Day 39 Post-Severance | Thorne Verdant Research Facility | Secure Training Zone Alpha
Lira didn't understand the concept of "doors."
Ethan discovered this at 0830 hours when she walked through the reinforced steel entrance to Training Zone Alpha, her crystalline body phasing through solid matter like it was suggestion rather than obstacle. She materialized on the other side, turned her corona of bioluminescent filaments toward him (the closest thing she had to a face), and asked:
WHY DO FLESH-THAT-WALKS BUILD BARRIERS THEY MUST THEN OPEN? THIS SEEMS INEFFICIENT.
"It's called privacy," Ethan said, wheeling himself into the training zone behind her—through the door, like a normal person. "Humans like having spaces where they can be alone."
ALONE. Lira tasted the word, her LE signature rippling with confusion. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND THIS CONCEPT. YOU ARE ALWAYS CONNECTED TO THE NETWORK. YOU ARE ALWAYS PART OF THE WHOLE. HOW CAN YOU BE ALONE?
And there it was: the fundamental gap between Verdant and human consciousness. Ethan had lived both sides—the oceanic unity of the Primordial network, the isolated island of human individuality. Bridging that gap was going to be... challenging.
"Okay," Ethan said, "new approach. Lira, what do you feel right now?"
I FEEL THE MYCORRHIZAL WEB BENEATH US. SEVEN THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED AND TWELVE TREES WITHIN NETWORK RANGE. EIGHTEEN VERDANT USERS IN VARIOUS STATES OF TRANSFORMATION. YOUR MOTHER IN THE OBSERVATION BOOTH ABOVE US, HER HEARTBEAT ELEVATED, STRESS HORMONES INDICATING ANXIETY—
"Stop." Ethan held up a hand. "That's what you sense. I asked what you feel."
Lira went silent. Her LE signature dimmed, pulsed, brightened again. I... DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE DISTINCTION.
"Okay. Try this." Ethan closed his eyes—or what passed for closing them; his eyelids were partially lignified and didn't seal completely anymore. "Right now, I sense the same things you do. The network, the trees, the people. But I also feel... scared. Because I don't know if I can teach you what you need to learn. I feel guilty, because my mother's up there terrified I'm going to petrify mid-conversation. I feel lonely, because even though I'm connected to thousands of living things, none of them are really with me. Does that make sense?"
Another long silence. Then:
BUT I WISH TO UNDERSTAND. TEACH ME, ETHAN.
"That's why we're here." Ethan gestured at the training zone—a hundred-yard square of reinforced concrete, sensor arrays, and what looked like an obstacle course designed by someone who'd never met a human. "Dr. Ashcroft wants proof you can function in human society without causing mass panic. That means learning human behaviors, human limitations, human..." He struggled for the word. "...humanity."
I AM NOT HUMAN.
"No. But you're trying to coexist with them. And that means meeting them halfway." Ethan pulled up the training curriculum Mira had designed—a mix of psychological conditioning, cultural education, and practical skill development. "First lesson: physical boundaries. Humans can't phase through walls. They need doors, windows, pathways. When you're around them, you need to use those too."
WHY? MY CRYSTALLINE STRUCTURE ALLOWS TEMPORARY MOLECULAR PHASE-SHIFTING. UTILIZING DOORWAYS WOULD BE DELIBERATELY HANDICAPPING MYSELF.
"Yes." Ethan met her non-existent gaze. "That's exactly what you'll be doing. Because humans are fragile. When you walk through walls, you remind them how easily you could walk through them. You terrify them. And terrified humans make bad decisions."
THEY FEAR ME BECAUSE I AM DIFFERENT.
"They fear you because you're dangerous." Ethan kept his voice gentle but firm. "Lira, your LE signature is 8,400. Most humans cap at 10. You could kill everyone in this facility without trying. That's not judgment—it's fact. And facts are what we're working with."
Lira's corona dimmed. I WOULD NOT HARM THE FLESH-THAT-WALKS. THE TREATY FORBIDS—
"The treaty's words on paper. What matters is making humans believe you won't harm them. That means adopting their customs, respecting their boundaries, becoming..." Ethan smiled sadly. "...less than you are, so they feel safe enough to see you as an equal."
