Two weeks after consuming four hundred sixty-eight fragments, I'm learning to be human again.
It's harder than you'd think.
Simple tasks become complicated when you have hundreds of voices offering advice, criticism, or just commentary.
Making coffee? Thirty-seven people have opinions on the correct ratio.
Getting dressed? Debate about whether the blue shirt or the gray one.
Walking through the sanctuary? Constant tactical assessments, structural analyses, medical observations, and general anxiety about everything.
It's exhausting.
But I'm adapting.
Maya calls it "consensus management." I'm learning to quiet the voices that aren't relevant and amplify the ones that are.
Need medical knowledge? I listen to the doctors.
Need combat skills? The soldiers get priority.
Need to just exist as Silas Kaine? Everyone quiets down.
Usually.
"How's the integration?" Maya asks during our daily check-in.
"Stable. I think. Hard to tell when 'stable' means managing a mental committee of four hundred sixty-eight dead people."
She makes notes. "Any memory loss? Personality shifts?"
"I can't remember what my favorite food used to be. I have preferences now, but I don't know if they're mine or borrowed." I think about it. "My childhood memories are fading. Being overwritten by hundreds of other childhoods. But my professional skills—therapy techniques, counseling—those are still sharp. Maybe sharper."
"Because multiple fragments have overlapping expertise?"
"Yeah. I've got therapists, counselors, social workers, teachers—all contributing to that skillset. It's like crowdsourcing my own profession."
"Fascinating." Maya is typing rapidly. "You're demonstrating that extreme fragment integration might not fragment identity but rather distribute it. You're not one person with four hundred voices. You're a system of consciousness with one primary identity."
"That's a very academic way of saying I'm plural."
"You are literally plural. The question is whether that's pathological or adaptive."
I don't have an answer.
Yuki visits me in the observation room on day sixteen.
She looks better. Healthier. Her eyes are clearer.
"Twenty-three fragments," she says, sitting down. "I thought that was a lot. Then you consumed four hundred sixty-eight and stayed functional. How?"
"I didn't unify them. I gave them space to be themselves."
"And they just... cooperated?"
"Not at first. The first few days were chaos. But once they realized I wasn't trying to suppress or control them—that I was just offering a space to exist—they settled." I lean back. "It's like having roommates. Lots of roommates. You negotiate. Set boundaries. Create systems."
"I've been trying to control my twenty-three. Suppress the ones that get too loud. Force unity." Yuki's voice is quiet. "Maybe that's why it's so hard. I'm fighting them instead of working with them."
"It's not too late to change approach."
"Isn't it?" She looks at her hands. "I've been fighting for three years. I don't know if I can stop."
"Then don't stop fighting. Just—change what you're fighting for. Fight to give them space instead of fighting to keep control."
She considers this. "That's terrifying."
"Yeah. It is."
We sit in comfortable silence.
Finally, Yuki asks, "Do you ever feel lonely? With all those voices, all those people—do you ever feel alone?"
"All the time," I admit. "Because none of them are really here. They're memories. Echoes. They can talk to me, advise me, even argue with me. But they can't really see me. Connect with me. I'm surrounded by people but fundamentally alone."
"That's the worst part," Yuki says softly. "Being plural but still isolated."
"Yeah."
"Does it get easier?"
"I don't know. Ask me in a year if I'm still me."
Director Voss calls me to her office on day twenty.
"Kaine. Sit."
I sit.
She studies me for a long moment. "Dr. Zhao's reports say you're stable. Functional. Possibly the most powerful eater we've ever documented."
"Possibly."
"Can you fight?"
Strange question. "Yes. I've got combat training from dozens of military personnel. I can fight."
"Good. Because we need you to."
She pulls up a holographic display. It shows a map of the region around Sanctuary Seven.
"Three days ago, we made contact with another sanctuary. Sanctuary Twelve, about two hundred miles east." She zooms in. "They're in trouble. Dead incursion. Walls failing. They've requested assistance."
"Why are you telling me?"
"Because they mentioned something in their distress call. A nexus. They've detected a Residuum nexus forming near their sanctuary. Similar to the ones we dealt with."
My blood runs cold. "The Collective?"
"Unknown. Could be a separate entity. Could be a fragment we missed. Either way—" Voss looks at me. "—they need an eater. Someone who can identify the nexus type, assess the threat, and potentially neutralize it."
