The decision crystallized in the space between heartbeats. Niko could see three possible responses mapped out like chess moves in his mind: they could attempt to flee through the library's back passages, though Professor Morse would almost certainly catch them; they could fabricate some plausible excuse for unauthorized access, though the evidence spread across the reading table would demolish any lie within seconds; or they could trust the professor with the truth and face whatever consequences followed.
He met Ayesha's eyes and saw his own conclusion reflected there. They'd crossed too many lines already, uncovered something too dangerous to handle alone.
"Professor Morse," Niko called down, keeping his voice steady despite his racing pulse. "It's Niko Chambers and Ayesha Okafor. We need to talk to you about the disappearances."
The footsteps halted for a moment, then resumed at a faster pace. Professor Morse emerged into the restricted section with her communication crystal raised, its amber light casting sharp shadows across her angular features. She wore the same grey coat she'd had on during Marcus's disappearance, now rumpled as though she'd been working without rest. Her amber eyes swept the room, taking in their presence, the open case file, the displaced catalogue cards, processing everything with the rapid assessment of someone trained for field investigation.
"Explain," she said, the single word carrying more weight than a paragraph of accusations. "And it had better be both complete and convincing, because unauthorized access to restricted materials during a lockdown carries suspension at minimum, expulsion as a very real possibility."
Ayesha opened her mouth, probably to deploy some charm offensive that might soften the professor's stance, but Niko spoke first. This was his responsibility. He'd been the one to suggest investigating in the first place.
"Two nights ago, I performed an unauthorized scrying of the academy grounds," he began, and watched Professor Morse's expression shift from stern to genuinely alarmed. "I detected multiple tears in reality, what I'm calling cold spots, located throughout the facility. The training hall where Marcus vanished. The library's restricted section. The dormitory sub-basement. The administrative wing."
"You performed a what?" Professor Morse's voice dropped to a dangerous whisper. "Niko, scrying during an active supernatural incident is monumentally reckless. If whatever's causing the disappearances detected your consciousness—"
"It did," Niko interrupted. "It spoke to me. Called me a bright thing, said I would sustain it well." He watched the professor's face drain of color. "That's why we're here. We needed to understand what we're dealing with, and the faculty weren't sharing information."
Professor Morse closed her eyes briefly, and when she opened them again, something had shifted in her expression. The stern instructor had receded, replaced by the field investigator she'd once been. "Show me what you've found."
They guided her to the reading table where Case File 1847-A lay spread out like an autopsy report. She examined the documents with increasing tension in her shoulders, her fingers tracing over witness statements and incident reports that had been filed three-quarters of a century ago.
"The Devouring Year," she said quietly. "I knew this was in the archives, but it's above my clearance level. The Headmaster and the senior council are the only faculty authorized to access files from that incident." Her gaze snapped up to them. "How did you bypass the ward?"
"Spirit energy oversaturation followed by precise manipulation during the detection blind spot," Ayesha supplied, her tone carefully clinical. "We can provide technical details if that's relevant to the current crisis."
"It's relevant to the disciplinary hearing you're both going to face, but we'll table that discussion." Professor Morse pulled out one of the documents, a hand-drawn map of the academy with a location marked in the sub-basement. "If this seal has failed, if that's what's causing the current disappearances, then we're looking at a catastrophic threat. The entity from 1847 consumed seventeen students before it was contained. The battle to seal it cost fifteen lives total."
Niko studied the map, committing its details to memory. "The cold spot I detected in the sub-basement aligns with this location. Professor, we need to investigate the seal, verify its status—"
"You need to do absolutely nothing of the sort." Professor Morse's voice hardened again, the instructor reasserting control. "I'll take this information to the Headmaster immediately. The senior council will convene an emergency session. This is far beyond student involvement, no matter how talented you both are."
"With respect, Professor, the faculty doesn't even seem to know about the connection WE found." Ayesha pointed out, an edge creeping into her typically cheerful tone. "Students are disappearing. Marcus is gone. We can help—"
"No." The word cut through the restricted section like a blade. "This is not a negotiation. I understand your desire to help, truly, but you're describing an eldritch entity powerful enough to require eight faculty members and twelve students to contain seven decades ago. Most of them died in the attempt. You're sixteen years old."
"We're awakened," Niko countered, feeling something stubborn and hot rising in his chest. "We've been training for situations exactly like—"
"Training isn't the same as facing something that views you as food!" Professor Morse's composure cracked, genuine fear bleeding through. "Do you have any concept of what these entities are? They don't think like humans. They don't follow rules we understand. They're hungry and ancient and they will devour you without a second thought if you give them the opportunity."
The silence that followed felt heavy as lead. Niko became acutely aware of how young he and Ayesha must look to the professor, how naive their conviction probably seemed. But he also remembered the being he'd touched during the scrying, remembered its terrible interest in him specifically. Its hunger.
