The cataclysm lasted for five full minutes. To Cleo, adrift in the sudden silence, it felt like an eternity. The chaotic storm of unraveled reality ceased as abruptly as it had begun, the warped space smoothing over like a bad memory. The void returned to its cold, star-dusted stillness.
"...Rex?"
Her voice was like a whisper in the vacuum that was met with nothing. She reached out through their shared psychic link, a bond that had been a constant hum in the back of her mind for centuries. She searched for the familiar, steady warmth of his presence.
But... she found only a deafening silence. A hollow, absolute nothingness.
For the first time in ages, a cold, sharp feeling of being utterly lost pierced through her core. It was a vulnerability she had not felt since the fall of her own empire. Her hand tightened into a fist, her knuckles glowing white with a contained energy that mirrored the storm within her.
