"Don't panic." She tried to sound casually annoyed. She worried. What did she do to him? Only demons were supposed to react to that ability. He was within the safety of the shields and moving freely. He couldn't be a demon. Had he become infected during their expedition? From his palm to his shoulder she breathed in her spell.

She pulled up his sleeve to see new welts forming as the older ones blistered. Maybe the tendril lashed out before succumbing her toxic aura. "Does it still hurt?" Of course it still hurts, she mentally kicked herself.

"You're making it worse!" He pushed her away with such force that Astral felt the chiseled stone wall cut into her back. She bit back against the pain.

His blisters burst, leaking milky puss from the wound. It shimmered with the same intensity as Seth's soul. The essence dripped from his arm, dotting the ground at his feet. New wisps formed to lap at the droplets. In a burst of ecstasy, the tendril exploded into shimmering particles.

Astral failed to catch her surprise. Wide-eyed and slack-jawed, she had seen her first purification of a demonic entity. Seth hissed at the pain, fishing out a small medical packet and tore the package to free its contents.

"Wait!" She felt bad for wanting to appease her curiosity over allowing him to treat his wounds. She couldn't see the world like he could; for all she knew the milky substance that dripped to the floor was his blood. It didn't smell like blood; it smelled sweet. Her mouth watered.

Seth glared at her. "Look." She gestured to the hungry tendrils bursting around him.

"I know," Seth growled and proceeded to bandage his arm. "Now you know my secret." He was immune to demonic influence. His father had found a cure. That meant that Seth wasn't feeding the ghost in the machine, he couldn't. If the demon was tasting the captain's soul, little by little, the demon was being purified. Would the ghost lose strength through gradual exposure?

She had to tell her grandfather. He could bring Dr. Wright's research to light so that the Council could focus resources on creating a vaccine. It would limit casualties through the creation of husks, and limit the demon access to viable non-spiritual based food sources; they could starve out the enemy.

"I know what you're thinking and forget about it," Seth growled. "My father's vaccines have a habit of killing the test subjects. And I'll be damned if I'm going to let anyone use me as some lab rat."

She felt terrible for considering the idea. Her grandfather barely treated her as anything beyond a tool built to abide his demands. She was Dezmond's sword against the demonic hordes; what would he transform Seth into?

"I understand," Astral relented. It wasn't long ago that she could have been subjected to the tortures of the greater good. As much as she wanted to finish her search of the tunnels, she wasn't comfortable with leaving Seth to tend to his wound. There was no guarantee that she was right about Seth's immunity. What if she was wrong about the wards? The energy wisps were enough to tell her that the beast within the academy wasn't completely contained though it was most active closer to the demon's cell. Given enough strength, it would be able to extend its influence to the battlefields.

"If that barrier you mentioned is up, we should be done here soon." Astral tried to sound reassuring as the captain pulled his sleeve down over his sores with a wince. Even if exploring the tunnels ended abruptly, she had gathered quite a bit of information on the area and her companion. She would return later to collect samples to send to Damien. Her uncle would be her best option in sourcing the wards materials and their origins, thereby extending or condensing her timeline. If the ghost in the machine was the weapon meant to be used against the Academy, learning more about it should yield to clues to the identity of their attacker.

She saw the faded shimmer of the shield. It flickered and flashed as though attempting to maintain a failing connection. The fog was thick and stagnant. She could feel it watching them. She wished she knew how to use one of Mathias' prayers. She smirked at the thought of binding the demonic essence and restricting its space, forcing it to compress itself. Once it was in a manageable space, she could use her scythe's energy to cancel out the demon's essence. "Get back," she bade and called her scythe into action.

The shield resonated with the weapon, lighting up the tunnel. Seth gasped. She couldn't see beyond the brightness of the shield. She could feel them waiting on the other side. Whispers filled her mind. She ignored them. They were communicating in gibberish, seeking entry into her mind when she opened herself up to the words.

"Ignore them, they aren't speaking a real language," Astral snapped at Seth. He might be immune to physical possession, but his fears left him vulnerable to suggestion. "If you start listening, the language will get clearer, and that's when they've found a way in to manipulate you. If it gets to be too much, think of a field, a wall, an empty room, something simple. Don't let them in."

"They're stuck behind the shield!" Seth shouted over the voices in his head. "Maybe they're reacting to your weapon!" He covered his ears in a vain attempt to block out the shadow calls.

The whispers rose into a crescendo of howls and screeches. Her weapon vibrate in her hands as power surged through it. She twisted the grip in the center of her weapon, commanding it to separate and reshape as two smaller scythes. The energy flowed into her dual weapons.

She felt like herself again. It was as though she had been a spectator in her own life until this point. Shouting at the thing that looked like her. Sometimes it heard her. Sometimes it spoke to her. Most of the time, she'd lose her grip and fall back into the blurred vision that was her life. Time was precious, and they didn't have nearly enough of it.

Crap. They were here already. She called the shield's energy into herself. If she could hold enough energy, she could cleanse the demon ward of its hungry soldiers.

"Break the shields!" Seth shouted. "I need this!" His voice roared over the noise. He maintained his distance to avoid being drawn into her. It was true. Last time they weren't strong enough.

She pulled her twin scythe to her chest and focused on visualizing her attack. She released the energy. A barrage of spectral blades boomeranged through the shield, slicing through reality and emerging in the space beyond.

Releasing the demon might have been what Seth needed, but she could give him a fighting chance. "Issue the order," she commanded the entity that she knew was watching.

Her vision blurred. It wasn't fair that she had so little time to get things right this time.

Astral slumped against the wall. Seth rushed to her side. She pushed him away as she pulled herself back to her feet. "We've got to run," Astral panted. She took a few wobbly steps. She wasn't looking forward to this part. "Seth, run and don't look back." She had the lingering impression that she should have been angry with him, but couldn't quite remember why. Following him into the darkness, she knew one thing for certain, he followed her because his feet were guided.