The vacuum of space where Lot-09B once pulsated was now a hollow, silent tomb. Kane floated in the center of that nothingness, his skin no longer obsidian, but a terrifying, translucent marble shot through with neon-green veins of the Mother-of-Plagues.
Inside his soul-space, a billion tons of jungle, acid seas, and biological horrors were compressed into a single, screaming point of gravity. The strain was visible; Kane's silver hair had turned a jagged, crystalline white, and his eyes leaked a constant stream of violet vapor.
[WARNING: SOUL-CAPACITY AT 98%] [INTEGRATING BIOLOGICAL LOGIC: 45%] [EVOLUTIONARY OVERLOAD IMMINENT]
"Sarge... please tell me you're still in there," Vance's voice crackled through the Revenant's comms. The Void-Steel ship drifted toward Kane, its hull scarred by the Gardener's previous assault.
Kane didn't answer with words. He looked up at the Hegemony Orbital Mirror—the massive, five-hundred-mile-wide disc of gold and light that had just tried to erase an entire world. It was already rotating, its cooling vents screaming as it prepared to fire a second, "cleaning" burst at the Revenant.
"Unit-Alpha," Kane's voice whispered, but it didn't come from his mouth. It resonated through the metal of every ship in the vicinity. "Engage the Chrono-Leash. I'm going to use that Mirror as a slingshot."
"Sarge, the heat will melt the Void-Steel!" Sully yelled from the bridge.
"Not if we're already gone," Kane replied.
Kane launched himself at the Mirror. He didn't use an axe. He became a Lance of Pure Entropy. He slammed into the center of the gold disc just as it fired. The white-hot solar energy met the absolute black of Kane's hunger. Instead of an explosion, there was a Folding.
Kane used the Tier-10 energy of the blast to fuel a massive Timeline-Shunt. He didn't just warp; he punched a hole through the galactic fabric, pulling the Revenant and the "Echo" of the Jungle World through the gap.
[LOCATION: SOL SYSTEM - EARTH ORBIT] [TRANSIT TIME: 0.00 SECONDS]
The Revenant reappeared over Earth, but it wasn't alone. As it exited the rift, Kane exhaled. The "Echo" of Lot-09B didn't manifest as a planet—it manifested as a Cloud. A continent-sized swarm of emerald spores and violet mist descended upon the Earth like a falling shroud.
"Welcome home," Kane rasped, falling onto the deck of the Revenant as the green mist swallowed the blue marble below.