The safe house in Sector 24 was different from their usual hideouts—cleaner, better insulated, with actual running water and electrical systems that didn’t spark when you looked at them wrong. Dawn light filtered through reinforced windows, painting everything in shades of amber and gold.

  Velira Nocturne moved toward the back room, exhaustion a dead weight on her shoulders. The blood filtration had worked, but it had taken a lot out of her. And she hadn’t fed in a long time. Her body felt hollow, drained in ways that had nothing to do with blood loss.

  “I’m taking the med tank out for a test drive,” Kass ”Riot” Vex called from the door. “See what she can do.”

  Velira paused at the threshold of the room where she would sleep, looking back. Kass was moving with that restless energy that meant she needed space to think. After everything that had happened—Marcus, the trap, the poison—Velira understood the need to process alone.

  “Have fun,” she said simply.

  Kass grinned, that familiar reckless expression that defined her.

  “Good night, you old bat.”

  The door closed with a soft click, and Velira listened to the med vehicle’s engine rumble to life outside. She stood there for a moment, surrounded by the unfamiliar quiet of a truly secure location, then finally surrendered to the pull of daylight sleep.

  ———

  Velira woke to silence.

  Not the comfortable quiet of a safe house, but the wrong kind of silence—empty, hollow, missing something essential.

  She sat up, immediately alert despite the grogginess that came with daylight waking. The light through the windows had shifted, painting the walls in deeper gold. Late afternoon, maybe early evening.

  “Kass?”

  No response.

  Velira moved through the safe house with growing unease, avoiding the light. The main room was empty, Kass’s gear still scattered where she’d left it. Her jacket hung on a chair, spare magazines lined up on the table haphazardly.

  But no Kass.

  The med vehicle was gone, which made sense—she’d said she was taking it for a test drive. But that had been hours ago. Kass might be reckless, but she wasn’t careless. She wouldn’t stay out in a stolen Red Memory vehicle too much longer than necessary.

  Velira pulled out her communicator, thumbed to Kass’s contact.

  Straight to delayed messaging.

  A cold knot formed in her stomach.

  She tried again. Same result.

  “Kass, it’s me. Call back.”

  The silence stretched, thick with implications she didn’t want to give voice to.

  Velira began to pace, mind racing through possibilities. Equipment failure. Breakdown. Maybe Kass had found something and was investigating. Maybe—

  Maybe Red Memory had found her.

  The thought hit like ice water. Velira grabbed her coat, heading for the door, then stopped.

  Where would she go? It was still daylight—an hour or more until dusk.

  For the first time in centuries, Velira felt the weight of her isolation. She was a force of nature. When she needed something, she took it. When she needed to go somewhere, she went. When she needed information…

  She’d never needed information. Not the kind that required contacts, networks, people who trusted her enough to share secrets.

  That was Kass’s world. Kass knew Skiv, had history with Marcus, connections to Jeks and the underground networks that kept the Undercity functioning. Velira was the weapon—sharp, precise, devastating—but Kass was the intelligence, the strategy, the human element that made their partnership work.

  Without Kass, Velira realized with growing horror, she was just another predator in the dark.

  She pulled out the communicator again, staring at the contacts list. Three names: Kass, Skiv, Emergency. That was it. Her entire network, her connection to the world beyond shadow and violence.

  She didn’t even know who ‘Emergency’ was—or who would answer that call.

  And she wasn’t sure Skiv would answer either.

  Panic rose in her chest—an unfamiliar sensation that she’d forgotten was possible. Not fear for her own safety, but something worse: fear of losing someone else.

  Not just a partner. Not just someone who made the work easier.

  Her connection to everything that made existence more than mere survival.

  Without Kass, Velira was exactly what she feared she was—a monster pretending to be something more.

  She had to find her. Had to get her back.

  But first, she had to figure out how to be human enough to ask for help.

  ———

  Kass woke to silence.

  Not the comfortable quiet of the safe house, but something else—familiar in a way that made her chest tight. She sat up, immediately alert despite the strange fog clouding her thoughts.

  Velira?

  But the voice that came out wasn’t calling for Velira at all.

  “Zara?”

  The name escaped her lips like a ghost, like something torn from her chest without permission. She looked around, confusion creating a haze in her mind.

  This wasn’t the safe house. This was…a different safe house.

  The old warehouse in Sector 12. Their base. The place where she’d felt safest in the world, surrounded by the only family she’d ever chosen.

  And there, sitting at the makeshift table they’d built from salvaged materials, was Zara. Dark hair pulled back in that familiar ponytail, fingers dancing over her tablet as she planned their next score. Alive. Breathing. Here.

  “You’re awake,” Zara said without looking up, her voice carrying that dry humor Kass had missed. “About time. We’ve got work to do.”

  Kass stared, her heart hammering against her ribs. “I thought… I thought you were…”

  “Dead?” Zara finally looked up, dark eyes sparkling with mischief. “Takes more than a few corporate goons to put me down, Riot. You should know that by now.”

  Riot. The name hit her hard. She hadn’t been Riot in years. Not since…

  “Zara.” The word came out broken, uncertain. “You’re really here?”

  “Where else would I be?” Zara’s expression softened, concern creeping into her features. “Hey, you okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  Why is this so familiar?

  “Ha, corporate goons. No match for Zara, the Core-Breaker!” It was weird hearing her own voice, ghosts of words she may have said.

