Occurs alongside Chapters 31 and 32

Alexia felt the change in the hyphae network even before she turned around to find Grayson, sunken back into that liminal state within the mutamycete. His eyes had gone back again, and he'd put his arm out to the wall. That too was now engulfed partway up his arm in hyphae.

"Not again," she groaned, stepping forward to pull him back- and then stopping. Tried again. There was a strong negative compulsion to leave him where he was.

That couldn't be a good sign. He hadn't even needed to use her as a client this time to connect in.

Marigold had begun to move ahead, realized she wasn't following, and doubled back. Her face had that pinched look to it it when she was fighting a bad headache. "Something's riled up your guest in the basement. What's going on?" He aunt looked from her to Grayson. "This is what happened before?"

Alexia nodded faintly. "He's had a few episodes- seeing things through the hyphae -but he had to interface with me directly to access it before this. I think…" she made a face. This was her network damn it. "I think the mutamycete is preventing me from getting him out. Could you?" She indicated to Grayson.

Marigold nodded. "Of course." She moved over to Grayson's side and put a hand on his shoulder to pull him back. Stopped. Tried again, grasping his arm this time. Almost immediately she let go and staggered back, blinking rapidly and pressing the heel of her hand to her forehead. "Ow."

Alexia could feel the dread rising again. "I thought it didn't affect you?"

"I think it got into my bloodstream. Those damned gas pellets held the door open just long enough, I think. It's…pressure. There's a strong feeling of pressure when I try." She lowered her hand. "You said you saw his memories in there?"

"We were in them." Alexia corrected. "The Mold is a repository of consciousness. A network."

"You die here and it has you."

"You and Grayson both make these literary flourishes and it's not necessary," Alexia responded testily. Then, "Grayson…thinks he can do something for Steve. The boy."

"He's dead." Marigold blurted out. "We…saw what was left when we found the two of you."

"He's still there, though*.* Maybe Grayson can, but…this rate of development is too fast. I think the mycosis is taking him over."

"I heard he's controlling the hyphae, now?" Alfred must have filled Marigold in in the fight downstairs, earlier.

Alexia nodded. "And seeing through them. Whatever equilibrium he had before…I'm worried for him, Auntie. This kind of rapid shift is rarely a good sign."

Marigold studied her a moment. "Do you have a medical glove?" Alfred had followed them back, and was now staring at the tableau with incredulity, visibly holding his tongue from making a caustic barb. Instead, he pulled a pair from a breast pocket and passed them across.

Alexia glanced over to Grayson again. He was like a statue, standing there. The more this happened, the greater the risk that the mutamycete would just…take him. "We can't move him, Auntie," she said anyhow.

"I promised your fungal network I will do no such thing." Marigold said in a slightly carrying voice, as if the mutamycete were eavesdropping. "There's something I can do. The beasties in the basement will break loose sooner or later, and one is dead set on you 'fixing' him."

"The jock?" Alfred asked. "You mentioned that was an unstable T-antibody mutation. There's no fixing that."

"I'll let the giant, desperate mutant know that when he get in our faces again. I'm aure he'll take it well." She slid her own pack off her back and handed it off to Alfred. I might have to get hands-on between here and the safe room, and this is a grabbable point. Could you keep this safe?"

"How do you know it's T-antibodies?" Alexia broke in. It was strange to see her brother interact with someone without either threatening or fawning. It was a welcome change, but still surprising. She decided not to comment on it.

Marigold wrinkled her nose. "It was such a stupid theory that I broke radio silence and asked the source if McNally stole his blood like a damned vampire. There might have been some taunting. He was having a bit of a pout over losing access. The amount of time he's had to come up with a backup plan makes me nervous."

Alexia stared. "You called on the radio?" Alfred grimaced and shook his head, looking at the floor.

While she'd been talking, Marigold had cut her hand deep and made a fist with the medical glove around the bleeding wound. She eyed where Grayson's arm was sunk into the hyphae. "No. It was a side effect," she said shortly, popping her hand inside the glove. She popped her hand into the glove. "Here goes nothing." She moved forward quickly, smearing the bloody glove across the hyphae around his arm. "Does Grayson understand what's happening?"

"…I haven't had the chance," Alexia admitted.

