ONE WEEK AFTER THE ARMY'S SURRENDER - SERA'S QUARTERS - 3 AM
I woke to SCREAMING.
Not external. INTERNAL. Through the walls. From Sera's room next to mine.
I ran. Slammed open the door.
Sera stood in the center of the room. FLOATING three inches off the ground. Silver light POURING from her skin. Eyes wide. UNSEEING. Lost somewhere between HERE and EVERYWHERE.
Around her—CHAOS. Furniture orbiting like planets around a sun. The walls were TRANSPARENT—showing not the city outside but OTHER PLACES. A jungle. An ocean. A desert. EVERYTHING simultaneously.
"SERA!" I grabbed for her. My hand passed through her FORM—she was partially DISTRIBUTED. Shifting between physical and REALITY state.
"Too MUCH—" she gasped. "I can feel—EVERYONE—the whole world is—screaming and laughing and DYING and being BORN and I can't—I can't shut it OUT—"
Her consciousness was EXPANDING. Involuntarily. REACHING back toward the distributed state. Toward being EVERYTHING again.