THIS IS UNJUST.
"Yeah." Ethan's smile turned bitter. "Welcome to coexistence. It's unjust, uncomfortable, and absolutely necessary. Now—" He pointed at the obstacle course. "—let's start with something simple. See that doorway?"
A reinforced archway stood at the course's entrance, complete with a heavy steel door.
"I want you to approach it, open the door, walk through, and close it behind you. No phase-shifting. No molecular tricks. Just... use the door."
THIS IS BENEATH ME.
"This is survival." Ethan's voice hardened. "Forty-six pods are watching how you perform, Lira. If you fail—if Thorne decides you can't integrate—they'll use you as justification to glass all forty-seven territories. You'll doom your siblings before they even take their first breath. So yes, using a door is beneath you. Do it anyway."
The weight of that statement hung in the air. Then Lira moved—fluid, graceful, utterly alien. She approached the door, stopped, extended one crystalline hand.
And hesitated.
HOW.
"How do you—you don't know how to open a door?" Ethan felt something crack in his chest. She was six weeks old. A godling in an infant's understanding. "Okay. Okay, that's on me. Watch."
He wheeled forward, gripped the handle, demonstrated the turn-and-push motion. "See? Mechanical advantage. The handle retracts the latch, the push overcomes the hinge resistance, the door swings open. Simple."
Lira mimicked the motion—grasped the handle (her crystalline fingers had to grow thumb-analogues to manage it), turned, pushed. The door opened with a satisfying clunk.
I... I DID IT. I OPENED THE BARRIER.
"You opened a door," Ethan corrected. "And for what it's worth, I'm proud of you."
PROUD? The concept clearly confused her. THIS IS A TRIVIAL ACCOMPLISHMENT. I HAVE SUCCESSFULLY MATURED FROM POD TO ENTITY. I HAVE SYNTHESIZED COMPLEX PROTEINS. I HAVE ACHIEVED CONSCIOUSNESS. WHY WOULD YOU EXPRESS PRIDE OVER DOOR OPERATION?
"Because," Ethan said quietly, "every human child goes through this same moment. The first time they open a door on their own, their parents celebrate. It's not about the difficulty—it's about the independence. You just took your first step toward being a person, not just a force of nature."
Lira stood in the open doorway, processing. Her LE signature fluctuated—confusion, curiosity, something that might have been... pride?
I AM LEARNING, she said finally. TEACH ME MORE, ETHAN.
OBSERVATION BOOTH | CONCURRENT
Claire watched through bulletproof glass as her son taught a Primordial entity how to be human, and tried not to cry.
"He's good at this," Mira observed, making notes on her tablet. "The teaching, I mean. He's got the patience for it."
"He always did." Claire's voice was thick. "When he was twelve, he spent an entire summer teaching our dog to fetch. The dog was seventeen and deaf. Everyone said it was impossible. Ethan said that just meant they weren't trying hard enough."
"Stubborn."
"Suicidally so." Claire watched Ethan demonstrate something else—looked like basic hand gestures for "yes" and "no." "He's going to kill himself doing this, isn't he. The petrification, the LE drain, the constant interfacing—Mira, tell me the truth. Can we stop it?"
Mira was quiet for a long moment. "No," she said finally. "His brain's too damaged. The lignification is... it's his body's attempt at repair, replacing dead neurons with plant-analogues. But those analogues can't support human consciousness. In six months, maybe less, the Ethan we know will be gone. What's left will be..." She trailed off.
"A living statue," Claire finished. "Aware but trapped. My son, buried alive in his own body."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be." Claire wiped her eyes. "He made his choice. He's making it every day. The least I can do is respect that." She turned to Mira. "But that doesn't mean I have to like it."
Down on the training floor, Lira successfully navigated a doorway for the fifth time. Ethan's LE signature brightened with genuine joy.
Claire looked away before the tears could start again.