  Zara smiled a wide, toothy grin. Except she was missing one. The front left, lost in a fist fight with a much bigger knuckleduster. Or was it the right tooth? Either way, it always made Kass smile.

  ———

  The sun was slowly setting, probably the longest sunset in the history of the world. Velira stood inside the safe house, communicator in hand, staring at Skiv’s contact information like it might bite her.

  She’d never called him directly. Had never needed to. That was always Kass—the networking, the human connections, the delicate art of asking favors from people who had every reason not to trust a vampire.

  Velira pressed the contact.

  It rang twice before Skiv’s voice crackled through, wary and professional. “Yeah?”

  “Skiv, it’s—” She paused. What was she to him? Kass’s partner? The vampire who scared his informants? Who makes him too uncomfortable to lie? “It’s Velira.”

  Silence stretched across the connection. She could almost hear him processing, probably wondering why Kass wasn’t making this call.

  “Where’s Kass?” His voice had shifted, concern bleeding through the wariness.

  “I don’t know.” The words came out harder than she’d intended. “The medical vehicle is missing. She’s not responding to communications.”

  “How long?”

  “She left at dawn. Said she was taking it for a test drive.” Velira found herself pacing, a habit she’d picked up from Kass. “That was over twelve hours ago.”

  Another pause. Then Skiv’s voice, all business: “Wait, did you say med vehicle? It had a tracker, that’s how I found it.”

  “What?”

  “Standard Red Memory protocol on high-value assets. GPS locator, encrypted transmission. I should have thought—I should have told her to sweep it for surveillance tech. I…I didn’t know she stole it.” His voice carried the weight of professional failure. “They’ve been tracking her the whole time.”

  Velira closed her eyes, feeling the room start to spin. “Where would they take her?”

  “Depends what they want. If it’s interrogation, they’ve got facilities. If it’s…” He trailed off.

  “If it’s what?”

  “If it’s what I think it is—if they want to use her to get to you—then they’ll take her somewhere secure. Somewhere they can work without interruption.”

  The room spun faster. “Find out where.”

  “I’m already on it. But Velira—” Skiv’s voice carried a note she’d never heard before. Concern. “Whatever you’re planning, don’t go in alone. Red Memory’s been preparing for you specifically. They’ll be ready.”

  “Let them be ready.”

  “That’s not—look, just give me an hour. Maybe two. Let me find out what we’re dealing with before you tear the city apart.”

  Velira stared out at the neon-washed streets below, at the familiar chaos of the Undercity’s night shift. Somewhere out there, Kass was in the hands of people who wanted to use her as bait. People who thought they could cage a vampire by threatening what she cared about.

  They were about to learn how catastrophically wrong they were. There was still an hour of daylight left.

  “One hour,” she said quietly. “Then I’m coming for her.”

  “Velira, wait—”

  She ended the call and stood in the darkened safe house, listening to the city’s pulse. Somewhere in that maze of steel and shadow, they had taken the one person who’d made her feel human. The only person she cared about in the world.

  They were going to regret it.

  But first, she had to be patient. Had to trust that Skiv could find what she needed to know.

  Had to resist the urge to burn down everything between here and Kass until she found her.

  For one hour.

  After that, all restraints were off.

  ———

  “We need to move fast,” Zara was saying, her fingers flying over the tablet’s cracked screen. “The longer they hold him, the worse this gets.”

  Kass found herself nodding, though something felt off about the conversation. Like she was watching herself participate rather than actually being there. “Right. Which facility?”

  “That’s what we need to find out.” Zara looked up, that familiar intensity burning in her dark eyes. “Your contact still reliable?”

  My contact? Kass felt a strange disconnect, like she was reaching for a memory that wasn’t quite there. But her mouth was already moving, words flowing without her conscious thought.

  “Yeah, he owes me. Let me make the call.”

  She pulled out her communicator—wait, was it my communicator? It looked different somehow, older—and scrolled through contacts that felt both familiar and strange. There: the name she was looking for.

  The call connected after two rings.

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s Riot,” she heard herself say, the name still feeling like someone else’s identity. “I need information.”

  A pause. Then: “What kind of information?”

  “Corporate holding facilities. Sector 7 area. They’ve got one of mine.”

  Another pause, longer this time. “That’s dangerous territory, Riot. You sure you want to poke that hornet’s nest?”

  “They took my family.” The words came out with a conviction that surprised her. When had she started thinking of her crew as family? “I’m getting him back.”

  “Alright, alright. Give me an hour. I’ll see what I can dig up.”

  The line went dead. Riot stared at the communicator, something nagging at the back of her mind. This conversation felt… rehearsed. Like dialogue from a play she’d forgotten she was in.

  “One hour,” she told Zara, who was already back to her tablet.

  “Good. That gives us time to plan the extraction.” Zara’s grin was sharp, lips curled back slightly. Riot blinked, looked at her again—this time Zara’s grin was goofy, front tooth missing. “Just like old times, right Riot?”

  Just like old times.

  But something about those words made Riot uneasy, but she couldn’t explain it. Because if this was like old times…

  Why did she have the terrible feeling that someone wasn’t coming home?

  ———

  The sun hung like a dying ember on the horizon, painting the Undercity’s smog in shades of orange rust. Velira stood at the safe house window, watching shadows lengthen across the streets below. Forty-three minutes since she’d called Skiv. No word back.

