up until I discovered the truth." Finally, the witcher lowered his gaze. "It knew everything about her. Mimicked her like a doppler."

"Who?"

"The mayor's daughter."

"Kyra." Oslan was caught off guard. He lifted his eyes and saw the same sadness on the sorceress's face that had filled her voice upon saying the girl's name.

"You knew her?"

"The real her, yes," Morgan answered softly. "She came to the tower often—was curious about us and our research. A mind as clever and inquisitive as hers would've been perfectly suited for Vintrica. She… she was the only reason we began taking the complaints of madness seriously."

"The mayor's personal aid came to your tower," Oslan recalled.

"Yes. Kyra's personality had suddenly started to abruptly change—jumping from one to another as though two minds were fighting for control. When she sneezed, her handkerchief would be stained with something black. And by the time I went to the mayor's house to have a look at her…"

Morgan gave a heavy sigh. She pinched the bridge of her nose and, with her eyes still closed, continued, "That thing—its spores had been in the air she breathed. And because she was always coming to the lab so often… it festered, concentrating in her skull. Mingling with her spinal cord, unbeknownst to us all. And by the time I got to her, she was… gone. That thing was thriving in her head. It somehow knew which parts of the brain to destroy to eliminate the conscious. The person. Reduce the host into nothing but a vegetable—a vessel to puppet. Kyra was dead. I knew the moment I examined her. She was dead, but she was still talking to me. I was horrified. I… "

Her hand lowered. Her eyes opened, but they were dim. "The only thing I told the mayor was that her daughter was very sick. It wasn't true, but I had to stall for time and you know they wouldn't have believed me if I had told them what really happened to Kyra, Oslan. Think about it—if you hadn't witnessed what you had outside, would even you believe me?"

"I'm a witcher."

"And I suppose your profession has allowed you to stretch your perspective somewhat beyond that of a common man," Morgan agreed, though her tone remained skeptical.

"So you stalled for time," Oslan continued. "What for?"

"Because the more responsibility one has resting on their shoulders, the more delayed—more calculated—their reaction must be," Morgan replied. "I had to consult with the others and be absolutely sure of what had happened. What was presented to me was something utterly terrifying: our worst fears placed into reality. When we started our research, we were very careful about preventing the spread of this contamination. That's why Orchyn was a very natural choice for our location—close to the mountains and to Vintrica, yes, but also with fresh mountain air and no vicinity to any rivers or lakes. And this… disease, as we assumed it to be at first," Morgan said with a wave of her hand, "was unprecedented—meaning there is no existing cure. No way to save lives should this become an epidemic, which it has. And… and it started with Kyra, of all people."

Oslan tried to ignore the sorceress's distress. He didn't like the pain he saw for that dark-haired girl. It got too close. The witcher's fingers, stiff from being clasped for so long, relaxed and his hands parted to rest atop his knees.

So far, amidst everything Morgan had told him, something didn't sit right with him.

"No cure?" he repeated. "After studying this thing for—what has it been? Decades?"

"Early prototypes were developed years ago, but you can see for yourself how effective they are," Morgan answered with a sharp gesture towards the window. "The mold used to only thrive in water, and now it is airborne. It has gone from a simple cranial parasite to a grotesque puppeteer! It is evolving!"

Oslan still wasn't satisfied with that answer. "You relied on outdated vaccines?" That didn't seem like a mistake that Vintrican sorceresses would make. "But your research has been ongoing. What were you doing in here since then?"

He saw it there clearly in that pale green—conflict. Then it disappeared as the sorceress quickly lowered her eyes. Her gaze quickly switched to the floor, where it remained for a beat before she looked back up at Oslan. And where there was conflict, there now was resolution. Morgan opened her mouth to speak.

"Enough." The voice came from the door.

Oslan kept his eyes trained on Morgan for just another second, watching her resolution quickly snap, before slowly turning his gaze to the door. There stood Lilibet, looking far more authoritative than she had when they'd first met. "Apologies, Oslan, but that information is strictly Vintrican business. Even despite the circumstances, we must abide by our policies."

'I've heard that before,' Oslan thought irately. 'Well, no matter. I'm a witcher, not a detective. It's not my business to get tangled up in the intricacies. The masters always told us there were two things a witcher should always steer clear of—politics and secrets.' Out loud, he responded, "I understand."

"Good. Thank you. Now…" Lilibet beckoned for the two of them to stand. "Are you ready? Time grows short."

