A Bite-Sized Hero

Before reading this vision, it is worth remembering that Entity is a creature that speaks in opposites and lies. A deeper analysis of her claims in this vision can be found in Mantle of the Shepherd.
Your eyes open to the Lands of Dreams, and you find yourselves in free fall. A hand encompasses your entire torso, and as you dive towards the ground, you try desperately to turn your back, and fail. The camera snaps from a first-person view, and we see Cornelius slam into a pool of dark water, pushed down by a pale hand.
Helen: “It is never this way. The Shepherd and her Sheep. A mantle held by few, passed down from man to man.”
Cornelius bites into the hand, releasing blood into the water, but to no effect. The hand pushes deeper, and he begins changing shape - a cube, a sphere, a pyramid. The hand holds firm.
Helen: “Never is the Shepherd in the limelight, but there is nothing more to her story.”
Cornelius’ body hits the bottom of the pool, and as he turns to look back, air bubbles release from his lungs as his howls in terror. Bones. A sea of bones, left behind by his brothers and sisters. The ones who failed.
Helen: “Many Shepherds rise to immortality, and some fall. I ask you, dear Dreamers, is it her strength that keeps a wind in her wings? Her wit? Her power? Yes. Never is it in the strength of the Sheep.”
Cornelius bites again, form twisting wildly, and then a moment of bestial rage. An iron spike pierces through the hand, and the squirrel swims free. The camera view shifts to the side of a pool. One cast in concrete… The Core. For a moment, silence. Then bubbles. Then blood. With a gasp, a blue paw erupts from the surface of the water, and Cornelius climbs out, his little form hacking. Helen emerges not far behind him, nursing a bleeding hand. This time, instead of speaking directly to you, her voice seems to come from the vision itself.
Helen: “What do you think?”
The camera pans up and away, pointing to a man that Isra recognizes. An elderly Android, his face wrought with augmentations, but those steely blue eyes are the same… Cromwell.
Cromwell: “He’ll do.” We fade again, and land atop Cromwell’s shoulder. Isra lies on an altar surrounded by whirring gears, the light of her nanites gone dark. Carefully, Cromwell nestles Cornelius into her arms, and then retreats.
Cromwell: “Wake her up.”
A shadow falls over Isra, and from behind the wall of gears, two enormous eyes light up the chamber - one amber and sickly, the other a silvery white.
Helen: “Vessel full, and soul undying, cease your dance and endless crying. Screaming now into your heart, I reach to frost and pull a spark. Fulcrum. Wall. Despair. Fleet. Rise for me now! Shepherd. Sheep.”
The gears around Isra glow, and Cornelius rises from her arms, his eyes wide with fear and wonder. Suddenly, the dead nanites on her body explode in that same light, and the Android’s eyes snap open.
Cromwell: “Welcome, child. What is your name?”
Isra: “Isra.”