The voices didn't stop.
They didn't fade.
They didn't weaken.
They multiplied.
Cassian felt them before he fully saw them pressure against his mind, like dozens of hands pressing inward, each carrying fragments of something broken.
Pain.
Fear.
Desperation.
"…please…"
"…it hurts…"
"…I don't want to disappear…"
The darkness surged around him as the figures closed in.
This time, they were clearer.
Too clear.
They weren't just shapes anymore.
They were people.
Faces half-formed, incomplete stretched across shifting bodies of sand and shadow. Eyes blinked unevenly, some fully formed, others melting away mid-motion.
Mouths opened, gasping, trying to speak through forms that couldn't hold themselves together.
Cassian's chest tightened.
This wasn't an illusion.
It was memory.
No
Worse.
It was what remained.
A hand grabbed his arm.
Cold.
Shaking.
Real.
Cassian turned sharply.