Marigold glanced back at her. "…when we have a moment of quiet - real quiet - you should take a look at the pack I gave you. It's the basis for the chelators, but I'm sure it goes beyond that. We got lucky with the prototype shot last time, but this?" She nodded to the hyphae, which had flailed briefly before withering back from his arm. "You need to tell him, or he's going to push himself without knowing there's a limit."

"Like you," Alfred supplied, echoing Alexia's sentiment. Alexia shot him a surprised look, but nodded.

Marigold only quirked a smile at her, neither agreeing nor disagreeing. "I'm not being consumed by ghost mold. I know how far I've pushed my limits. I probably need to sleep for a week once we're secure."

With the hyphae are dying back around his arm, Marigold started to to pull Grayson out again by the back of his vest, and he blinked. Marigold stepped back, swaying on her feet.

Alfred stepped forward to steady her when she wobbled, casting a worried look at Alexia. "I'll carry the bag, but I don't think you're in any condition to pick more fights. It's a quick run to the safe room."

Alexia, watching them begin to limp forward again with consternation, turned to Grayson, and watched him slowly swim back to the surface.


When they had boarded the elevator in Alexander's old study, the elevator had been opened. Marigold had noted the scratched up lock to the study aloud, letting the twins argue amongst themselves who the culprit was.

Grayson had remained quiet. He seemed to be having trouble focusing as they made their way out, but he still kept casting worried looks at her. It was honestly quite touching, that concern.

It was also likely warranted. Despite what she'd claimed, pushing against the Mold had make her situation even worse. More and more, that dissociative headspace that ran on instinct threatened to crowd in.

The dry, museum quality of the study juxtaposed against the smell coming up from the elevator shaft. The twins seemed to turn delicate shades of grey when it hit them collectively, while Grayson only looked grim. The smell of carnage- and it could only be that - seemed to anchor him into the moment. As the all squeezed into the elevator, she tumbled the DOWN button. "I must warn you," she said to the group. "It isn't pretty down there." The urge to gag merged with the raw, congested feeling in her chest, and she turned her face into her elbow to try stifle a round of painful coughing, making her diaphragm cramp in sympathetic rebellion.

If the smell had been bad upstairs, it had only been a teaser of what hit them when the doors opened. It hit her hard, and Alexia had to nudge her with a worried look before Marigold realized she had plastered herself to the side wall of the lift like a cat being forced into a bath.

She'd warned them there was a mess down here, yes, but it seemed like McNally returned here to make a moat of blood and shit and offal of the bodies he'd must have had squirreled away somewhere. He must have moved them just before coming upstairs, she thought, numb.

Grayson strode out casually into the river of carnage, like a gunslinger on a Saturday afternoon, remarking almost cheerfully on the state of the place. Alfred twitched ahead of them, and Alexia let go of her arm to step forward and shoot her twin a forbidding glare. Marigold automatically followed.

Outside the lift was instantly worse. A large heat register was pumping sweltering heat across the back of the room, across the bodies. the pile on the cart was inert (there were so many), but those on the meathooks swung gently in the warm current buffeting the room.

The cold wasn't here to shield her from the smell anymore. between the headache, and the nausea it was making her dizzy just to stand here. If they didn't -

Something was wrong with her eyes. Red spots danced across her field of vision, the trickle of dizziness morphing into a wave.

She opened her mouth to say something, but her gorge rose, and she doubled over, vomiting hard on her boots. Just ahead, she heard the footsteps approach her, hands reaching to steady her out of concern. She swatted the hands away - don't touch me, not safe - stumbling to the side to find something to brace herself on. The spots were converging into a black fog, but there was something just ahead, and if she could just make it -

She stumbled over something with wheels - the work cart, piled high with bodies, she thought with detached horror. She fell into the avalanche, her hands sinking into something soft, putrid.

That strange void space opened, and it was like a switch in her head flipped. She shakily tried to find to her feet again but kept slipping in gore. Everything felt…grey.

Empty.

Somewhere distant, she heard someone speaking, so far away. "Ma, come grab my hand." A figure approached her in the gloom. She couldn't make her brain make sense of the faces in the room, but the one reaching for her had a distinct fungal smell. Threat. She bared her teeth without thinking.

"Grayson," another voice said. She could smell the slow onset of fear from that direction, but no one was leaving. "We need to move. We need to move right now."

The words were meaningless noise to Marigold's ears, but that figure was taking too long to heed them anyways. Marigold snarled, lunging forward.

Screaming, and the hot taste of blood, followed.