They left the car hidden behind a stand of young redwoods, where the logging road had become so overgrown that it was barely visible. The forest closed around them as they walked, dense and damp, the air heavy with the smell of wet pine and decaying leaves. The green lightning flickered overhead, casting strange shadows through the canopy, and somewhere in the distance, a raven called once and then fell silent.
Ben had forgotten how much he loved this forest, even with everything that had happened here. The old-growth sections were cathedrals of living wood, towering sequoias and Douglas firs that had been standing since before the Gold Rush. Walking among them felt like walking through history, through a landscape that had seen empires rise and fall while it simply endured.
But as they approached Welling Glen, the character of the forest changed. The trees grew younger and more sparse, the undergrowth thicker and more tangled. This was where Maplehurst’s crew had cut, where the ancient guardians of the ley line had been felled for lumber. The stumps still dotted the landscape, raw and weathered, monuments to destruction. Some of them were six feet across, the rings of their growth visible like the pages of a book no one would ever read again.
And beyond them, through a gap in the remaining trees, Ben caught his first glimpse of the Aetheris camp.
It was larger than the satellite images had suggested. The prefab buildings had multiplied, forming a small compound around a central structure that looked like a cross between an oil derrick and something out of a science fiction movie. Metal scaffolding rose thirty feet into the air, supporting an array of sensors and what appeared to be some kind of focusing apparatus pointed directly at the ground. Cables snaked across the muddy earth, connecting the drilling apparatus to a bank of generators that hummed with barely contained power.
“What the hell is that?” Rebecca murmured.
“That,” Finn said grimly, “is how you drill into a ley line.”
They settled into position behind a fallen log, close enough to observe but far enough from the perimeter to avoid the detection grid. The log was damp and covered in moss, and Ben could feel the moisture seeping through his jeans almost immediately, but he ignored the discomfort and focused on the task at hand. Finn handed him the binoculars, and he pointed them at the central structure.
Workers in white coveralls moved around the base of the derrick, checking equipment and consulting tablets. The drilling apparatus itself hummed with a low, subsonic vibration that Ben could feel in his bones even from this distance. It was deeply unpleasant, like nails on a chalkboard translated into pure sensation, and his dimensional scars prickled in response.
“There.” Rebecca pointed toward one of the prefab buildings. “Movement near the main office.”
Ben swung the binoculars toward the spot she’d indicated and found himself looking at Julian Gregory in the flesh.
The tech billionaire looked exactly like his headshot — expensive haircut, expensive leather jacket, an easy confidence that seemed to scream that the man had probably never been told “no” in his life. He was talking to someone, gesturing expansively, and even without audio, Ben could tell he was selling something. The man practically radiated charisma, the kind that would make people want to believe whatever he was saying. He’d probably been the kid in school who could talk his way out of any detention, who could convince teachers that late assignments were actually innovative experiments in deadline flexibility.
But the person he was talking to wasn’t buying it.
Dr. Sonya Rosenthal stood in front of him with her arms crossed, her posture rigid, her face set in an expression that Ben recognized all too well. He’d seen it in the moments before she’d ordered her agents to fire on Sidney, a kind of cold calculation that signaled she believed the ends justified any means.
Except now, something was different.
The woman looked haggard. Her gray hair, which had always been short and immaculately styled, was now longer, messy and limp. Dark circles shadowed her eyes, visible even through the binoculars, and she’d lost weight she couldn’t afford to lose. Her clothes — a white lab coat over dark slacks and a sweater — hung on her frame like they belonged to someone else. She looked like a woman who hadn’t slept in weeks.
And she looked afraid.
“Interesting,” Finn murmured. He’d produced his own pair of binoculars and was studying the same scene. “Gregory is pushing for something. Rosenthal is pushing back.”
“What, you can read lips?” Ben asked. At this point, he was ready to believe almost anything.
“Enough to get the gist.” Finn was quiet for a moment, watching. “Gregory wants to increase the extraction rate. He’s talking about ‘breakthrough potential’ and ‘revolutionary applications.’ Classic tech bro bullshit.” He paused. “Rosenthal is warning him about destabilization. She’s saying something about…cascading failures. And containment protocols.”
Rebecca swore under her breath. “She knows what they’re waking up.”
“She knows,” Finn agreed. “And she’s scared. But Gregory isn’t listening.”
Ben watched as the argument continued, Gregory’s gestures becoming more emphatic while Rosenthal grew more agitated. At one point, she grabbed his arm, her face urgent, and Gregory actually laughed — the kind of indulgent laugh you might give a child who was worried about monsters under the bed. He patted her shoulder in a way that was clearly meant to be reassuring but came across as dismissive, and Ben saw Rosenthal’s expression harden into something between fury and despair.
Finally, she threw up her hands and stalked away, disappearing into one of the other buildings. Gregory watched her go with an expression of mild annoyance, like a man whose assistant had just told him his lunch reservation was delayed. He checked his phone, typed something with his thumbs, and smiled at whatever response he received.
Then he turned back toward the drilling apparatus, and his smile transformed into something approaching reverence. He looked up at the structure with naked hunger, the way a prospector might look at a mountain of gold.
“He has no idea what he’s doing,” Ben said, anger surging again in the face of the man’s obliviousness. “He thinks he’s just tapping into an energy source. He doesn’t understand what’s actually down there.”
“Or he doesn’t care.” Finn lowered his binoculars, his face now bleak. “Men like Gregory don’t believe in consequences. They believe in disruption, in moving fast and breaking things. The idea that some things shouldn’t be broken doesn’t compute for them.”
“But Rosenthal knows better.” Rebecca’s voice was thoughtful. “She’s seen what dimensional energy can do. She knows the risks.”
“Which means she’s the weak point,” Ben said slowly. “Gregory won’t listen to warnings, but Rosenthal might be willing to talk if she thinks we can help her contain this.”
“You want to approach Sonya Rosenthal?” Finn asked, his tone clearly skeptical. “The woman who tried to kill my daughter?”