The question slipped out of him before he realized he'd spoken.
"Can't we bring the people from the world into the new timeline? Isn't that the point?"
The woman wearing his mother's face watched him with a soft patience that only made the knot in his chest tighten. "It isn't possible," she said. "Only you and your squadmates can cross into this timeline. You are the focal points of its creation. Even if we could bring others in, it would undermine everything. Corruption's focus would shift. The balance you forged would collapse and disaster would follow."
Her explanation sounded too smooth. Too neat. Too detached from the weight of what it meant.
Leon felt something inside him snap. He didn't notice how sharply his voice rose until it echoed around them.
"So you're just going to let a whole world die?"
She didn't flinch.
"It is the only way."
"Bullshit." The word cracked out of him, raw and unfiltered.