  Her communicator sat silent on the table, mocking her with its stillness. She’d checked it seventeen times in the last ten minutes—not that she was counting.

  But there was someone else. Someone whose location she actually knew.

  The maintenance station in Sector 8. Her suggestion. And one of the few places she could find on her own.

  Jeks.

  A nineteen-year-old ripper who looked at Kass like she’d hung the stars and probably saw Velira as a fanged nightmare. Not exactly ideal backup for infiltrating a Red Memory facility, but he was human. He had connections she didn’t. And most importantly, he owed Kass.

  The sun slipped another degree toward the horizon. Normally Velira had the patience of an immortal—but not now—now it began ripping apart. She could feel that familiar coldness creeping in, the part of her that had survived centuries by being absolutely ruthless.

  But being around Kass had taught her she wanted to be better than that. To think before she acted. To consider consequences. Kass was reckless, but not careless.

  The irony wasn’t lost on her that the very lesson she had learned from watching Kass was now the only thing standing between Red Memory and the kind of violence that urban legends were based on.

  Five more minutes, she told herself. Five more minutes for the sun to set completely, and then she was moving. With or without Skiv’s intel. With or without a plan.

  Because somewhere in this city, they had her. And every minute Velira spent being patient was another minute they had to hurt her.

  When the sun finally sank below the horizon, Velira’s world went dark in more ways than one.

  Time to collect her only remaining ally.

  ———

  Riot checked her communicator for what felt like the hundredth time, watching the display mock her with its silence. Marcus had said one hour. Seventeen minutes to go.

  That felt like an eternity when someone you cared about was rotting in a corpo holding cell.

  “He’ll call,” Zara said without looking up from her tablet, but her voice carried an edge.

  Riot resumed pacing, boots striking the warehouse floor in an irregular rhythm that matched her growing agitation. The familiar space felt wrong somehow—too quiet, too still. Like they were waiting for something terrible to happen.

  “Fuck this,” she said finally, grabbing her jacket from the back of a chair. “I’m going to get Torch. We’ll need his demo skills for this anyway.”

  “Riot, wait—” Zara started.

  “I can’t just sit here.” The words came out sharper than intended. “Every minute we waste is another minute they have to break him down, move him, or worse.” She checked Drujment’s holster, then paused. The weapon at her hip felt familiar, but something about the weight seemed… different.

  “Torch?” Zara asked. “Haven’t seen him for a while.”

  “He’s holed up in that squat behind the foundry. Ten minute walk, maybe fifteen if I avoid the main streets.” Riot headed for the door, then stopped. “If Marcus calls—”

  “You’ll be the first to know,” Zara finished. “Just… be careful out there. Something feels off about this whole thing.”

  Something feels off.

  Zara was always cautious before big jobs. That was why she was such a good planner, why Riot trusted her to coordinate their operations.

  So why did those words feel like a warning about something else entirely?

  “Always am,” Riot replied, showing a grin she didn’t feel.

  “No you’re not!” Zara shot back playfully.

  You’re right, I should be careful. “You’re right, don’t need to be, I’m Riot.” Her voice, and it sounded like something she might have said. Back in…

  “Back in twenty.”

  She stepped out into the Undercity’s neon-washed night, leaving Zara alone with her tablet and the silence of the communicator. Behind her, the warehouse felt like a tomb.

  Ahead, the foundry district beckoned with the promise of allies and action.

  But as Riot walked through streets that felt both familiar and strange, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was walking toward something she didn’t want to remember.

  ———

  The maintenance station’s ancient heating system clanked and wheezed, filling the cramped space with sounds that made Jeks jump every few minutes. He’d been on edge for hours, checking the locks, peering through the grimy windows, waiting for Red Memory to kick down the door.

  So when something actually did hit the door—three sharp, precise knocks—his heart nearly stopped.

  Kael looked up from the handheld game Kass had left in the emergency stash, his eyes wide but not afraid. The kid had nerves of steel, or maybe he’d just seen too much to be scared of normal dangers anymore.

  “Jeks.” The voice came through the reinforced metal, cold and controlled but with something underneath that made the hair on Jeks’s neck stand up. “It’s Velira.”

  Jeks hesitated, hand on the lock mechanism. The voice was right, but something about it felt… wrong. Too tight, like glass ready to shatter.

  “Open it,” Kael said quietly. “We can trust her. She saved me. And helped us.”

  Right. The pale woman who flowed like water and spoke like a spider. Jeks took a breath, then worked the locks. The door swung open.

  Velira stood in the doorway, and Jeks immediately knew something was catastrophically wrong.

  She looked the same—pale skin, dark hair, elegant features that belonged in some corporate tower rather than the Undercity’s filthy streets. But there was something in her posture, in the way her hands hung at her sides, that screamed predator, ready to strike.

  Her eyes were the worst part. Usually they were cold but controlled, like looking into deep water. Now they burned with something that made Jeks want to run, regardless of the consequences.

  “I need to find Kass.” she said, stepping into the station without invitation.

  “I… what?” Jeks stammered, still processing the wrongness radiating from her. “She’s not with you?”

  “Red Memory has her.” The words came out flat, emotionless, but Jeks could see her hands trembling slightly. “They’ve had her for hours.”

