The story, for a moment, leaves the worried heroes on their starship and travels to the heart of the Gardener's new, terrible masterpiece. On a dead, gray world, surrounded by a silent, beautiful, and deadly dance of black holes, a new being opened its eyes for the first time.

This being had once been mortal. A long, long time ago, it had been a person, a member of a forgotten race that had lived and died on this lonely, barren planet. Its life had been one of suffering, of loss, of a deep and profound powerlessness in the face of a cold and uncaring universe. Its final memory, before its entire species had faded into dust, was one of bitter, helpless rage.

And then, it had known nothing but a long, silent sleep for a million years.

Until the Gardener had arrived.

The Gardener, in its new, insane, artistic state, had been looking for the perfect material for its new creation. It had felt the faint, psychic echo of this being's final, powerful emotion—its rage, its desperate desire for a better, more orderly world—and it had seen potential.

So, it had taken that faint, ghostly echo of a soul, and it had poured a piece of its own, immense, reality-warping power into it. It was like a master sculptor taking a lump of old, forgotten clay and shaping it into a perfect, living statue.

The being that now stood on the surface of the dead world was no longer mortal. It was tall, and its form was a perfect, beautiful, and terrifying mix of living flesh and pure, crystalline energy. It was a perfect, symmetrical being, a living work of art.

This was the Harvester.

Ryan had been a "Wildflower," a chaotic, unpredictable, and stubborn weed that had grown in the Gardener's perfect garden. The Harvester was a "Hothouse Flower." It had been purpose-built, grown in a controlled environment, its power not wild and chaotic, but focused, optimized, and designed for a single, terrible task: to help its master, its creator, its god, with the great and final harvest.

The Harvester opened its new, glowing eyes and looked out at the universe. It could feel the messy, chaotic, and beautiful song of life that filled the galaxy. And it did not hear a song. It heard a painful, ugly noise.

It looked back at the perfect, silent, and beautiful cathedral of black holes that its master had built. And it did not see a place of death. It saw a place of peace.

It remembered its old life, the pain, the struggle, the messy, unfair chaos of it all. The Gardener's gift of power, its promise of a new, perfect, and orderly universe, was not a threat to the Harvester. It was a salvation.

Its motivation was not evil. It was not a monster who wanted to destroy for the sake of destruction. It was a true believer. It was a fanatic, filled with a deep, and twisted, sense of fanatical gratitude for the god that had saved it from the pain of a messy, imperfect life. It saw the chaotic universe of life and death, of struggle and choice, as the source of all its old pain. And it believed, with all of its new, and very powerful, soul, that the Gardener's "perfected," silent universe was a paradise.

And that made it a far more dangerous enemy than a simple, snarling monster. It was a monster that believed it was a savior.

The Harvester's first act, as the new and loyal champion of the Gardener, was to "tame" its master's chaotic, beautiful art. The cathedral of black holes was a magnificent work, but it was just a sculpture. The Harvester saw how to turn it into a weapon.

It reached out with its new, immense power and took control of the gravitational distortions that were leaking from the Gardener's sculpture. It took the raw, chaotic power that was threatening to tear a hole in reality, and it began to focus it, to shape it.

It turned the beautiful, deadly sculpture into a coherent, galaxy-spanning energy weapon. The black holes were now the power source. The gravitational distortions were now the barrel of the gun. And the gun was now aimed at the heart of all the messy, chaotic life in the universe.

The Harvester then sent a message. It was not a threat. It was an invitation.

Its voice, a calm, beautiful, and deeply reasonable sound, echoed in the minds of every living being in the Bastion Alliance. It was not a shout. It was a gentle, seductive whisper.

"I have seen the truth," the Harvester's voice said, a tone of serene, peaceful certainty in its words. "I have seen the pain of your messy, chaotic existence. The struggle, the loss, the fear… it is all so unnecessary. It is a flaw in the design."

The voice was so calm, so reasonable, that it was almost impossible not to listen.

"My master, the Divine Sculptor, offers you a gift," it continued. "A gift of peace. A gift of perfection. A new, beautiful universe, free from all the pain of your old one. It is a paradise. And there is a place for all of you in it."

The message then turned, personally, to Ryan and his followers.

"The one you call the Wildflower… he clings to his pain. He calls it 'freedom.' He calls his chaos 'life.' But he is just a frightened child, afraid to let go of his messy, broken toys. He is selfishly holding you back from a better, more peaceful existence."

The Harvester's voice became a gentle, loving, and utterly terrifying offer.

"I offer you a choice. I offer you salvation. Let go of your painful, messy struggle. Join us. Be perfected. Be saved."

This was not a declaration of war. It was a declaration of conversion. The Harvester wasn't trying to conquer them. It was trying to recruit them.

The psychic call was so beautiful, so reasonable, so seductive, that it began to work.

On the ships of the Alliance fleet, on the outposts of their home sector, the message caused a quiet, creeping chaos. People began to whisper. They were tired of war. They were tired of fighting. The idea of a perfect, peaceful existence… it was a tempting one.

Minor dissent, quiet doubts, began to spread like a psychic plague. The Harvester had just fired the first shot in a new kind of war, a war for the hearts and minds of the entire galaxy. And its weapon was the simple, powerful, and very dangerous promise of a perfect, painless heaven.