David woke up on the bank of a river.
The water was dark. Still. Reflecting a sky that had no sun. CJ stood a few feet away, flames crawling up his arms, his chest, his face. He wasn't screaming. He was just... burning. Watching.
"Hope you didn't," CJ said.
David tried to move. Couldn't.
A hand touched his shoulder. Jane. She leaned down and kissed him—soft, quick, desperate. Then she ran.
"Jane—wait—"
He stood. Chased. But the distance between them grew. Every step he took, she moved farther. The river stretched. The sky darkened. CJ's flames flickered behind him.
"Jane!"
She didn't look back.
He woke up.
Jonathan and Praise were staring at him.
"You were doing that sleep thing again," Jonathan said.
"Talking. Twitching. The whole deal."
David rubbed his face. The green headband was still in place. His hair was damp with sweat.
"Sorry."
"Don't apologize," Praise said. She leaned forward, her new hands folded in her lap. "You should try to talk to her."
David looked out the window. The sun was setting over Calabar—orange and gold and green, the city spreading out beneath them like a fever dream.
"Yeah," he said. "Maybe."
He wouldn't.
ETTA AGBO — CALABAR
The helicopter touched down on a cracked helipad behind an abandoned building. The rotors slowed. The dust settled. Joy killed the engine and turned to face them.
"Most of the town is sick," she said. "You won't see many people out. The ones who are still moving... they're not well."
"How long?" Jonathan asked.
"Reports started three days ago. But it's spreading fast."
"Febrihobia?"
"Likely. We won't know until you find it."
Joy handed each of them a small earpiece—barely visible, fitted to the curve of the ear.
"I'll circle back every fifteen minutes. Stay in contact. Don't get separated."
"And if we find it?" Praise asked.
"Call me. I'll bring the helicopter."
She climbed back into the cockpit. The rotors started again. The helicopter lifted, turned, and disappeared into the orange sky.
David watched it go.
"I hate it when she does that," he said.
"Flies away?"
"Leaves us alone in a sick town with a Phobia ."
"That's the job," Jonathan said.
They walked.
The streets were empty.
Not quiet—empty. Shops were closed. Windows were dark. A few cars sat abandoned at intersections, doors open, engines ticking. The air was thick and warm, heavy with the smell of stagnant water and something else—something sweet and wrong.
Then they heard the buzzing.
David looked up.
A cloud of mosquitoes was moving toward them—not a swarm, a wall. Thousands. Millions. Their wings caught the setting sun, turning the air gold and black.
"Well," Jonathan said. "That was easier than I thought."
He raised his hand. Cobalt-blue light gathered in his palm—not a punch, not a gauntlet. A vortex. It spun, grew, and shattered.
The mosquitoes didn't burn. They didn't fall. They disintegrated. The blue light spread through the swarm in a ripple, turning them to dust.
"Showoff," David said.
"Efficient," Jonathan corrected.
Another swarm appeared behind them—not from the sky, from a side street. A group of civilians was running from it, their faces pale, their clothes torn, their arms covered in bites.
"David—"
"I see them."
He raised his hand.
"Page 82."
Web-shooters manifested on his wrists—green-ink, compact, the nozzles gleaming. He fired. A line of green webbing shot across the street, caught a lamppost, and pulled. He swung.
The air rushed past his face. The buildings blurred. He landed between the civilians and the swarm, his back to them, his hands raised.
"Keep running," he said. "Don't stop."
They ran.
The mosquitoes surged.
David fired—not webs, bursts. Green splashes of adhesive that caught the swarm in mid-air, clumping them together, dropping them to the ground in sticky, buzzing balls.
"Praise—"
"I see them."
A golden bolt streaked over his head. Not at the swarm—into it. It detonated. Solar Flare.
The mosquitoes burned. The ones that survived scattered, disoriented.
Praise fired another bolt—this one into the sky. It didn't detonate. It opened, spreading into a small golden sphere that floated above the battlefield.
"Afterglow," she said. "This town is actually empty."
"Any Phobia yet?" Jonathan asked.
"Not yet. But we're being watched by two people."
Before anyone could answer, the air shifted.
It came from nowhere.
One moment, the street was empty. The next, it was there—a figure wrapped in sweat-soaked sheets, skin jaundiced yellow, stretched tight over sharp bones. Mosquitoes clouded around it, whining, whispering. Its teeth chattered constantly.
"You're warm," it said. Its voice was delirium made audible—nursery rhymes and fever dreams and your mother calling you inside for dinner. "So warm. It's in your blood now. You just don't know it yet."
"This isn't a Febriphobia," Jonathan said.
"More like a malariaphobial," Praise corrected.
The Phobia lunged.
Jonathan met it first.
His gauntlets flared—cobalt-blue, heavy, ready. He swung at Ague's head.
"Shattering Impact."
The shockwave cracked the pavement. Ague dissolved—not into smoke, into mosquitoes. The swarm reformed behind Jonathan, already reaching for his neck.
"Jonathan—"
David fired a web line. It caught Jonathan's wrist and yanked him out of the way. The mosquitoes closed on empty air.
"Thanks."
"Don't mention it."