  Kael was on his feet instantly, the game forgotten. “What happened?”

  “She took the medical vehicle out this morning. It had a tracker.” Velira’s voice was getting tighter with each word. “They used it to find her.”

  “Shit,” Jeks breathed. He didn’t know what medical vehicle she was talking about, but her mannerisms were putting him on edge.

  Kael was staring at Velira with that intensity he got when he was working through a problem.

  “You need help,” Kael said simply. “To get her back.”

  “I need information,” Velira replied, eyes fixing on Jeks. “I contacted Skiv. He hasn’t given me anything yet.”

  The way she said it made Jeks’s blood run cold. Like she was explaining why she might have to start killing people until someone gave her answers.

  Velira took a step closer, and Jeks instinctively stepped back. “You know this city. You know the networks.”

  “I’m just a low-life ripper,” Jeks protested. “I don’t know—”

  “She saved my life,” Kael interrupted, looking between them. “And now she needs help.”

  “Kael—”

  “I’m coming too,” the younger boy said with quiet determination.

  “Absolutely not.” Jeks and Velira spoke simultaneously, the first thing they’d agreed on.

  “I’m not leaving him alone,” Jeks said firmly. “Not with Red Memory hunting everyone.”

  Velira was quiet for a moment, and Jeks could almost see her mind working behind those terrifying eyes.

  “Lita,” she said finally. “Skiv’s sister. She’s in hiding too, but she could watch him.”

  “You want me to trust my brother to some woman I’ve never met?”

  “Kass is out there and I need her back.” The coldness in her voice could have frozen blood.

  Kael stepped forward, placing himself between Jeks and Velira—not defensively, but like a mediator.

  “Jeks,” he said quietly. “She’s family.”

  The simple words hit. Because Kael was right. Kass and Velira had saved the only thing that meant something to Jeks. His little brother.

  They’d become family.

  And you didn’t abandon family.

  “Okay,” Jeks surrendered. “We find Skiv, we find this Lita person, and then we get Kass back.”

  Velira’s posture shifted—not relaxing, but changing from barely controlled rage to focused purpose. Still terrifying, but now aimed in a specific direction. And it wasn’t in his direction.

  She simply nodded.

  Jeks tried not to think about what they were walking into. Or what Velira might do to Red Memory when they found them.

  Because looking at her now, he was pretty sure he was about to witness something horrific.

  ———

  The squat behind the foundry was exactly as Riot remembered it—a gutted apartment building that the city had given up on decades ago. Gil “Torch” Dunha’s unit was on the third floor, marked by the smell of chemical explosives and burnt metal that followed him everywhere.

  She knocked twice, paused, then three times. Our old signal.

  The door opened to reveal Torch’s grinning face, all wild hair and manic energy contained in a wiry frame that looked like it might explode at any moment. Which, knowing Torch, was entirely possible.

  “Riot! Fucking beautiful to see you alive,” he said, pulling her into a hug that smelled like gunpowder and synthetic coffee. “Thought you might be corporate paste by now.”

  Something cold crawled up Riot’s spine. No. A whisper. Don’t drag him into this. Something’s wrong. Something’s—

  “Need your help, Torch,” she heard herself say, the words flowing out of her. “Big job. Corporate facility, heavy security.”

  Torch’s eyes lit up with that familiar gleam that meant he was already excited for the possibility of blowing something up. “Oh, this sounds like fun. What’s the target?”

  Don’t tell him! Please, just walk away!

  “One of ours got grabbed,” Riot continued, helpless to stop the words. “They’re holding him in a corpo facility. We need to punch through their defenses, fast and hard.”

  “Who’d they take?” Torch asked, already moving toward his equipment stash.

  Stop…Please stop.

  “Phoenix.”

  Her heart skipped a beat, and for a moment the warehouse seemed to shimmer around the edges. Phoenix. Sweet, brilliant Phoenix who could hack any system but couldn’t throw a punch to save his life. Phoenix, who was not much older than…someone she couldn’t quite remember…Velira? No that’s not it.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  Phoenix who made terrible jokes and always brought synth-coffee for the crew.

  Phoenix who she’d—

  “Phoenix?” Torch’s expression darkened. “Those corporate fucks. Yeah, I’m in. When do we move?”

  No, no, no. This is wrong. This is how it goes bad—

  “Soon as we get intel back,” Riot said, watching helplessly as her best demolitions expert started gathering shaped charges, detonators, and other things that went ‘boom.’ “Marcus is working on location and security layout.”

  “Marcus still reliable?” Torch asked, stuffing explosives into a tactical bag with casual disregard for basic safety.

  He’s dead. Marcus is dead. Isn’t he?

  “Solid as ever,” Riot heard herself say.

  Torch grinned that reckless grin that had gotten them out of more tight spots than she could count. “Then let’s go get our boy back.”

  Please no, don’t smile like that. Please don’t look so happy. You don’t know what’s coming. You don’t know that I’m going to—

  “Ready?” Riot asked, though the word felt like swallowing glass.

  “Born ready,” Torch replied, shouldering his bag of barely controlled destruction.

  As they left the squat together, Riot felt like she was two steps behind herself, screaming warnings that no one could hear. In the back of her mind, she knew there was no happy ending to this story.

  And there was nothing she could do to stop it.

