3.4.2021
The merged minds of Gyre and Marie plan obsessively about how to infiltrate Alpha but no plan is necessary. The key to getting inside turns out to be Marie's incorrect but unshakeable belief that she alone manifests the ability to see the connecting fibers, traverse the fibers, and enter the thoughts of other humans. Because she doesn't at all believe that her intuition is another intelligent entity (although it is), her eyes will show no doubt when she meets Alpha.

They find Alpha in a squat house filled with junkies and homeless. He is in the living room, resting in an armchair, the floor littered with mattresses and humans used for his meals. He is wearing a new body but is easily identified by the void of connecting fibers, and is so famished that when Marie appears he approaches and attaches to her immediately. No small talk this time. The moment Marie opens to Alpha, Gyre moves. Alpha suspects nothing as he begins to feed.

Gyre embodies Alpha with one quick glide along the feeding fiber, easily passing through Alpha's relaxed filters. Treating him like a scorpion, Gyre controls Alpha's attention, never letting him feel cornered or threatened, and always keeping mindful of the stinger. Alpha's behavior is closer to an animal than a human, his stinging is a defensive reaction based on fear and survival more than strategy or conniving. Gyre goes to work connecting one fiber after another to the feeding animal, leashing him to their will.

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