Angela Diaboli and the Heart of New Eden

Dust hangs in the cramped storage chamber. In the corner, a huddled survivor shakes under wet, grey sores, breathing hard enough to rattle. Silas keeps his blade at the throat, steady and waiting.

Angela takes in the room in one hard glance, the open door behind her, the sealed chamber ahead, the sickness already inside the tower walls.

The survivor flinches back against the rusted wall, palms up, too weak to run and too afraid to beg properly.

Silas does not move. Brutus waits in the corridor, ready to seal the threshold if Angela orders quarantine instead of death.

This is the breach inside the tower now, not blades at the stairs. Angela has found the carrier, and the next command decides whether the sickness is cut out here or spreads deeper.

Silas lowers the blade a fraction, waiting for the command to become final.

Brutus shifts in the corridor at once, ready to take the survivor into his grip and drag the problem away from the tower.

Silas hauls the weakened survivor upright. The wet breathing turns into a choking rasp as the pair move for the door.

Outside the room, metal still rings somewhere deeper in the tower, but no one moves to stop them.

A moment later, the threshold empties, and the corridor swallows the fading drag of footsteps. The sickness is being carried out to end away from New Eden.