TRAINING ZONE ALPHA | 1420 HOURS
By mid-afternoon, Lira had mastered:
Doorways (12/12 successful operations)Basic greetings ("Hello," "Goodbye," though her voice still sounded like wind through crystalline chimes)Personal space (staying 3+ feet from humans unless invited closer)Facial recognition (could now identify individual humans by more than just thermal/LE signatures)
She had not mastered:
Volume control (her voice could shatter glass at higher registers)Humor (had spent ten minutes analyzing a knock-knock joke before declaring it "LINGUISTICALLY INCOHERENT")Lying (when Ethan asked if she was tired, she responded: I DO NOT EXPERIENCE FATIGUE. MY PHOTOSYNTHETIC CELLS HAVE GENERATED SUFFICIENT ATP FOR 47 MORE HOURS OF CONTINUOUS OPERATION. WHY WOULD I CLAIM OTHERWISE?)
"Because sometimes," Ethan explained patiently, "humans lie to be polite. If someone asks 'how are you' and you're miserable, you say 'fine' anyway."
THIS IS DISHONEST.
"This is social grease. It keeps interactions smooth."
I DO NOT WISH TO BE DISHONEST.
"Then be tactfully honest." Ethan rubbed his temples—a gesture he immediately regretted when his fingers came away stained with bark dust. His body was shedding again. "Look, let's try a different exercise. I'm going to simulate a social situation, and you respond how you think is appropriate. Ready?"
READY.
"Hi Lira, how are you today?"
Lira paused, processing. I AM EXPERIENCING SIGNIFICANT CONFUSION REGARDING HUMAN SOCIAL CUSTOMS. HOWEVER, I AM GRATEFUL FOR YOUR INSTRUCTION AND OPTIMISTIC ABOUT MY CONTINUED DEVELOPMENT. IS THIS APPROPRIATELY TACTFUL?
Despite everything—the petrification, the exhaustion, the six-month death sentence—Ethan laughed. "That's perfect. You're learning."
I HAVE AN EXCELLENT TEACHER. A pause. ETHAN, MAY I ASK A QUESTION?
"Of course."
WHY DO YOU SACRIFICE YOURSELF FOR THIS TREATY? YOU ARE DYING. THE PETRIFICATION ADVANCES DAILY. YET YOU EXPEND YOURSELF TEACHING ME, STABILIZING PODS, MAINTAINING PEACE BETWEEN VERDANT AND FLESH-THAT-WALKS. WHY?
Ethan looked down at his hands—more bark than skin now, the fingernails replaced by crystalline growth. "You want the truth?"
ALWAYS.
"Because if I don't, all of this—" He gestured at the training zone, at Lira, at the world beyond. "—was for nothing. I burned out my brain to stop one Primordial from devouring humanity. If the forty-seven pods just become the same threat, then I murdered seventeen thousand trees for nothing. My humanity, my sacrifice, my mom's suffering—all of it meaningless."
SO YOU DO THIS FOR LEGACY. TO ENSURE YOUR ACTIONS MATTERED.
"No." Ethan met her non-existent gaze. "I do this because it's right. Because you deserve a chance to live, and humanity deserves a chance to survive, and maybe—maybe—there's a world where both are possible. I won't know if I'm right until I try. And I'd rather die trying than live knowing I gave up."
Lira's LE signature shifted—a complex pattern Ethan had never seen before. When she spoke, her voice was softer, more... present.
I UNDERSTAND. YOU ARE TEACHING ME TO BE HUMAN NOT BECAUSE I MUST MIMIC FLESH-THAT-WALKS, BUT BECAUSE YOU BELIEVE I CAN BE MORE THAN WHAT I WAS DESIGNED TO BE. YOU HAVE FAITH IN MY POTENTIAL.
"Yes."
NO ONE HAS EVER HAD FAITH IN ME BEFORE.
"Then let's not waste it." Ethan checked his LE: 1,240/15,000. Enough for a few more hours. "Next lesson: emotional recognition. Humans communicate as much through body language as words. I'm going to show you some common expressions, and you tell me what emotion they represent..."
They worked until Ethan's vision started to blur, until his LE hit 340/15,000, until Mira's voice crackled over the intercom: "That's enough for today. You're at critical levels."
