NOVEL NEXT Chapter 63 - The Serpent's Truth
Selene took a deliberate step back from them. She didn't speak for a while, seeming to wait for the moment to ripen with anticipation.
Then she turned and walked deeper into the archives, Nick and Jordan following at her heels.
She stopped at one of the shelves. Pressing her palm against its surface caused the wood to ripple like disturbed water, then an image began to materialized on the wood—a serpent devouring its own tail.
"Ouroboros," she whispered, and the word seemed to writhe in the air like something alive. "The eternal cycle. Destruction and rebirth. Death feeding life. Life feeding death."
Jordan's face paled as he stared at the serpent symbol, recognition plain as day in his eyes. Noticing his friend's reaction, Nick made a mental note to ask him about his connection to Ouroboros later.
Moving closer to the wooden surface, he asked, "What is Ouroboros, and what do they have to do with Maggie and the other students who were kidnapped?"
"They've been called many things throughout history. Visionaries. Fanatics. Saviors. Monsters. They believe Earth is dying, and they're not wrong. Plastic and poison fill our oceans. Forests burn faster than they can regrow. Humanity hasn't ended starvation, yet nations tear each other apart for greed."
"Mana," she continued, "is Ouroboros' solution. A clean power source that never depletes. A force that could restore the oceans, remake the ozone, and evolve humanity beyond its current limitations." Her eyes found Nick's. "And they believe exposure to the things beyond the veil is a price worth paying for this salvation."
Jordan snorted softly. "The fracture in the city today, that was their doing, wasn't it?"
"Yes. It was larger than intended, but combined with the missing students, I'm certain it was them. I've been watching them for years. They've been using Callahan Industries to test specific veil-breaking techniques. Professor Vellian has been their operative on campus for the last twelve years. He and his team evaluate every single student who come on AIA's campus. He must have known people like your Val would be swooping in soon, which is why he chose this moment to grab some of the students he's had his eyes on and disappear."
Stepping back from the shelf, Selene began to pace in front of them. "Obviously, he's not alone. Professor Harkin in Advanced Resonance Theory. Dr. Morse from the medical wing. Assistant Director Cairns."
Jordan's voice came out strangled. "How many?"
"Over 50 faculty and staff. Not just watching the students, but to recruit them to Ouroboros' cause. This is what's happened to me and every identified Omega student on this campus. They identify students with specific resonance patterns and feed that data back to Ouroboros' primary facilities."
"And the Headmaster is aware of this?" Nick asked, taken aback. They'd left one conspiracy at Westlake only to jump headfirst into another.
"Why do you think you were originally brought here?" Selene asked snidely. "Are you that naive? You and your friends are bait!" She practically shouted. "Marcus Eidolon knew how irresistible you'd be to Vellian and offered you to Headmaster Krestrel as such." With a bitter laugh, she looked at him. "Did you never wonder why you were able to transfer so easily? Why things have been so smooth for you and your friends since you got here?" She stopped pacing abruptly. "No one transfers to AIA, Nicholas. No one barely even knows this place exists. It's a secret only governments, the uber-rich, and the super powerful are aware of. You don't just transfer in whenever you want."
Nick had known he, Maggie, and Jordan were special, but he hadn't realized to what extent.
He closed his eyes as a slight throb began to beat at his temple.
I don't understand. Sophia, are you getting all this?
[Correct. Recording function is currently active. I am also verifying AIA logs and data files against Selene D'Lavoisier's claims.]
Jordan stepped up next to him, his direct gaze pinning Selene where she stood. "So you're saying Marcus sent us here to get captured by Vellian?"
Selene didn't back down. "Yes."
Jordan took a breath and looked at Nick.
"Okay, so we were going to be used as bait. We'll table that for now. Nick opened his eyes, fixing them once again on Selene. "Why are they recruiting or in Maggie's case, kidnapping students from AIA?"
"Veil test experiments. They've been running them for seven years now. Students with rare resonance patterns like those taken in previous years, and now, your friend Maggie and those other students. They'll make perfect 'anchors' for controlled breaches like what happened today. Our unique mana signatures can stabilize dimensional tears, letting Ouroboros regulate the flow of mana between worlds for a limited time."
The memories hit Nick unbidden: students in an auditorium, eyes rolled back, blood leaking from their ears and nostrils. His stomach turned. "They kidnap students to test who can survive direct interface with pure mana. They're the ones that will serve as living conduits between dimensions."
Nick's hands clenched into fists, his nails digging deep into his palms. "Maggie and the others..."
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"Are just like you and me. Prime anchor candidates, yes. Their resonance patterns marked them as ideal subjects for the next phase of testing." She watched his reaction with those unsettling eyes. "If it helps, they're probably still alive. Dead anchors are useless for dimensional work."
The word 'probably' echoed in Nick's ears.
"By now," Selene continued with casual cruelty, "they're likely being prepared. Physical modifications to enhance conductivity. Neural conditioning to make them easily accept foreign mana influences. Psychological restructuring to—"
"Stop." The word ripped from Jordan's throat as he got in Selene's face. "If you knew all this, why didn't you stop it?"
An infuriating smile bloomed on her lips. "Me and what army? I couldn't have even if I wanted to. No, that's not my job." She stepped back and continued pacing, putting distance between them.
"You want to know the fascinating thing about all of this?" She stopped suddenly, standing next to Nick as she gazed at the image on the shelf. "If they succeed, Earth would probably be better off."