"Now's a good time as any," Oslan agreed as he rose. Morgan did as well, and they followed Lilibet out of the small sitting room. "Has there been any sort of plan drawn up? Any at all?"

"Something like that," Lilibet answered simply.

"And…?" The sorceress didn't answer him at first. "Lilibet."

With a sigh, Lilibet slowed so she could look back at Oslan. "We only waited this long to see if there was any way to save them. But upon learning what that parasite has done to them, we now know there's no hope for them. The people they once were are, in every sense of the word, dead." In a mutter, Lilibet added, "It's almost like necromancy—kept in this world only by some horrific force."

Back in the short hallway, Oslan was once again greeted by that strange, charred smell. He could only guess it was coming from one of the rooms at the far end of the hall.

They arrived at the door that was across from the sitting room, which Lilibet pushed opened. As they stepped through, Oslan immediately recognized a laboratory with its wide space cluttered by humming and whirring instruments. Lattice windows lined the walls, though the light that poured through was dim. Even the shadows of the instruments thrown over the hardwood floors seemed like nothing but ghosts.

"So it has become a game of survival," Lilibet continued. "Us, them, or neither at all. Our only chance of making it out of this city is mass extermination."

Oslan had seen it coming. Still, it didn't make the hearing of it any less grim. But the witcher held all of it inside, keeping his exterior calm. It almost seemed to make the sorceresses uneasy.

"Unfortunately, we dwindled our options when we initially chose mercy," Lilibet said. She led them through the lab, between the instruments and furniture. "To go and attempt to clear out the city… even with all of us, there simply wouldn't be enough time at this point. We'd suffocate before we even eliminated half the city—Orchyn was once thousands upon thousands."

'She talks as if the city is already lost,' were Oslan's somber thoughts at her words. 'But then again, it is. Here we are—within the heart of the dead city.'

"Not to mention that the air is contaminated," Oslan pointed out. Suddenly, he remembered, and added, "there's a party of soldiers right outside the bubble, waiting for answers on behalf of Lan Exetor's castellan. If the spores got to any of them…" He didn't need to finish his sentence for the sorceresses to catch on to his line of thinking.

"Lan Exetor," Morgan muttered. "I almost forgot about them."

"And they'll be wanting answers." Lilibet took a deep breath, and put her hands out as if halting someone in their tracks. "That's not our problem right now. At the moment, we need to focus on—."

"Not our problem? We killed an entire city, Lilibet!" Morgan snapped. "You keep trying to ignore that fact!" The sharp rise in her voice put Oslan immediately on edge. Or perhaps it was the telltale jump of his medallion, like a warning. Lilibet glared at her colleague. The head researcher's still composure suddenly shattered like a glass table put under too much pressure.

"Because if I don't, I'll end up like Heather!"

That name seemed to trigger something within both women. Morgan pulled in a shuddering breath and Lilibet quickly turned away like a parent ashamed of what they'd said in front of their child. Only Oslan remained unaffected, though he was confused and nervous by what had just happened.

"Heather?" he dared to ask.

Morgan shook her head, refusing to speak. Lilibet took a deep breath. She wouldn't turn, but she said, "You still smell her, don't you? With that witcher sense?"

"I smelt…" Oslan glanced at the door that led to the short hallway, "… something burnt. Coming from the end of the hall—."

"Heather's room," Lilibet said softly.

"None of us have gone near it since," Morgan added in a whisper.

Oslan lifted his eyes to the ceiling. He could hear Diona walking about on the floor above them. Beside him were the gentle thumps of the hearts within the two sorceresses next to him. "There's only four of us in this entire tower," he said.

"A week into the quarantine," Lilibet began, "there… there was a horrible argument. I didn't realize how hard it was for her. We were all scared, but she… All the shouting about how we had killed the city. Our fault. She kept saying it was our fault."

"She'd been the closest to Kyra out of all of us," Morgan recalled. "The two of them… like sisters. And then when she learned what happened to Kyra, what happened to all of them, she just… just…" Morgan's hand quickly flew to her mouth. Oslan still heard the quick sob that the sorceresses tried to hide behind her fingers.

"It was so quick. Right before my eyes. One moment, we were arguing, and the next… I stood there for seconds—they felt like years—trying to comprehend what had happened. Heather had vaporized herself. She couldn't take it. The smell stayed on me for days."

