WEBVTT
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Calarogu Shark Media.
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Welcome to Midnight Frequencies, a special Romance Weekly and Ghost
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Scary Stories crossover event. This is episode three, Dead Air.
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The voice that comes out of me isn't mine. It's deeper, older,
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carrying harmonics that seem to resonate in dimensions I can't see.
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When I speak. The air itself bends around the words,
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creating visible ripples that spread out from my throat, like
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stones dropped in still water. Stop. I command, and the
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word carries the weight of centuries, the authority of every
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siren who came before me. Drop your weapons, forget you
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saw us, leave this place, and remember nothing. The effect
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is immediate and terrifying. Six armed agents freeze midstride, their
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faces going blank behind tactical masks. Weapons clatter to the
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floor like dropped toys. They turn in perfect synchronization and
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walk back through the shattered doorway, their movements mechanical, puppet like.
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In less than thirty seconds, we're alone again. I collapse
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against the wall, my legs suddenly unable to support me.
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The power that just flowed through my voice has left
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me feeling hollowed out, like an instrument that's been played
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too hard and might shatter at any moment. Jesus Christ.
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I whisper my British accent, making the words sound absurdly polite.
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After what just happened. I made them forget. I erased
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their memories. Kai is staring at me with something between
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awe and terror. In three hundred years of order records,
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there are maybe five documented cases of untrained sirens successfully
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using command voice, and none of them on their first attempt.
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Is that good or bad? It's unprecedented. Kai moves to
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the surveillance monitor, watching the agents file out of the
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building like sleepwalkers, which means you're either the most naturally
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gifted siren in recorded history or what, or your bloodline
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is far more ancient and powerful than I realized. He
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turns back to me, and I can see something new
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in his expression, not just attraction or protectiveness, but genuine,
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fear lyra What did your grandmother tell you about your
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family history? Anything about where your ability might have come from?
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I try to focus through the exhaustion clouding my thoughts,
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just stories, old folklore about women who could speak truth
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into existence, who could call storms or calm seas with
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their voices. I always thought they were metaphors, nothing about
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specific ancestors, names, locations, dates. She mentioned someone called the
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White Siren once said she was our family's greatest shame
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and greatest glory. But when I asked for details, Grandmother
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would just get this look, like she was afraid of
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the words themselves. Kai goes very still. The White Siren.
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You're certain that's what she called her? Yes, why do
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you know that name? Every listener knows that name, Kai
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says quietly. She's the reason the order exists. The room
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seems to grow colder outside, Dawn is breaking over Manhattan,
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painting the windows with golden light. That feels incongruous with
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the darkness of what I'm learning about myself. Tell me,
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I say, Kai sits down heavily, like the weight of
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what he's about to reveal is physical. In sixteen ninety two,
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during the Salem witch Trials, a woman named Evangeline Morgan
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was accused of using her voice to bewitch an entire town.
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The records say she could compel truth from anyone, command
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absolute obedience, even influence the weather through song. Morgan, I repeat,
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feeling the name resonate in my bones. That's my surname.
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The White siren wasn't just any siren, Lyra. She was
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the first siren to fully manifest what we call the
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true voice, the ability to alter reality through spoken will
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not just influence people's actions, but actually change the fundamental
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nature of things. I think about the armed agents, how
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they didn't just follow my commands but seemed to forget
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on a cellular level that we existed. Is that what
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I just did? I don't know. Maybe the line between
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powerful compulsion and reality alteration is blurry. Kai runs his
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hands through his hair, and I noticed they're shaking. According
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to the records, Evangeline's abilities grew so strong that she
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began to lose control. People who heard her voice would
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become permanently altered, their personalities, rewritten, their memories, restructured. Entire
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communities were transformed into extensions of her will. What happened
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to her? The order was formed specifically to stop her.
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It took thirty listeners working together to contain her abilities
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long enough for Kai's voice trails off. For what for
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her execution? They burned her, but even then her voice
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continued to echo for days. Afterward, the area around Salem
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was considered cursed for decades. No supernatural being could enter
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that region without experiencing what witnesses described as the White
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Sirens scream. The implications hit me like a physical blow.
