The memory gardens collapsed around them in a cascade of dying light, forty-seven thousand civilizations winking out like snuffed candles. Reed felt each extinction as a physical blow through the neural link, but Lyralei's anguish was so profound it threatened to shatter his enhanced consciousness entirely.
"Emergency extraction," she gasped, her hands weaving complex patterns in the air as dimensional portals struggled to form around the Prime Consciousness's assault. "Hold onto me."
Reality twisted, folded, and spat them back into the material universe with the violence of cosmic rejection. They materialized in Lyralei's private chambers aboard the flagship Convergence, both of them bleeding from neural feedback burns that painted crimson streaks across their skin.
But they weren't alone.
"My Lady," Captain Vex stood at attention, though Reed could see the tension in his augmented frame. "We have a situation."