  ———

  Velira pulled out her communicator, and Jeks noticed her hands weren’t shaking anymore. That should have been reassuring. Instead, it made his skin crawl.

  “The hour’s up,” she said simply, scrolling to Skiv’s contact info.

  Jeks exchanged a glance with Kael, who was watching Velira with that same intensity from earlier.

  The call connected after three rings.

  “Velira?” Skiv’s voice crackled through the speaker, tinged with exhaustion and stress. “Tell me you haven’t done anything stupid yet.”

  “I’m still talking to you instead of painting the walls with blood,” Velira replied, her voice deadly calm.

  “Fuck’s sake.” A pause. Then: “Okay, I’ve got something. Three possible locations where they might be holding her. Problem is, they’re all heavily fortified, and I don’t know which one—”

  “Give me the coordinates.”

  “Velira, wait. You can’t just charge in blind. These aren’t street-level thugs. Red Memory’s pulled out all the stops—military-grade security, synthetic guards, the works. You need a plan.”

  Jeks saw Velira’s expression shift. The last traces of humanity sliding away.

  “I am the plan,” she said quietly. “I need Lita to keep an eye on Kael.”

  No nonsense. No room for discussion.

  “Okay. She’s holed up in a safe house in Sector 12. I can get her to watch the kid.” Skiv didn’t dare deny her request.

  “Good. Send me everything.” Velira’s eyes found Jeks, and he suppressed a shiver. “You’re coming in case I need some help…being human.”

  The way she said it made Jeks want to find the deepest hole in the Undercity and hide in it.

  “Velira,” Skiv’s voice carried a note of genuine fear. “Whatever you’re planning, remember—Kass wouldn’t want you to become something you can’t come back from.”

  For just a moment, something flickered in Velira’s eyes. Doubt? Pain? Or the last echo of the person she’d been an hour ago.

  Then it was gone.

  “She isn’t here to stop me,” her jaw clenched, ending the call.

  The silence that followed felt like a dream, right before it goes full nightmare. Jeks looked at his brother, who was still watching Velira with that unsettling focus.

  “You should stay with Lita,” Jeks told Kael quietly.

  “I know,” Kael replied. “But I want you to bring her back.”

  “I will,” Jeks said, not sure if Kael meant Kass, Velira, or both.

  Velira was already moving toward the door, her movements screamed barely contained, absolute violence.

  Both their communicators pinged. Skiv had sent the coordinates.

  “Take Kael to Lita, I’m going to the…” she checked her communicator. “Checkpoint facility in Sector 8. Meet me there when you’re done, but stay back.”

  As the door closed behind her, Jeks knew he was going to be witness to something that would give him nightmares for the rest of his life.

  Assuming he survived it.

  ———

  Back at the warehouse, Zara looked up from her tablet as Riot and Torch entered, the demolitions expert already buzzing with excitement about the upcoming job.

  “Marcus call yet?” Riot asked, though Kass already already knew the answer.

  “Ten minutes ago,” Zara replied, her expression grim. “Got the location. Sector 15, processing facility. Heavy security, but he thinks there’s a weakness in the eastern perimeter.”

  NO! That’s where it’s waiting! That’s where—

  “Perfect,” Riot said, moving to the tactical display with confident strides. “What’s the layout?”

  Torch peered over her shoulder as Zara brought up the facility schematics, his eyes already selecting blast points and structural weaknesses.

  “Here,” Zara pointed to a maintenance shaft on the eastern side. “Marcus says the sensor grid has a blind spot. We can get close without triggering alarms.”

  You have to listen, it’s a trap—

  “Smart,” Riot nodded approvingly, that familiar tactical calm settling over her like a second skin. “How many guards?”

  “Dozen, maybe more. But if we hit fast and hard, we can be in and out before they coordinate a response.”

  You won’t make it!

  Torch grinned, patting his bag of explosives. “I can make sure they’re too busy with other problems to worry about coordination.”

  Please don’t smile like that. Please, God, just walk away. All of you, just walk away.

  But Riot was already in full planning mode, the legendary confidence that had made her a symbol of rebellion in the Undercity radiating from every gesture.

  “Phoenix is probably being held in the security wing, here,” she said, pointing to the facility’s center. “We go in through the maintenance shaft, Torch clears us a path with directed charges, I handle any guards, and Zara coordinates extraction.”

  “What about backup?” Zara asked. “If things go sideways—”

  “They won’t,” Riot said with absolute certainty. “But just in case, Nico and Juno will hook up with us on the way. Besides, we’re better than Corpo goons. Always have been.”

  No no no, don’t bring them into this! They know…Red Memory knows everything—

  The confidence in Riot’s voice was unshakeable, the kind of calm assurance that had gotten them through impossible odds before. The crew looked at her and saw their invincible leader, the woman who’d never led them wrong.

  But I did. I did lead them wrong. I failed them.

  “When do we move?” Torch asked, already checking his equipment.

  “Now,” Riot decided. “Let’s not keep Phoenix waiting.”

  Zara and Torch nodded, grabbing their gear. They trusted her completely, believed in her completely.

  Stop believing in me. Please. Please…

  And as Riot watched her crew prepare for what Kass knew would be their final mission, she could do nothing but watch in helpless horror as history repeated itself, word for terrible word.

  The trap was closing, and she was leading them right into it.

  Again.