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You think I'm like her, You think I'm going to
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lose control and start rewriting people's minds. I think you
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have the potential to be exactly like her, Kai says honestly,
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and that terrifies me because it means the Order will
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never stop hunting you. They'll see you as an extinction
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level threat. And what do you see me? As? Kai
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looks at me with an expression so complet I can't
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pass all the emotions in it. I see you as
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someone I'm falling in love with, despite every instinct telling
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me I should run as far away as possible. The
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confession creates that electric resonance between us again, but this
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time it's stronger, more visible. The air around us shimmers
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with silver light, and I can feel our supernatural frequencies
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not just matching, but beginning to merge. Kai I whisper
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something's happening. He sees it too, the way the space
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between us is bending, how our voices are starting to
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harmonize even when we're not trying to match pitch. When
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he speaks, I can hear layers in his words that
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weren't there before, and I know he's hearing the same
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complexity in mine. This is what I was afraid of,
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he says, but he doesn't move away. Listeners aren't supposed
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to be affected by syral nobilities. But you're not just
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any siren, and this connection we're developing, it's creating something new?
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Is it dangerous? Everything about you is dangerous. Kai's voice
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is rough, and when he looks at me, I can
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see desire warring with duty in his dark eyes. But
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I can't seem to make myself care. Before I can respond,
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my phone rings, not the shrill electronic tone of a
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normal call, but something else, a sound that seems to
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bypass my ears and resonate directly in my bones. When
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I look at the screen, there's no number, just a
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symbol that looks like a spiral made of intersecting waves.
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Don't answer that, Kai says urgently, But I'm already reaching
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for the phone, compelled by something stronger than curiosity. The
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moment I touched the screen, the device grows cold in
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my hand, and when I answer, the voice that speaks
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isn't coming from the phone speaker. It's emanating from the
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air around us, daughter of the White Siren, the voice says,
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and it sounds like wind through ancient trees, like waves
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crashing against stone. We have been waiting for you to awaken.
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Who is this, I ask, my voice automatically shifting into
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that compelling frequency. We are the Council of First Voices,
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the original Sirens, those who chose to transcend mortality rather
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than face extinction. We felt your awakening across the spheres,
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heard your command voice echo through dimensions most humans cannot perceive.
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Kai has gone pale. He's gesturing frantically for me to
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hang up, but I can't seem to move my hand.
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Your descendant shows promise. The voice continues, and now I
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realize it's not one voice, but many, speaking in perfect unison.
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But she walks a dangerous path, guided by one who
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would cage her power rather than set it free. I'm
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not caging anything, Kai says, loud enough for the voices
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to hear. I'm trying to help her learn control. Control
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is a limitation imposed by the fearful. The White Siren's
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error was not in her power, but in her restraint.
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She tried to live within human boundaries, to love a
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human man, to pretend she was something less than what
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she was destined to become. And what am I destined
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to become? I ask, though part of me dreads the answer.
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What you were always meant to be a bridge between worlds,
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a voice that can reshape reality according to will and desire.
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But first you must choose remain limited by mortal attackishments,
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or embrace your true nature. The phone grows so cold
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it burns, and I can see frost forming on the
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screen around us. The safe house is changing, walls becoming translucent,
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showing glimpses of other places. Other times I see a
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woman who looks like me standing before a massive tree
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that pulses with silver light, her voice weaving threads of reality,
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like a spider creating a web. The white siren. I breathe,
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your ancestor your template, your warning. The voices are growing stronger,
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more compelling. She fell because she chows love over power.
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Do not make her mistake. Love isn't a mistake, I
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say fiercely, and as I speak, I feel that strange
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resonance between been Ki and me flare brighter. It's what
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makes power worth having. The counsel's laughter is like breaking glass,
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spoken like a child who has never tasted true power.
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But you will learn when your voice grows strong enough
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to reshape continents, When you can speak new realities into
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existence with a whisper, you will understand the burden of transcendence.