Jordan stiffened. "Excuse me?"
"Think about it." She spread her hands, and the air between them shimmered with possibility. "Mana would heal our world. The technology it enables could solve every resource crisis, end every war over scarcity, elevate humanity beyond its current limitations."
Launching her interface, images came alive: gleaming cities free of homelessness, forests tall and strong, oceans clear and clean. Finally, the earth with its ozone restored. Humanity now stronger, healthier, and happier for the power it held.
"So why should we resist?" Selene asked, her voice dropping to a whisper. "Why cling to mundane weakness when salvation is within reach? Yes, there would be casualties during the transition. Yes, some would die as the Veil fell and mana rushed into this dimension. But what are a few thousand lives against the survival and elevation of billions?"
"Because that's not our choice to make!" Jordan's voice cracked as it thundered in the quiet space. "You're talking about playing god with entire populations. About sacrificing people who never agreed to be martyrs."
"Every evolution requires sacrifice," Selene countered smoothly. "Humanity's history proves it. How many died to end slavery? To defeat fascism? To split the atom? Progress demands blood. It always has."
"That's different," Jordan insisted, but uncertainty had crept into his voice.
"Is it?" She turned to Nick. "You've seen the news reports, Nicholas. Rising sea levels displacing millions. Resource wars brewing in every corner of the globe. Ecosystems collapsing faster than they can adapt. Earth is dying. Slowly, perhaps, but inevitably. Is forcing mana into a dying world really worse than watching it suffocate on its own failures?"
Nick wanted to deny it. He wanted to immediately reject her words. But the news feeds and statistics he'd read painted humanity's future as bleak. The Great Barrier Reef, bleached white as bone. The Amazon, burning faster than it could regenerate. Cities running out of water while others drowned in rising tides.
Earth was dying. That was a fact.
But then other memories surfaced—Arlize's, his parents' research that had gotten them killed, the terror in the eyes of the students around him as they watched the Mt. Cook fracture tear the air apart. He thought of Maggie, probably strapped to some table right now, being turned into a living battery for someone else's vision of salvation.
"Yes, Earth is dying," Nick said finally, each word carefully chosen. "But forcing its evolution through mass casualties isn't salvation, it's genocide. Every dictator in history thought they were saving their people. Every atrocity started with someone believing the ends justified the means."
Selene's smile widened. "I can't wait to see what you choose, Nicholas, when you're forced to decide between letting millions die slowly or saving billions through violent change. I hope you remember this conversation."
"Right now," he said, forcing himself to speak despite the anger and disgust churning in his stomach, "that's not a choice I have to make. Right now, the only choice in front of me is saving Maggie and the others. Everything else can wait."
"So refreshingly simple," Selene said, though her tone suggested otherwise. "Very well. If you want to keep your head in the sand, do that. But know that I gave you the chance to truly see what is going on around you. Do with it as you will."
Walking closer to Nick, she stretched her hands out, a silent request for him to give her the Codex, still in his hands after all this time.
Nick edged the book away from her. He didn't want her to finish burning it, in case she was wrong about it holding wards that stopped all speech about Ouroboros.
[Host, I've scanned the contents and matched it to a previously scanned document. Part of my resources are currently working on decoding the language used to write the book. It should be safe enough to hand the codex back.]
Nick hesitated only a moment longer, the charred remains of the book a dead weight in his hands, before finally extending it back to her. Selene merely smiled at his hesitation before taking the book with one hand and setting it ablaze once more until the last of its pages curled inward and collapsed into ash.
A faint silver shimmer rippled through the remains, barely visible to the naked eye. It rose from the ashes and slid over Selene's skin. Inhaling sharply, she shivered as though cold, then let out a long, satisfied sigh.
"Ahh, that really does feel good." Turning to Nick, she gave him a predatory smile. Walking a little ways from them, she launched her interface screen, enlarging it for Nick and Jordan to see. She zoomed out from their location to that of the world, then focused in on Europe, then Switzerland.
"The Zurich site," she said, pointing to a marked location. "Callahan Industries' private research facility, though it's so much more than that. Three sub-basements that don't officially exist. Dimensional manipulation equipment that violates seventeen international treaties. And as of six hours ago, the new home for thirty-one test subjects."
Nick memorized every detail, burning the information into his mind with desperate intensity. "Why are you helping us?"
"Can't I just do a good deed?" She laughed. "I'm helping you because you're about to do something spectacularly stupid and probably die in the process, and I find that entertaining. Good entertainment is so hard to come by these days." Her smile was radiant.
She paused, then added, "Or maybe I want to see what choice you'll make when ideology meets reality. When you have to decide if Maggie's life is worth more than the breakthrough her suffering might provide."
"It is," Nick said without hesitation.
"To you. But what about to the billions who might benefit? What about to history?" She shrugged. "I suppose we'll find out."
Nick and Jordan turned to leave. They'd gotten what they'd come for.
"Nicholas," Selene called, and something in her tone made him look back. "Your parents didn't die because they opposed Ouroboros, by the way. They died because they tried to find a middle path, a way to bring mana to Earth without the casualties. Remember that when you're tempted to do the same."
Nick opened his mouth to respond, but a wall of wind rose from the floor and he suddenly found himself and Jordan outside the Archives, the door shut in their faces.
What the fuck was that?
He remembered the memory shard of his parents, of what Cassandra Callahan had done to them. If Ouroboros was involved in his parents' death, they and everyone else connected including the Callahan's, were going to pay.