  ———

  The abandoned checkpoint facility in Sector 8 loomed in the industrial district like a ferrocrete tomb, all harsh angles and reinforced walls. No windows on the ground level, just security cameras and the kind of lighting that made everything look sick.

  Jeks crouched behind a shipping container, studying the approach. He’d dropped Kael off with Lita as fast as he could, but Velira’s impatience meant she was already here somewhere. Now he was alone, staring at a building that screamed danger from every surface.

  The main entrance should have been crawling with guards. Instead, it stood open, emergency lighting casting everything in violent red. No movement. No sound except the distant hum of generators.

  That wasn’t right.

  Jeks pulled out his communicator, tried Velira’s frequency. Static. Then tried Skiv. Same.

  The silence pressed against his eardrums. Even the normal sounds of the industrial district seemed muted, as if the facility was swallowing noise.

  He moved closer, keeping to the shadows between stacked containers and rusted machinery. The closer he got, the more wrong everything felt. The security cameras hung at odd angles, some sparking intermittently. The reinforced door—the kind that should require explosives to breach—stood ajar.

  Through the gap, more red emergency lighting leaked out like blood.

  Jeks reached the entrance and peered inside. A reception area that had probably once looked corporate and intimidating now looked like a disaster zone. Furniture overturned. Papers scattered across the floor. And on the sterile white walls…

  Dark stains that looked suspiciously like splatter. Mishapened lumps on the ground that looked suspiciously like bodies.

  And more eerie silence.

  His instincts screamed at him to run. This was a crime scene. A fresh one. And he was walking into it alone, armed with only a small caliber pistol and whatever courage he could scrape together.

  But Kass could be somewhere in this nightmare. And Velira…

  Velira was the nightmare.

  Jeks stepped through the doorway, boots crunching on broken glass. The lighting cast shadows that shifted at the edge of his vision. Ahead, a corridor stretched into darkness, lined with doors that hung open like dead mouths.

  The air smelled of ozone and iron, it made his stomach turn.

  Somewhere in the distance, a sound echoed through the facility—like metal being torn apart. God, he hoped it was metal…

  Jeks started forward, deeper into the red-lit maze, following the signs of destruction toward whatever monster was down there.

  ———

  The processing facility loomed against the night sky like a ferrocrete tomb, all clean lines and efficient brutality. Security lights swept the perimeter in steady patterns.

  Riot crouched behind a shipping container, studying the approach. Everything exactly as Marcus had described.

  No no no, don’t go in there. Turn around. Please.

  But Riot was already in full tactical mode, hand signals directing her crew into position. Zara melted into the shadows to the north, Torch disappeared toward the eastern perimeter with his bag of carefully controlled destruction. Nico and Juno flanked wide, their movements coordinated and in sync.

  They were beautiful to watch—her crew operating like a machine built from trust and shared purpose.

  They’re going to die. All of them. Because of me.

  “Maintenance shaft, just like Marcus said,” Riot whispered into her comm, studying the facility’s eastern wall through her scope. “Sensor grid’s got a blind spot right where he indicated.”

  “Copy that,” Zara’s voice crackled back. “I’ve got eyes on two guards, patrol route’s exactly as advertised.”

  It’s perfect. It’s all too perfect.

  Riot moved forward, leading from the front like she always did. The maintenance shaft access was exactly where it should be, the security sensors positioned just as Marcus had described. Even the timing felt rehearsed, like they were moving through a performance they’d practiced a hundred times.

  Because I have. Because this is exactly how it happened before.

  “Torch, you in position?” Riot’s voice was calm, confident. The voice of someone who’d never failed her crew, who’d led them through impossible odds time and again.

  “Born ready,” came the reply, that familiar grin audible even through the comm static.

  No. Please. I can’t do this again.

  Riot reached the maintenance shaft, fingers working the access panel with practiced ease. The lock disengaged with a soft click—too easy, too clean. Inside, the tunnel stretched away into darkness that seemed to swallow her tactical light.

  “We’re in,” she reported. “Moving to breach point alpha.”

  Her crew acknowledged, their voices steady. They trusted her completely. They were moving into position exactly as planned, exactly as she’d directed them.

  Exactly as I led them into the trap.

  And as Riot crawled through the maintenance tunnel toward what Kass knew would be their death, she could only scream silently from the prison of her own memory, watching her family walk into hell one last time.

  The processing center waited ahead, the monster was down there, patient as a spider in its web.

  ———

  Jeks walked into a nightmare, painted in death.

  Bodies lay scattered like broken dolls, Red Memory operatives twisted into positions that human anatomy shouldn’t allow. The walls were decorated with dark splatter in the emergency lighting. Some of the corpses were missing pieces—arms torn clean off, heads missing, legs at impossible angles.

  Jeks had seen violence before. Street fights, gang executions, even corpo clean-up jobs. But this wasn’t violence. This was brutality.

  He stepped carefully around an enforcer whose chest had been torn open, trying not to look too closely at what used to be inside. His boots stuck slightly to the floor with each step.

  Where the hell is Velira?

  More importantly, where was Kass?

  If she wasn’t here, there were two more facilities on Velira’s communicator…

  The facility was a maze of corridors and offices, all bearing the same signature of bloody efficiency. Velira had moved through the building like a force of nature. No movement, no survivors.