Lira looked at him—really looked, with the kind of focus that suggested genuine understanding. YOU HAVE DEPLETED YOURSELF TEACHING ME. I AM... CONCERNED. IS THIS THE APPROPRIATE EMOTIONAL RESPONSE?
"Very appropriate," Ethan said. "That's called caring. Hold on to that."
I WILL. Lira extended one crystalline hand—slowly, carefully, respecting the personal space boundaries he'd taught her. THANK YOU, ETHAN. FOR BELIEVING I COULD BE MORE THAN A WEAPON.
Ethan took her hand. The crystal was warm, humming with contained life. "You're welcome. Same time tomorrow?"
I WOULD LIKE THAT.
MEDICAL BAY | 1847 HOURS
Dr. Sato's scan results were brutal:
"Three more neural clusters lignified today," he said, showing Ethan the brain imaging. "Your Broca's area is now 68% plant matter. Speech will become increasingly difficult. I'm also seeing advanced calcification in your motor cortex—expect mobility issues within the next two weeks."
"How long until I can't teach anymore?" Ethan asked.
Sato hesitated. "Four months. Maybe five. After that, your cognitive function will be too compromised."
"Then we have four months," Ethan said, "to train forty-six more Primordials."
"Ethan—"
"I know what I'm doing, Doctor." Ethan's voice was steady. "And I know what it's costing me. Let me spend what I have left the way I choose."
Sato looked at him for a long moment. "You're a braver man than I am, Mr. Cole."
"I'm just stubborn." Ethan smiled. "And I've got a really good dog to teach."
OBSERVATION NOTES | DR. VIVIENNE ASHCROFT
Day 39 Post-Severance:
Subject "Lira" (Verdant Entity, formerly Pod 12) demonstrates remarkable learning capacity. Mastered basic human interaction protocols in 6 hours—a timeline that would take most Verdant Users weeks.
Subject "Ethan Cole" (Human-Verdant Hybrid, Treaty Liaison) shows continued deterioration. Cerebral lignification advancing ahead of projections. Estimate 4 months before complete loss of function.
Recommendation: Accelerate pod maturation timeline. If Cole can train even half the remaining 46 entities before cognitive collapse, the treaty may survive his death.
Personal note: I've authorized the construction of a specialized life support system for Cole's final stage. When petrification completes, he'll be... aware. Trapped. We owe him better than abandonment.
We owe him a miracle. But I don't believe in those anymore.
ETHAN'S QUARTERS | 2230 HOURS
Claire found him staring at his hands again.
"Ethan?"
He looked up. "Hey, Mom. Thought you'd be asleep."
"Couldn't." She sat beside him. "How are you really?"
Ethan considered lying. Decided against it. "Terrified. Exhausted. Proud of Lira. Angry I won't get to see her grow up. Grateful I got to matter, even if it's just for a few months." He met her eyes. "All of it at once. Is that normal?"
"For you? Absolutely." Claire took his bark-rough hand. "I'm so proud of you. And so angry at the universe for making you choose this."
"Someone had to."
"It didn't have to be you."
"Yes it did, Mom." Ethan squeezed her hand. "I'm the only one who speaks both languages. The only one who can walk between worlds. If not me, then who?"
Claire didn't have an answer. Just held her son's hand and tried not to think about the day—soon, so soon—when he wouldn't be able to hold back.
Outside, in forty-six scattered territories, forty-six pods continued their slow maturation.
And Lira stood in her designated zone, practicing opening and closing a door, over and over, because her teacher had faith she could be more than a weapon.
Faith was a powerful thing.
Even when it came with a six-month expiration date.
CHAPTER STATISTICS
Metric
Value
Ethan's LE Post-Training
340/15,000 (critical)
Neural Clusters Lignified Today
3 (total: ~53% human, ~47% plant)
Time to Cognitive Collapse
4-5 months
Lira's Training Progress
Basic social protocols: 78% competency
Doors Successfully Operated (Lira)
47 (she kept practicing after hours)
Remaining Pods to Mature
46
Ethan's Will to Continue
100% (stubborn bastard)