The silence that followed Rex's revelation was not merely an absence of sound; it was a physical entity. It was a vacuum that seemed to suck the very oxygen out of the domain, leaving Apollo gasping in a space that had suddenly become impossibly small and infinitely hostile.
Apollo stared up at Rex. Whatever was happening on his face could no longer be described as grief.
Grief was human; grief was something that could be mourned. What was surfacing now was something older, darker, and far more dangerous.
The tears still tracked through the blood and grime on his cheeks, but underneath them, something ancient was rising through the wreckage of his psyche.
The trembling that had been born of heartbreak moments ago had transformed. It was no longer the shuddering of a broken man; it was the violent, tectonic vibration of something about to detonate.
"You," Apollo said.