Oslan hadn't realized how much his brow was furrowed until he felt the tension upon reemerging from Lilibet's words. Unable to stop himself, he gave another quick glance to the door before tearing his eyes away. "I'm sorry."

"So am I, witcher. And she was right—it is our fault. But we cannot, cannot lose focus now." She turned then to Morgan. "Pull yourself together," she ordered.

"Give her a moment," Oslan said, reaching out. He was tempted to push Lilibet away from Morgan, but the head researcher shot him a look that halted his hand. Still, she obeyed the witcher's words and turned to face the instrument they stood by. To Oslan, it looked like a sun dial—a large stone tabletop with curved lines carved in its surface, only it lacked the tall fin. Small crystals that reminded him of pea-sized versions of megascope crystals were embedded, intermittently spread along the lines like mapped constellations.

"We've noticed a strange pattern in those things outside, but only when they're active. The pattern is in the way they move—like this." Lilibet swept a hand, palm down, across the table. The crystals twinkled with a sudden light. Wisps of silver-blue smoke snaked softly from transparent air, collecting onto the surface of the table. They quickly morphed together into small shapes—little specks gathered together like a captured segment of the night sky. These specks formed the body of an oblong shape, something familiar. A brain, Oslan realized.

"This is a projection captured from the scan of an individual's head. Look here." Lilibet pointed as a faint flash of light surged through part of the brain. It almost looked like a bolt of lightning. "I'd just asked that individual a question—what they had for breakfast the day before, I believe. What you saw was them receiving the question. And here." What followed was more of those little flashes of lightning, this time brighter and across multiple parts of the projected brain. "That's them coming up with their answer."

The witcher was astounded. "Thoughts? Am I seeing… thoughts?"

"Yes, the electrical surges that travel through the brain—thoughts, put simply." The sorceress swept her hand again. The smoke moved, dissolving the brain projection, and reformed into… well, Oslan could only describe it as a swarm of bugs. A moving, organic cloud of bead-like shapes.

"This is a colony of bees, recorded decades ago by Vintrican zoologists," Lilibet explained. "They captured the colony's reaction to an invading wasp." This invader was represented by a larger, nondescript shape, though it moved in that familiar way which made Oslan want to shoot out a burst of Igni.

The wasp moved closer to the colony. It hovered from a safe distance for a second, and then dove in for the brash attack.

The closest specks reacted first. And then Oslan saw it—something that rippled through the entire colony. It wasn't as obvious as the lightning, but what he witnessed gave him a dizzying sense of déjà vu.

The dive of the wasp. Danger, it signaled. And the entire colony reacted to it. Before the witcher's eyes, the specks moved like one being made up of many. One single sweeping attack over the invading wasp. There was no longer amazement in Oslan's eyes—only grim understanding.

"One more," Lilibet said. The smoke once again dissolved, this time sinking to the tabletop and reforming small shapes lying on its surface. "This is a replication of Orchyn's activity about five hours ago." Oslan watched as the silhouettes closest to the border reacted first. The movement traveled across the entire city—like lightning. Reaction to a question asked, a wasp's dive.

A witcher's arrival.

"So," Oslan said, "the things out there are acting like one brain?"

"A collective conscious," Lilibet affirmed. "Individual beings acting as one."

"And how does that provide a solution?" Oslan asked with a shrug. "To kill a swarm, you still have to destroy the entire thing."

"This is no ordinary swarm," Lilibet said. "Not of gnats or locusts, no. You've seen what it can do. It's able to speak and understand. More importantly, it is able to communicate among itself. How, I'm still not sure, but what I do know is that this is the key to taking it down. There is a focal point from where it sends signals—like a brain controlling limbs. Or a queen bee commanding her colony. One of them down there is the key. The only question is…" Lilibet glanced out the window to the streets below. "Who is it? I… I don't know how long it'd take to find out."

But to Oslan, it was no mystery. He had seen it for himself. Experienced it for himself. The dive of the invading wasp.

He's lying, she had screamed. And it had rippled through, that signal.

Oslan turned his somber gaze to Morgan. And from the way she gazed back, that sadness that threatened to unearth something long buried within him, Oslan could tell that she understood.

Sun won't rise for our morning

You can't come back from the dead

Try to dry my eyes for the fallen

But the tears won't wait for the rest

It's cold as ice

But this kind of fire don't keep us warm inside

It's cold as ice

I am unstable and there's nowhere to hide

"Casualty"—Hidden Citizens