"You're sending me?"
"I'm asking you to volunteer. This is dangerous. Potentially lethal. And you're valuable. Losing you would be—"
"I'll go," I interrupt.
"You didn't let me finish."
"You were going to say losing me would be a strategic loss. Waste of resources. Etc." I stand. "But there are people dying. And I can help. So I'll go."
Voss almost smiles. "You're very like Father Mikhail. He would have volunteered too."
The comparison stings. In a good way.
"When do I leave?"
"Tomorrow at 0600. Captain Park will lead the security team. Dr. Zhao will accompany you for technical support." She pauses. "Kaine—come back. That's an order."
"I'll try."
That evening, I'm packing gear when Sarah Reeves finds me.
"Heard you're going to Sanctuary Twelve."
"Yeah."
"I'm coming with you."
"You're not assigned—"
"I talked to Jin. He's bringing me as additional security." She crosses her arms. "My brother's consciousness is in your head now. Part of the four hundred sixty-eight. I want to make sure you come back."
"Sarah—"
"Don't argue. I'm coming."
I study her. See the determination. The grief. The need to protect the last piece of her brother, even if that piece is trapped in a stranger's mind.
"Okay," I say. "But you follow Jin's orders. No heroics."
"Same to you, fragment-boy."
Fair.
We leave at dawn.
The convoy consists of three vehicles. Armed security team. Medical support. Technical equipment.
And me, carrying four hundred sixty-eight dead people into another warzone.
The journey takes six hours. The roads are bad—years of neglect and dead incursions have destroyed most infrastructure.
We pass through dead territory. Hundreds of them, wandering aimlessly. Their tethers severed when we collapsed the central nexus.
They don't attack. Just shamble.
Lost. Purposeless.
It's almost sad.
One of the voices in my head—a woman named Carol who died trying to reach her parents—whispers, They're like us. Trapped between existence and oblivion.
You're not trapped, I think back. You have space. Agency.
Do we? Or are we just prisoners in a more comfortable cell?
I don't answer.
Because I don't know.
Sanctuary Twelve is smaller than Sanctuary Seven. Maybe two thousand people instead of three thousand.
And it's falling apart.
The walls are breached in three places. Dead are getting through. The security teams are overwhelmed.
We're met at the gate by their director—a man named Torres, mid-forties, exhausted.
"Thank God you're here." He's looking at our equipment. "Did you bring dispersers? Sonic weapons?"
"Yes," Jin says. "But we need intel first. The nexus—where is it?"
"Northwest quadrant. About half a mile outside the walls." Torres pulls up a map. "It appeared three weeks ago. Small at first. But it's growing. And the dead—they're organizing around it. Just like you described in your reports."
Same pattern as before.
Which means either the Collective survived, or something else learned from it.
"We need to see it," I say. "Assess the threat."
"I'll take you. But we need to move fast. We're losing ground every day."
The northwest approach is a warzone.
Dead everywhere. Not wandering. Organized. Patrolling.
Guarding the nexus.
We approach cautiously. Stay low. Use cover.
And when we crest the ridge, I see it.
The nexus.
It's smaller than the ones from Sanctuary Seven. Maybe six feet in diameter. But it's growing. Pulsing. Feeding on the dead arranged around it.
And at its center—
A figure.
Not light. Not energy.
Solid. Human.
A person, standing in the nexus, conducting it like an orchestra.
I pull out binoculars. Focus.
And my heart stops.
Because I recognize her.
Maya gasps beside me. "That's—that's not possible."
The figure in the nexus is a young girl. Maybe eight years old. Dark hair. Small frame.
And she looks exactly like the photo Maya has shown me a hundred times.
Lily.
Maya's dead daughter.
Somehow alive. Somehow real. Somehow standing in a Residuum nexus, controlling the dead.
"That's my daughter," Maya whispers. "That's Lily."
But I can feel it. The wrongness.
That's not Lily.
That's something wearing Lily's face.
And when it turns, when it sees us—
It smiles.
"Hello, Dr. Zhao," it says with a child's voice layered with thousands more. "We've been waiting for you."
The Collective.
Not dispersed. Not destroyed.
Reconstituted. Rebuilt.
In the body of Maya's daughter.