It was the source of a calamity that was gripping our star. One that had ended countless other worlds before ours, consuming them in despair until all life was eradicated. We went to Ultima Thule with no knowledge of what we would find there, borne on hope alone, because we were given the chance to flee the destruction that was coming for us and instead we chose to fight.

[He presses his lips together into a tight line.]

But what we found there was nothingness. No life, no aether. Not one of us would have lived had we set foot outside that ship. There was nothing. Nothing but dynamis saturated with countless centuries of hatred and sorrow and loss.

None of us knew what she was capable of, in the seat of her own power, there in her nest.