Chapter 5: The First Test

Chapter 5: The First Test

For two days, Anya lived with her pulsing, emerald secret. The memory of Aethelgard was a warm, constant hum beneath the surface of her fear, a reminder of her purpose. Hiding the Plastiphage felt wrong, like caging a songbird. It wasn't meant to be a stain on her nightstand; it was meant to heal. The ache in her chest, the planet’s silent scream, was no longer a vague sorrow but a specific, localized agony. It was the choked gurgle of Penance Creek, a waterway just a few blocks away that had long since surrendered to the plague of plastic.

The creek was a festering wound in the cityscape. Anya remembered a time, years ago, when her father had taken her there, pointing out a hardy species of filtering reed. Now, it was a graveyard. A rainbow-sheened film of chemical runoff coated the stagnant water, and plastic bags, bleached and torn, clung to the dead branches of skeletal trees like pathetic ghosts. The air was thick with the sweet, sickening smell of decay and polymers baking under the perpetual smog-light. It was the perfect, desperate place for her first real test.

Driven by a need that was more instinct than courage, she made her move. While her father was lost in a labyrinth of chemical equations, she carefully coaxed a tiny, pea-sized piece of the Plastiphage from the main colony. It pulsed in her palm, a warm, living jewel of hope. She concealed it in a small, clean glass vial and slipped out of the apartment, her heart a frantic, fluttering thing against her ribs.

The walk to the creek was a journey through a landscape of neglect. Every overflowing bin, every piece of plastic debris skittering across the cracked pavement, was a fresh accusation. When she finally stood on the crumbling concrete bank, the sheer scale of the pollution was overwhelming. This was her father’s leviathan, the monster he fought with data and theories. And she was here to fight it with a whisper of magic.

With a trembling hand, she uncorked the vial. She held it over the most stagnant, refuse-choked part of the water. For a moment, doubt gnawed at her. This was not a controlled experiment with a single bottle. This was an ecosystem of filth. What if it did nothing? What if it made things worse?

Then she remembered the rivers of light in Aethelgard. Heal, she thought, a clear, silent command directed at the glowing piece in her palm. Show them what you can do.

She tipped the vial, and the tiny piece of Plastiphage dropped into the oily water.

For a second, nothing happened. The emerald speck sank beneath the surface, and her hope sank with it. But then, a soft, green light began to bloom in the murky depths. It wasn't a flash; it was a gentle, inexorable dawn. The light spread, a network of glowing fungal threads racing outwards from the point of impact.

The effect was breathtaking. Where the light touched, the water began to clarify. The oily sheen broke apart, dissolving into nothingness. The plastic bags and brittle fragments of styrofoam it encountered didn't just get pushed aside—they were consumed. The Plastiphage flowed over them, and they simply unraveled, their complex polymer chains breaking down and becoming fuel for the expanding miracle.

A soft, ethereal hum filled the air, the sound of cleansing, of restoration. The fungus multiplied with shocking speed, climbing the banks and devouring the plastic litter caught in the reeds. In the space of three minutes, a five-foot circle of the creek had been transformed. The water was almost clear, the foul stench replaced by a clean, earthy scent. A tiny, silver-sided minnow, a survivor from a bygone era, darted out from under a rock, its scales catching the impossible green light.

Tears of pure, unadulterated joy streamed down Anya’s face. It was real. It worked. This tiny piece of her home could heal this broken world. The triumph was so absolute, so profound, it left her breathless. For the first time in her life, she felt powerful. She felt whole.

Her moment of triumph was shattered by the crunch of tires on gravel.

A heavy, unmarked black van, brutally utilitarian and devoid of chrome, screeched to a halt on the access road behind her. It was nothing like the sleek car from before; this vehicle was built for a purpose, not for show. The side door slid open with a pneumatic hiss, and three figures emerged.