  Jeks found what looked like a security station, its monitors still lit. On the desk was a small device—a military-grade communications disruptor, still humming with power. Red Memory’s attempt to interrupt any attack plan. It didn’t help them at all.

  He switched it off.

  His communicator immediately crackled to life.

  “Jeks? Jeks, where the hell are you?” Skiv’s voice was tight with panic.

  “I’m in the checkpoint facility,” Jeks whispered, not wanting to disturb whatever might still be lurking in the darkness. “Skiv, it’s… it’s bad. Everyone’s dead. I can’t find Velira or Kass.”

  Silence for a moment. Then: “Can you find any intel?”

  “Maybe,” Jeks moved to the main computer terminal, noting how the screen was cracked but still functional. “What am I looking for?”

  “Anything. Data cards, file transfers, security logs. Anything that can link us to Kass and her location.” Skiv’s voice carried the weight of someone trying to stay professional while the world burned around him. “Can you access their system? I can get in remotely if you can.”

  Jeks studied the computer interface. Whoever was working at this station didn’t bother to log out before…

  “Give me a minute.”

  He patched Skiv in, then started looking for more intel.

  He searched, gathering data cards, datacores, anything and everything. As he stepped over corpses and tried not to think about what kind of creature could do this to trained soldiers, one thought kept circling through his mind like a vulture:

  If this was what Velira did to find Kass, what would she do to the people who actually had her?

  The computer beeped softly as Skiv gained access to the facility’s records. Time to find out where this nightmare was really headed.

  ———

  Riot walked into a nightmare.

  The processing center wasn’t a rescue operation—it was a slaughterhouse. Bodies lay scattered across the sterile white floor, her crew twisted into positions that human anatomy shouldn’t allow. Zara’s lifeless eyes stared at nothing. Torch’s bag of explosives lay spilled beside him, unused, his grin frozen in eternal silence.

  No no no not again—

  The cells stood empty except for one. Phoenix lay on the floor like a broken doll, dark hair matted with blood, that grateful smile finally gone.

  I killed them. I led them here to die.

  “Kassandra Vex.”

  The voice came from behind her—smooth, cultured, with an undertone that made Riot’s skin crawl. She spun around to find a figure standing in the doorway, tall and pale, something that had never been fully human.

  Synthetic vampire. Just like the stories whispered in the Undercity’s darkest corners.

  This is him. This is the one who—

  “The infamous Riot,” the synth continued, stepping into the light. His face was sharp angles, red eyes that reflected the facility’s harsh lighting. “Leader of the resistance. Symbol of hope for the downtrodden.”

  He gestured casually at the bodies scattered around them.

  “How does it feel to watch your legend die?”

  Riot’s hand moved to her weapon, but she already knew it was too late. Had been too late from the moment they’d entered the maintenance shaft.

  Just like before. Just like it always happens.

  “They trusted you completely,” the synth observed, circling her, sizing her up. “Right up until the end. Even when they realized it was a trap, they kept fighting. Kept believing you’d save them.”

  Was it his voice, or hers?

  Stop. Please stop.

  “But you can’t save anyone, can you?” His smile revealed fangs like polished ivory. “You’re just a street punk playing at revolution. And now your family is dead because of your arrogance.”

  The processing center’s lights flickered, casting everything in twisted shadows. Around them, the bodies of everyone Riot had ever cared about lay cooling in their own blood.

  This is how it ends. This is how it always ends.

  The synth raised his hand, unsheathing claws like surgical instruments.

  “Time to die.”

  ———

  Jeks made it to the next facility just in time…

  In time to see something that had once been Velira as she moved toward the operatives with deadly purpose.

  Jeks crouched behind a concrete barrier, watching this dance of violence, as she moved through Red Memory operatives like death. She flowed between gunfire with inhuman agility, bullets sparking off walls where she’d been a heartbeat before.

  This wasn’t the controlled predator he’d seen before. This was something primal unleashed.

  A Red Memory soldier raised his rifle, finger tightening on the trigger. Velira appeared behind him before the muzzle flash faded, her hand punching through his armor like it was nothing. She lifted him off his feet, held him there for a moment as his legs kicked uselessly, then tossed him aside like garbage.

  “Fuck me,” he whispered.

  Another operative tried to run. Velira caught him in stride, moving faster than anything had a right to. Jeks heard bones snap from fifty meters away.

  “Fall back! Fall back!” someone screamed over the facility’s comm system.

  But there was nowhere to fall back to. Velira had already cut off their escape routes with methodical precision. This was more than rage—this was extermination.

  A team of five soldiers took cover behind an overturned vehicle, coordinating their fire. Professional, disciplined, exactly the kind of tactics that should work against a single target.

  Velira vaulted over their barricade, landing in their midst like a bomb. What followed wasn’t a fight—it was butchery. Jeks caught glimpses through the chaos: a head separated from shoulders, arms torn away, someone thrown hard enough to crack the reinforced wall behind them.

  When the screaming stopped, she stood alone among the bodies, pale and perfect, remorseless and utterly covered in gore.

  That’s not Velira anymore. That’s something wearing her face.

  She turned toward the facility’s main entrance, and for a moment Jeks thought she might have sensed him watching. But she simply continued into the building, following some instinct or scent that would lead her to more targets.

  More Red Memory operatives to kill in her search for Kass.

  Jeks pulled out his communicator with shaking hands.

