There was no Ursula.
There never had been.
They had given her a name and a gender, spoken of her as if she was human, but that was nothing more than a way for their tiny, pathetic human brains to try to cope with the concept, with the simple idea of a collective consciousness.
All that existed was a vague sort of awareness, he realised that now. A glimmering of life. A basic understanding without purpose or reason.
Without a soul.
It was aware of him. He knew that too.
He felt its fear roll over him; he felt it recoil from him and then lash out at him with needle-like fingers of the purest poison.
But he was beyond that now. The fury and power of its attack were no more than the outflung hand of an infant, an instinctive defensive reaction from an embryonic being.
He accepted its fear, and he took its fear and there was fear no more.
Then he moved towards it, and without fear it accepted him, it embraced him and then it was gone, and there was only him.
That had once been called Sam.