It came from Hadal Forest

My breath caught in the apple of my throat. My vision swam with murky highlights. Atha. I shook my head, and dug my heels into the ground; fighting against both Rilah's pull, and my better judgment, for one extra moment with her, at the end.

No! It couldn't end this way!

I braced my elbow against the wall, as my head spun. So dizzy, all of a sudden...

Rilah continued to usher me away, despite my best efforts. She hissed under her breath, "Zo-el, please. I'm sorry. She's already gone."

"No!" I shouted, uncaring of the danger. If the abominable taigaspawn took notice, I didn't deign to record it into my memories, as they had clearly unveiled themselves as being unworthy of my gaze. My voice was raw, and rueful, as I spoke. "I can't leave, yet! We haven't even said goodbye! Atha!"

I suddenly felt very raw — all the wounds I'd accumulated along my journey seemed to flare up at once — like I'd been doused in saline. Red tongues of flame burned from the seams where the spider carved my shoulder. Lava oozed from beneath my feet. Sparks flew from the scratches across my face, and forearms. Lightning arced between my bloodied fingernails.

Rilah yelped at the sight, hopping back away from me, out of fear of being caught in the radius of my evident transformation. "Zo-el?!"

I wailed on the edge of a growl, as the muscles across my body flexed involuntarily. "Arrgh..! Rilah... What's happening to me?!" My fingers clenched the handle of the gardening implement with such force, it almost cracked. I hunched over and dry heaved light from every orifice of my face.

Rilah shielded her eyes from me. The brilliant glow seemed like a second sun in the dim twilight of the encroaching night. It seeped between her fingertips, outlining the phalanges buried within.

"By the great blue!" she prayed. Dazed, and alarmed by the scene before her, she went to retreat further, when a blast of heated air erupted from me, knocking her off her feet.

"Zozi!" She squealed, finding herself suddenly airborn. Her trajectory landed hard against the anterior wall, and collapsed into a resigned posture.

"I, I don't—! Ugh..." I sighed, allowing the glow to temporarily overtake me — its power invigorating, and heightening my capacity, as I felt the weight falling away — to the chorus of several dozen rasping mandibles, and agitated arthropodan vocalizations. Almost. A buzzing of energy filled the air, as my poncho fluttered in the indoor current. Lighter. I slipped into the rippling haze overhead, reaching up to grasp the potent energy that had gathered there.

I arduously tore my eyes away from the spectacle. Again, I refused to miss this. Looking down, again, into my atha's own eyes, I sensed an ember of recognition; as my feet finally left the ground.

Then, as soon as it had returned, she was gone. The light disappeared from her eyes. I watched as her lids shut for the last time; a look of peaceful resignation replacing her anguish.

"No. No, no, no!" I screamed, despite myself; hair whipping in the convection of the thermals I generated. I extended my hand toward her.

Then, in a flash, it was gone.

The body, the swarm, the wall beyond, all vanished in a sterilizing wave, and a puff of smoke; in a circle like the mouth of a smelting forge, the doors to hell opened for only an instant, leaving only singed cassocks on the edges of the radius to cook within their very shells. As for everything else? Ash.

Rilah screamed, feeling the residual heat from the resulting fires spread; filling the room with heat and smoke. Again, my attention was brought back to the world, by her concern. I turned to look back at her, with irises like burning coals.

"Rilah..." I started, tears evaporating from the corners of my eyes before I could shed them. I went to reach out to her in turn, but she flinched at the motion.

I was stunned, for a moment. Hurt. Offended by the implication. Then, I realized what was really happening. She saw what had happened, the last time I raised my arm that way. She was afraid of me.

I quickly drew my hands close to my chest, in conciliation. A spray of particles burst from the gap whence my hands brushed against one another. "I'm sorry," I blurted. The room grew another lumen in intensity, as the glow within kindled to another degree of vigor. "I-I don't know what came over me. I didn't mean to... — I would never!"

"No." she replied, holding her own hands out to show her acquiescence; like I was a flock of buzzards, or an encroaching boar. Even with the fires growing in the room, and the smoke beginning to choke out the edge of her words, she still cared enough to put my feelings first. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to shout. I know you'd never hurt me. I know you. Zozi..."

She coughed into the crook of her elbow, and squinted in the smoke as she climbed to her feet. "I can't believe it... But you did it, didn't you?! Went ahead and integrated without me, you cheater! How'm I supposedta compete with you now?" She grinned a wan smile as she said it; approaching me with her other hand extended before her eyes.

The smell of burned hair filled the room as my skin crackled into a patchwork of bright subdermic fault lines, with liquid fire peeking through the gaps. "Ough!" I howled. Until now, it hadn't felt like much of anything, but this recent development hurt. "You— know what this is?! I don't know what's happening!"

"Yes, Zozi. Everything's gonna be okay. You've just integrated with the soliby, for the first time. Your body is venting all that power, and you ate a lot, so it's all coming out at once. Can you feel for the impulse?" She spoke very calmly, measuring out every word like she knew that they were numbered.

"I don't know," I confessed. The spiderweb of fractures grew more intricate. Wherever three lines met, bright sores opened up; venting ochre jets into the air. "All I can really feel right now is a crazy amount of pain. None of this makes any sense!" Scales fell from my forearms as the arcs of plasma leapt from one open sore to the next, like a smooth bow of gleaming orange energy.

"Zozi, you have to calm down! Try to feel for it. If you're integrating, it's gotta be the place where all the pain is coming from." Her eyes were red with irritation from the smoke. Teardrops streamed down her cheeks, as she hacked and coughed her way through the lines; signaling to me how much this was costing her, and how much she believed in me.

"Just — get away from me!" I shouted; refusing to move my arms from their folded position. "I can't control this, Ri. Get outside!"

"No! There's no time!" She rasped, pushing even closer to me, despite it all. I kicked in the middle of the air to gain distance, but I didn't budge. "Focus, crybaby! You're only going to be able to do this once, and I'm not letting you go through it alone!"

Impressed by her conviction, I nodded. "Okay. I'll try." Closing my eyes, I tried to do what she asked; ignoring the umbra of growing plasma circulating around my body, and consuming any flesh remaining in their path. I followed the avenues of all the heat, and traced them back to their source.

A violently churning mass was seething where my stomach would be. I gasped. It was so dense with compacted power that I was surprised it didn't simply tear right through me.

Rilah, noticing the change, asked "Did you find it?"

"Yes! At least, I think so!" I opened my eyes. "Wh-what do I do now?"

"I need you to temper it, somehow. I think you're supposeta make a cage around it, but with your mind."

"Okay...?" I didn't understand what she meant, but I tried it anyway. She was getting close now, so I hurried to avoid burning her. Taking a deep breath, I imagined reaching into my abdomen with ethereal fingertips. The phantom limb clutched the fireball.

A cold print spread on my chest like the shadow cast by the hand inside. "Woah!" I gasped, astonished by the effectiveness. Quickly, I wrapped an opposing hand around it. Enclosing it in a capsule of fingers immediately snuffed out the corona orbiting my form.

The fissures soon followed. With an audible snap, they sealed up over themselves. Nary a hint was left.

Then, I dropped, and Rilah caught me. "Whew! There you go, Zozi. I knew that you could do it!"

I didn't waste a moment too long, celebrating the achievement; pushing onto my own feet, and urging with all my tenacity, "Let's get the five out of here."