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I don't want to transcend anything I say. I just
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want to learn control, so I don't hurt innocent people.
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Innocent people, The voices turne cold. Those are the words
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of someone who still thinks of herself as human. You
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are beyond such concerns. Now you are becoming something that
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exists outside mortal morality. No, the word comes out with
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enough force to make the windows rattle. I won't be that.
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I won't turn into someone who thinks other people don't matter.
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You will have no choice. Power of this magnitude cannot
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be contained by human conscience. The White Siren learned this
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too late. You will learn it in time, or you
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will be destroyed by your own limitations. The connection cuts
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off abruptly, leaving us in sudden, absolute silence. The phone
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screen goes black, and the walls of the safe house
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solidify back into normal matter, But the chill in the
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air remains, and I can still feel the weight of
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the Council's words pressing against my mind. Well, Kai says,
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after a long moment that was worse than I feared.
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Who were they really if they were telling the truth?
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The original sirens who chose to abandon their human forms
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rather than accept limitations on their power, They exist somewhere
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between dimensions, now technically immortal, but no longer quite real
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in any way that matters. Kai moves to one of
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his books, flipping through pages until he finds what he's
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looking for. There are references to them in the oldest
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Order texts. They're said to appear when a siren of
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unusual power awakens, trying to recruit them into transcendence, and
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if I refuse, then they'll either leave you alone to
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face the Order's judgment, or they'll try to force the
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transcendence process. Kai's expression is grim. Both options typically end
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with the siren losing everything that made them human. I
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sink into a chair, overwhelmed by the scope of what
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I'm learning, So my choices are become a reality altering monster,
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Let the Order kill me, or get turned into some
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kind of dimensional ghost. There's a fourth option, Kai says quietly,
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which is we run, We disappear completely, find somewhere the
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order can't track us, and I teach you control, away
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from all this supernatural politics, And then what live in
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hiding forever? Maybe or maybe we find a way to
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prove that you can be trusted with your abilities, build
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a life that's both supernatural and human. Kai sits across
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from me, and when he reaches for my hands, I
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can feel that electric connection sparking between us. It wouldn't
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be easy, and there'd be no guarantees, but it would
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be ours. The offer is tempting in ways I can't
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fully express, But even as I consider it, I can
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feel the weight of responsibility settling on my shoulders. Those
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people who called my show, who confess their secrets and
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destroyed their lives because of my uncontrolled power, they deserve
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better than having me run away from the consequences. What
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about my listeners, I ask the people I hurt with
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my broadcast? What about them? I can't just disappear and
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leave them to deal with what I did to them.
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If I really have this power, shouldn't I be using
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it to help rather than hide. Kai's expression grows troubled, Lyra,
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the road between helping and controlling is shorter than you think.
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The White Siren probably started with the best intentions too,
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But she didn't have what I have, which is I
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meet his eyes, feeling that resonance between us pulse with certainty.
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She didn't have you. She fell because she was alone,
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because there was no one to keep her grounded, to
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remind her of her humaneanity. But you can hear supernatural frequencies. Kai,
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you can monitor my voice, tell me when I'm losing control,
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help me stay connected to what matters. That's a lot
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of faith to put in someone you've known for less
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than twelve hours, is it? I challenge? You've been listening
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to my voice for eight months. I've been unconsciously responding
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to your presence in my audience the same length of time.
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This connection we have, it didn't start last night. It's
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been building slowly, carefully, one frequency finding another across the
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electromagnetic noise of the city. Kai stares at me, and
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I can see the moment he realizes I'm right. Whatever's
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between us has been growing for months, two supernatural beings,
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unknowingly calling to each other across the airwaves. You want
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to stay, he says, you want to face the order,
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deal with the council, learn to use your abilities properly
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instead of running. I want to find a way to
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be what I am without losing what I was, and
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I think the only way to do that is together.
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Before Kai can respond, alarms start blaring again, but this
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time they're not coming from the building security system. They're