"It already knows about me," he said quietly. "During the scrying, it sensed my spirit signature. Professor, if this entity is targeting students with developing spirit energy, targeting potential, then it's going to come for me eventually whether I investigate or not. My spirit pool is... unprecedented, according to every instructor I've worked with. If I'm already marked, wouldn't it make more sense to be proactive?"
Professor Morse looked at him for a long moment, and something complicated moved behind her amber eyes. Old pain, maybe, or memories of past failures. "I had a partner once, during my time with Velia's Supernatural Response Division. Brilliant investigator, tremendously powerful, absolutely convinced of his own invincibility. We walked into a situation we thought we understood, thought we could handle." Her voice had gone distant, aimed more at the past than at them. "I was the only one who walked back out. So when I tell you that student involvement is forbidden, understand that I'm trying to prevent you from becoming another name in a case file someone reads seventy years from now."
The weight of her words settled over the room like snow. Niko felt his certainty waver, felt doubt creeping in at the edges. Maybe they were in over their heads. Maybe his mind and Ayesha's control weren't enough. Maybe all he'd accomplish by pushing forward was getting them both killed.
He'd pushed too much before, after all. Last year, during a training exercise that was supposed to be routine, he'd miscalculated the spirit energy requirements for a defensive barrier. His partner had ended up in the infirmary for three days with spirit burn. The memory still woke him some nights, the image of someone hurt because he'd been arrogant enough to think his vast spirit pool made him infallible.
What if this was the same mistake, magnified a thousand times?
Ayesha must have sensed his hesitation because her hand found his beneath the table, fingers interlacing with his own. The touch was warm and grounding, and when he glanced at her, she offered a small smile that somehow managed to be both supportive and challenging.
"We understand, Professor," Ayesha said, addressing Professor Morse while her grey eyes remained locked on Niko's. "We'll defer to the senior council's investigation and stay out of it. But we need to know that something's being done, that Marcus and the others haven't just been written off."
"Something's being done," Professor Morse assured them, though she still looked troubled. "The council has been working around the clock. We just... we've been focusing on containment and prevention rather than looking backward at historical precedent. Your research may have provided the crucial connection we were missing." She began gathering the documents back into their file. "I'll need to confiscate this and bring it to the Headmaster immediately. As for you two, return to your dormitories and stay there. I'll handle the unauthorized access incident in my report as a judgment error born of laudable intentions, which should minimize disciplinary consequences. But if I catch you investigating further, I won't be able to protect you from expulsion. Are we clear?"
"Clear," Niko said, though the word felt like ash in his mouth.
They retraced their path through the darkened library with Professor Morse escorting them, her communication crystal providing light. The cathedral space felt different now, less mysterious and more oppressive, as though the weight of what they'd learned had transformed their perception of everything around them. At the eastern entrance, the professor paused.
"For what it's worth," she said quietly, "your initiative tonight, reckless as it was, may have saved lives by accelerating our understanding of the threat. But initiative and survival are not the same thing. Remember that."
She left them at the entrance to the dormitory wings, disappearing into the night with Case File 1847-A tucked under her arm like a bomb. Niko and Ayesha stood in the corridor for a moment, neither quite ready to separate and return to their respective rooms.
"You're thinking about the barrier incident," Ayesha said. It wasn't a question. "From last year."
"How did you—"
"Because I know you, Niko. You get this look when you're doubting yourself, like you're running failure calculations in your head." She turned to face him fully, and in the dim light of the corridor's emergency wards, her grey eyes seemed to shine. "That was a training accident. A miscalculation during a controlled exercise. This is different."
"Is it? We're still students. Still learning. What if I get it wrong again, except this time instead of three days in the infirmary, someone ends up—" He couldn't finish the sentence.
"Then we'll get it wrong together," Ayesha said firmly. "And we'll deal with whatever comes. But Niko, we can't just sit in our rooms while people disappear. I know we told Professor Morse we'd back off, and maybe we should, but... do you really think the faculty are going to move fast enough? Do you think they'll include us in any meaningful way?"
Niko thought about the cold spot in the administrative wing, about the possibility of faculty compromise or corruption. Thought about the entity that had marked him as particularly interesting prey. Thought about Marcus, wherever he was, if he was even still alive.
"No," he admitted. "I don't think they will."
"So we have a choice to make." Ayesha squeezed his hand once more before releasing it. "We can be obedient students who follow the rules and hope the adults fix everything. Or we can be what we've trained to become—awakened investigators who do what's necessary even when it's difficult and dangerous."
The choice hung between them like a blade balanced on its edge, and Niko felt the weight of consequence pressing down from all sides. Whatever they decided now would set them on a path with no easy way back.