FOR WEEKS AFTERWARD, Jas nursed a secret hope that Carl would suddenly wake up and return to normal, but it never happened. She brought him with her to the Transgalactic Council, where she had to tell her story many more times. Supported by the testimony of the officers who had come to Ganymede Station, she managed to convince the Council that what she was saying was credible, and that Carl was some kind of anomaly—not a Shadow, but also not the person he had once been. He was a replica of the original Carl minus whatever it was that had made him himself.
But in truth Jas couldn’t bring herself to believe that the real Carl didn’t lurk somewhere inside the shell of his body. He’d returned from the Void looking exactly as he had when he entered it, except that his burn scars were gone. As