Praise fired two bolts. Unerring Accuracy. They curved around Ague's swarm, seeking its core.
Ague raised a hand. A wave of fever pulsed from its body—not heat, not cold, both. Praise's bolts detonated early, thrown off course. The wave hit Jonathan. He stumbled, his face flushed, his breath coming fast.
"Fever and Chills," he said. "Can't... stabilize my Faith..."
"Stay back," David said. "I'll draw it out."
He fired a web line at a building, swung high, and came down behind Ague. His hands moved—not webs, spreads. A net of green adhesive shot across the street, catching Ague's swarm, pinning it to the ground.
Ague screamed. Not pain. Frustration.
"Annoying," it whispered. "So annoying."
Jonathan pressed the attack—gauntlets swinging, Mass Addition stacking, each punch heavier than the last. Ague tried to dissolve, tried to reform, but David's webs held pieces of it in place.
Praise fired bolt after bolt. Not at Ague—around it. Boxing it in.
"Double Impact," Jonathan growled.
The punch landed. A heartbeat later, a second detonation erupted from the same spot. Ague's form cracked.
"Now, David—"
David fired a web line at Ague's chest, pulled himself forward, and drove his reinforced knee into its jaw.
Ague fell.
It didn't stay down.
It raised both hands.
The world changed.
The street disappeared. The buildings vanished. The golden sky was gone.
Endless stagnant water stretched in every direction—warm, dark, thick. Eggs floated on the surface. Larvae wriggled below. Millions of mosquitoes whined in the humid air.
"You've got to be kidding me a crusade ," Praise said.
"Law," Jonathan added. "It's going to have a law—"
"You are already infected," Ague said. Its voice was everywhere—in the water, in the air, in their blood. "You were infected the moment you entered. There is no cure."
David tried to manifest a page.
Nothing.
He tried again.
Nothing.
"My Gift—"
"Gone," Jonathan said. His gauntlets had faded. His arms were bare. "Mine too."
"And mine," Praise said. Her crossbow was gone. Her hands were empty.
The fever hit them all at once.
David's head throbbed. His skin burned. Then froze. Then burned again. His vision blurred. Jonathan stumbled, caught himself, fell to one knee. Praise pressed her palms against her eyes, trying to focus, trying to see.
"We have to exorcise it," she said. "The Crusade falls with the caster."
"Easier said than done," Jonathan growled.
Ague moved through the water toward them. Not fast. Not slow. Inevitable.
David had never fought without his Gift.
No pages. No clones. No webshooters. Just his body and his Faith—and the fever was eating his Faith from the inside.
He looked at the water. The eggs. The larvae.
Water.
He remembered Page 52. The pool. The cooling machines. The way water had neutralized Ruese's fire.
But he didn't have Page 52.
He just had... water.
"Jonathan," he said. "When I say now, hit the water as hard as you can."
"What?"
"Trust me."
Ague raised a hand. Mosquitoes gathered around its fingers, forming a spear.
"Now."
Jonathan slammed his fist into the water—no gauntlets, just Faith reinforcement, just force. The shockwave rippled through the stagnant pool, sending waves crashing against Ague's legs, disrupting its balance.
The spear dissolved.
David moved.
He kicked water into Ague's face—not an attack, a distraction. The Phobia flinched. David grabbed its wrist, spun, and pulled. Ague fell face-first into the water.
"Praise—"
"I can't shoot. I don't have my bow."
"Then kick it."
She did.
Her foot connected with Ague's jaw. The Phobia's head snapped back. Its teeth stopped chattering.
Jonathan hit it again. And again. And again.
David held it down.
They beat Ague until the water turned dark, until the mosquitoes stopped whining, until the stagnant pool began to fade.
The Crusade collapsed.
They were back on the street. The sun was setting. The air was clean.
Ague lay on the ground, dissolving, already breaking apart. The mosquitoes around it fell still, their wings finally silent.
"It's done," Praise said.
"Finally," Jonathan breathed. His chest was heaving. The fever was still in his blood, but fading.
David turned to respond.
He didn't see it coming.
A blast of light—white,orange and red, blinding, wrong—erupted from somewhere above them. Not from Ague. From the roof of a building across the street.
"LOOK OUT—"
Jonathan moved.
Not away. Toward David.
He stepped in front of the blast, arms spread, body blocking. The light hit his chest and detonated. Jonathan flew backward—into David, through David, through the building behind them.
They crashed through the first wall. Brick shattered. Dust exploded. David's arms wrapped around Jonathan's limp body, trying to hold on, trying to stop.
The second wall. Glass rained around them.
The third. Steel groaned.
They landed in a crater of rubble and debris, blocks away from where they started. The sky was orange above them. The dust was thick around them.
David pushed himself up. His ears were ringing. His vision was blurred.
"Jonathan. Jonathan—"
Jonathan's eyes were closed. His chest was burned. A dark stain spread across his uniform.
"Jonathan!"
No answer.
David looked up at the sky. At the building where the blast had come from. The roof was empty. Whoever had fired was already gone.
He looked down at Jonathan.
"Stay with me," he said. "Please. Stay with me."
The dust settled.