The floating, glowing spheres of salt and dirt flattened into discs, until it was almost one homogenous slab about the size of a coffee table and the thickness of construction paper floating between them. Enola waved one of his hands as if he were waving goodbye, and something like a thin, gaseous arch appeared on the flat slab, sitting atop it like a long, translucent black pipe cleaner.

“THIS STRING REPRESENTS A DIMENSION OUTSIDE OF OUR SPACE-TIME. ONLY THIS STRING IS NOUMENAL, AND AS IT EXISTS OUTSIDE OF SPACE, IT EXISTS IN ALL SPACES. A SINGLE POINT IN EXISTENCE THAT CONNECTS ALL POINTS.” THE FLATTENED SALT FOLDED IN HALF LIKE A PIECE OF PAPER, AND THE BLACK GASEOUS ARCH CONTRACTED UNTIL THE SLAB MET WHERE THE TWO ENDS OF THE ARCH HAD TOUCHED IT. “BY EXPLOITING THE OMNIPRESENT NATURE OF THIS DIMENSION, WE CAN CONNECT TWO POINTS IN THREE-DIMENSIONAL SPACE AND RIP THEM OPEN, BECAUSE THROUGH THIS DIMENSION, THEY ARE ALWAYS CONNECTED. THERE IS A NATURAL PRECEDENT FOR THIS, ONE BASED IN THE CONSCIOUS MINDS OF INTELLIGENT BEINGS.”

“Fusion bonding,” she said.

At this, the tension in the air dissipated, and the salt space-time metaphor disintegrated and fell to the earth. “IT IS THE EXISTENCE OF THESE NOUMENAL DIMENSIONS THAT ALLOWS OUR SPECIES TO SENSE THE LIFE, OR LACK THEREOF, OF OUR SYMPHYLES, NO MATTER WHERE THEY MIGHT BE IN SPACE.”

Enola leaned in toward her, placing two of his long digits under her chin. He turned her head to the right, and then to the left, as though he were scanning a 3D image of her brain.

“CAN YOU FEEL OUR DEAR BELOVED?”

She closed her eyes. “Yes.”

He removed his fingers from her chin. “WHAT DO YOU SENSE?”

Her eyes shot open. The wall had thinned, and she’d been so preoccupied with Enola, she hadn’t noticed. “He’s angry. He’s frightened. He’s extremely frightened. Oh . . . fuck, he knows. He knows I let you go.”

“DO YOU SENSE HIM STRONGLY?”

“Yes, very.”

“YOU HAVE ONLY BEEN BOUND TO HIM HERE, AN INFINITESIMAL DISTANCE RELATIVE TO THE SIZE OF SPACE. BUT NO MATTER WHERE YOU GO IN THIS UNIVERSE, YOU WILL ALWAYS SENSE HIM WITH THE SAME INTENSITY.”

“And that’s what you meant when you said he lied about why he decided to bind himself to me,” she said, trying to push away that fear that wasn’t hers. “Dynamic fusion bonding isn’t a homing beacon. He couldn’t use it to sense proximity.”

“CORRECT.”

“Then why did he do it?”

“I DO NOT KNOW. I SIMPLY KNOW THAT IF HE TOLD YOU THAT THE ABILITY TO SENSE PROXIMITY WAS HIS RATIONALE FOR MAKING THE DECISION TO BIND HIMSELF TO YOU, HE SPOKE MISTRUTH.”