They were not the corporate security agents in their sharp suits. These men wore dark, tactical gear, their forms lean and predatory. They moved with a chilling, synchronized efficiency, fanning out to cut off any escape. The man in the lead was compact and moved with a lethal grace she had never witnessed before. He didn't look at the miracle in the creek; his cold, grey eyes locked directly onto her. It was Talon.

Anya’s blood turned to ice. The predatory aura she’d felt from the first visitors was a faint perfume compared to the raw, killing intent radiating from these men. This wasn't a visit. This wasn't a warning. This was an acquisition.

Panic seized her. She spun around and ran, her sneakers slipping on the damp, grimy concrete. Behind her, there was no shouting, only the sound of disciplined, heavy footfalls giving chase.

She scrambled up the bank and plunged into a narrow, refuse-strewn alleyway. Her lungs burned. The lingering exhaustion from her previous uses of the power was a heavy weight on her limbs, slowing her down. She risked a glance over her shoulder. They were gaining. They moved like a pack of wolves, silent and relentless, their expressions utterly devoid of emotion. They were not chasing a person; they were retrieving an asset.

The alley ended abruptly in a high, chain-link fence topped with razor wire. A dead end. Trapped.

Talon and his men slowed their pace, their movements now calm and deliberate as they closed the net. There was nowhere left for her to run.

Desperation clawed at her throat. Her gaze darted around, searching for a weapon, an escape, anything. Her eyes fell on the ground at her feet. The alley floor was a carpet of filth—greasy fast-food wrappers, discarded plastic film, and the brittle remains of broken containers. An arsenal of fuel.

She still had the glass vial in her pocket. As she had tipped it, a tiny, almost invisible fragment of the Plastiphage had clung to the inside rim. It was all she had left.

An idea, born not of thought but of pure, survivalist instinct, erupted in her mind. She hadn't just commanded the Plastiphage to eat; she had willed it to heal. What if she gave it a different command?

She fumbled for the vial, her fingers shaking. The men were only twenty feet away now, advancing steadily. She upended the vial, tapping the last, tiny fragment onto a pile of greasy polyethylene wrappers at her feet.

She didn't plead with it. She commanded it. Grow. Spread. Defend.

A wave of intense dizziness washed over her, far worse than before. The world greyed out at the edges as her own life force poured into the command. The fragment of fungus flared with a brilliant, almost violent emerald light. Supercharged by her will and the sudden feast of discarded plastic, it didn't just consume. It erupted.

A slick, rapidly-growing fungal carpet exploded across the grimy pavement. It expanded with unnatural speed, a shimmering, organic oil slick that covered the ground between her and her pursuers in a heartbeat.

The two men behind Talon, their momentum carrying them forward, hit the slick without warning. Their heavy tactical boots found no purchase. One’s feet went out from under him, and he went down with a grunt of pained surprise, his head cracking against the brick wall. The other windmilled his arms wildly, struggling to stay upright on the impossibly slippery surface before crashing to his knees.

Talon, with inhuman reflexes, stopped just short of the slick, his eyes widening for a fraction of a second in genuine shock.

That was all the opening Anya needed.

Fueled by a final surge of adrenaline, she leaped, grabbing the chain-link fence and scrambling up. Her fingers were raw, her muscles screaming in protest, but the image of those cold, relentless men propelled her upward. She swung a leg over the razor wire, tearing her recycled-fabric trousers but clearing the obstacle. She landed hard on the other side, stumbling but not falling.

She ran. She ran without looking back, the sounds of surprised shouts and the slick, chaotic aftermath fading behind her. She didn't stop until the familiar, decrepit door of her apartment building was in front of her. She fumbled with the key, her whole body trembling uncontrollably, and finally slammed the door shut behind her, sliding the bolt home.

She collapsed against the door, gasping for air, her heart threatening to beat its way out of her chest. The elation she’d felt at the creek was a distant, bitter memory, completely incinerated by the terror of the hunt.

Her miracle was out. And the watchers had sent their wolves.