He considers that.
“How far along?” he asks.
“Far enough that if you wait, you won’t be preventing anything,” I say. “You’ll be containing what’s already here.”
One of the others steps forward, taking the fragment from my hand with careful precision, examining it up close, tracing the markings, testing them against whatever internal structure they use to verify relic classification.
“This isn’t aligned with any active record,” he says after a moment.
“It wouldn’t be,” I reply.
“Why?”
“Because it was sealed, not catalogued.”
“By whom?”
“That part doesn’t matter,” I say. “What matters is why.”
“And why is that?”
“Because it was never meant to be used.”
That ends that line of questioning.
He looks past me briefly, not at Vaedros, but at the structure of his own forces, as if aligning what he’s heard with what they already know, what they’ve chosen not to act on until now.
“Why bring this here?” he asks.
“Because you’re the only ones positioned to stop it before it stabilizes,” I say.
“That assumes we accept your assessment.”
“You don’t need to accept it,” I reply. “You just need to verify it.”
He nods slightly.
“Do it.”
The fragment is passed back, examined by another, then another, each confirming a different aspect of what it carries, until the conclusion forms without needing to be stated.
“Origin confirmed,” one of them says. “Older classification. Pre-seal structure.”
That’s enough. But I don’t stop there. I let the next part move outward. Not as a vision. As information.
The same sequence I just gave them doesn’t stay contained within this space. It spreads, carried through the same channels that move everything else in this war, intercepted, relayed, impossible to isolate once released. Velkiron will hear it. Drazharel will hear it. Every faction tied to this conflict will have it before they can decide whether they want it.
No one gets to ignore it now. The commander feels it happen.
“You’ve already sent it,” he says.
“Yes.”
“Without our authorization.”
“Yes.”
A pause.