The world was not a blur of motion; it was a sequence of agonizingly precise frames.
As Cattleya plummeted into the abyss, her new, crystalline senses catalogued everything. She saw the microscopic cracks in the falling light fixtures, the terrified dilation of the Council members' pupils, and the exact trajectory of Rusty”s body as he lunged not to catch her, but to seize the falling console she had sabotaged.
He didn't care if she lived. He cared that his investment”the facility, the centuries of research, the biological infrastructure of the Thorn”was turning into debris.
Cattleya tucked her limbs, her silver-bladed fingers slicing through the updraft of the collapsing stadium. She didn't aim for the floor. She aimed for the central cooling pipe, a massive, steam-hissing artery that
