(TAYLOR HEBERT) INTERLUDE

Taylor’s silhouette remained visible for a little while longer—small, pale, and moving with a speed that bordered on desperate—though to track her beyond a certain distance, Eidolon found himself instinctively equipping a sensory power to enhance his sight. She fled in a straight line across the sand, and every part of her posture made it clear she wanted nothing more than to be far from them.

For a few seconds, none of them spoke immediately. The wind moved around them, tugging at their capes and their exposed hair, filling the space she’d left behind with even more sand.

Legend was the first to exhale, his breath catching slightly at the end, as though something in their approach had left him uneasy. Eidolon, however, turned away from the horizon with a sharp pivot, impatience rolling off him with enough force that none could dismiss it.

“You don’t actually believe what she said… do you?” he asked. His voice was low, tempered only because he forced it to be, but the frustration was impossible to disguise.

Alexandria didn’t answer immediately. When she did, it was with a single, small shake of her head. “Not fully.”

Her calmness made something twist unpleasantly inside him.

Eidolon’s jaw clenched beneath the mask, and the words pressed out of him before he could regain his composure. “Then why did you stop us from taking it? If we act now, before she gains any more experience with it—”

“David.” Alexandria’s interruption was firm, her tone carrying the weight of someone accustomed to command. And instinctively, he kept quiet. “We need to exercise caution.”

He stared at her, searching for some indication that she wasn’t serious. But the tone in her voice brokered no argument.

She continued, but this time more slowly than usual, as if recognizing the volatility of the moment. A rarity for someone who usually spoke with unwavering certainty. “Regardless of how much she may have exaggerated, the device is powerful enough to single-handedly alter the outcome of an Endbringer fight. And more importantly, its full capabilities are still completely unknown. That kind of unknown demands caution. We cannot treat it like any other piece of Tinkertech.”

Legend folded his arms across his chest, eyes narrowing slightly as he considered her words. “So you’re suggesting we wait and see.”

“Yes,” Alexandria replied. “We study whatever data Armsmaster and Dragon can gather, observe her where we can, and learn everything there is to learn first. If we act prematurely, we risk triggering a countermeasure the device might possess, one we may not be able to counter.”

Eidolon drew in a slow breath, but it did little to calm the knot of tension building within him. He hated this, hated the idea of standing idle while something that powerful remained unchecked. Patience had never been his greatest strength, not when it came to threats, potential or not. And certainly not when those threats might rival Scion, or the Endbringers, or any of the problems that plagued their world. Certainly not when it could render his own abilities irrelevant if its transformations were as limitless as Taylor claimed.

But logic was logic, and Alexandria’s assessment wasn’t wrong. And he couldn’t erase the memory of the girl’s transformation tearing through the Simurgh’s defenses, or the way the Endbringer had been forced back, something he had never once accomplished alone, even at his peak.

It was a compromise. One he also disliked. Legend disliked it too—Eidolon could see that plainly—but for reasons rooted less in fear and more in the ethical discomfort Legend always carried in situations like this. If Eidolon wasn’t mistaken, the only reason Legend had not intervened earlier, during the conversation with Taylor herself, was the necessity of presenting a unified stance. Anything less would have been disastrous.

But this, this waiting, was the only course of action that didn’t risk immediate catastrophe.

Reluctantly, Eidolon inclined his head. “Fine. We wait. But understand this: if we wait too long, she may become another Endbringer… or worse, another Scion. Another variable we can’t control.”

“Or,” Legend countered quietly, “she becomes an ally we do not alienate. Someone who doesn’t see us as her enemies.”

The words settled heavily between them, carrying more truth than comfort. But it also carried with it a fair bit of doubt; it was possible that they had burned whatever bridge could be built between them. 

Still, after a beat, Eidolon gave a stiff nod. “Okay then.”

A silent consensus settled between the three of them.

One by one, they called for Doormaker. Legend was the first through the doorway created, though he lingered a moment, offering them both a final glance—a mixture of doubt and concern for the girl and situation they had mishandled—before disappearing from view.

Alexandria was next, already moving past the conversation into the next big matter to take care of. She vanished without another word.

Eidolon remained alone for a second longer. He turned once more toward the direction Taylor had run, his enhanced vision tracking the faint trail her footsteps had disturbed in the sand, though she was long out of sight.

Then his own portal opened beside him.

He stepped through it without another glance back.

Moments later, the beach returned to just wind, water, and empty shore, oblivious to the fact that one of the most consequential conversations in the world had taken place upon its sands, hidden from every cape and civilian in Brockton Bay.