Paul moved before Silas finished enjoying his own entrance.
A pale shine wrapped Paul's wrist, then broke into rings that spun around his forearm. Ripples formed beside him, not water and not glass until the light chose a shape. The rings tightened into a spear-thin point aimed at Silas's chest.
Paul fired.
Silas did not step aside.
Rirana threw a capsule to the dirt between them. It burst open and dumped a mass of stitched flesh into the air like a bad answer to a question nobody asked. Limbs unfolded from the center. A mouth opened where a shoulder should have been.
Paul's projectile hit the thing and spread.
The flesh hardened from the impact point outward. Skin, muscle, veins, and threadwork turned clear in a ripple that locked the creature mid-lurch. The change traveled fast enough that Rirana took one step back and Silas's butterfly lifted from his shoulder.
Silas watched the trapped mass with interest, not alarm.