  “Skiv,” he whispered. “She’s… she’s lost it. Completely lost it.”

  “How bad?”

  Jeks looked at the scattered bodies, at the walls painted with fury unrestrained, at the woman who’d saved his brother walking deeper into the facility like an angel of death.

  “I don’t think she’s coming back from this.”

  ———

  The synth moved toward Riot slowly. She raised her weapon, knowing it was useless, knowing this was how it ended.

  Then the processing center’s side door exploded inward.

  “Riot!”

  Nico and Juno burst through the breach, weapons blazing. Hope flared in Riot’s chest, or was it terror—her crew, her family, come to save her just like they always did.

  No. Please. Not them too.

  The synth turned with inhuman speed, amused rather than concerned.

  “More toys to break.”

  Nico opened fire, armor-piercing rounds stitching across the synth’s chest. The bullets penetrated pale skin, gaping holes that closed almost instantly. The creature didn’t even stagger.

  “What the fuck—” Nico started.

  The synth crossed the distance between them in a blur. His claws found Nico’s throat, lifting her off her feet with casual strength. She clawed at his grip, boots kicking uselessly.

  “Run!” Juno screamed, grabbing Riot’s arm. “We have to—”

  The synth’s other hand punched through Nico’s chest with a wet sound that would echo in Kass’s nightmares forever. Blood spilled from her mouth as her eyes went wide with shock and pain.

  Oh God, no…

  “Interesting,” the synth mused, holding Nico’s dying body like a specimen. “So warm.”

  Juno shoved Riot into an open maintenance shaft, where she fell to her back, his face a mask of desperate determination. “Go! Get out of here!”

  “I’m not leaving you—”

  “You fucking are!” Juno slapped a magnetic charge against the corridor wall, the device beeping as it armed. “Someone has to—“

  He was ripped away from the shaft’s opening.

  “Juno, no!” Riot screamed, desperately trying to get to her feet.

  The magnetic charge detonated, sealing the maintenance shaft with twisted metal and concrete. The explosion’s echo rang in her ears, mixing with the sounds of violence from the other side—Juno’s defiant shouts, the synth’s amused laughter, then terrible silence.

  Riot pressed her face against the sealed entrance, sobbing, screaming, begging.

  “Please! Please, let me out! JUNO!”

  But there was no answer. Just the weight of rock and metal between her and the family she’d failed to save.

  They died for me. They all died for me.

  In the darkness of the maintenance shaft, surrounded by the ghosts of everyone she’d loved, Riot finally understood the true cost of being a legend.

  Everyone else pays the price.

  I’m not coming back from this.

  ———

  Jeks’s communicator crackled to life as he watched Velira disappear deeper into the facility.

  “Jeks, you there?” Skiv’s voice was tight.

  “Yeah, I’m here. Still no sign of Kass, and Velira’s…” He searched for words. “She’s gone full monster mode, Skiv. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  “I still don’t have a location on Kass, but whatever Red Memory’s doing, they’re specifically trying to draw Velira out. Make her lose control.”

  Jeks watched another Red Memory operative flee screaming from a side entrance. “Well, it’s working.”

  “Too well. Listen to me—you need to bring her back. She’s too far.”

  “Bring her back? She’s not exactly listening to reason right now.”

  “You have to try. If she stays like this, even if we find Kass, Velira might not be able to come back from what she’s becoming.” Skiv’s voice carried genuine fear. “And Kass… Kass is going to need Velira, not a monster.”

  ———-

  “Bring her back…too far.”

  Kass was floating, or it felt like it. Not sure where she was. Who she was.

  Riot is dead.

  And Kass wanted to die with her. But something made her want to stay.

  She heard voices.

  “I am.” Female voice. Lithe. Deadly.

  More distorted, mumbled words. She did hear things like “no survivors” “bloodbath” “lost contact with”…

  Then closer—smooth, cultured, with an undertone that made Kass’s skin crawl. A voice dragged back from her nightmare.

  “Might as well tell her where we are. I’ll handle her myself. Dose her again, but not as much this time. We want the Wraith, not some petty rebel’s childhood drama.”

  ———

  Jeks swallowed hard, looking at the facility where inhuman violence was still echoing from within. “How the hell am I supposed to—”

  His communicator cut to static.

  Through the shattered windows, he could see Velira moving with terrifying purpose toward whatever was left of Red Memory’s forces. Each step took her further away from the person who’d saved his brother.

  Further away from the person Kass would need.

  Shit.

  Jeks started moving toward the facility entrance, trying not to think about what he was walking into.

  Time to see if the kid who’d looked up to Riot his whole life could talk her monster girlfriend back from the edge.

  Jeks found her in what used to be the facility’s command center, standing motionless among scattered bodies. Blood painted the walls in haphazard patterns, the air thick with the smell of death.

  She looked like a statue carved from pale marble, perfect and terrible and utterly still. Eyes black, hands curled into bloody claws, cold rage twisted her face.

  “Velira.”

  She didn’t turn. Didn’t acknowledge his presence. Just stood there, staring at nothing, her claws dripping crimson onto the floor.

  “Velira, we need to go.”

  Still nothing. Like she’d retreated so far into whatever predatory space she occupied that words couldn’t reach her.

  Jeks stepped closer, boots crunching and sticky. “Kass needs you.”

  A flicker. Almost imperceptible, but her head tilted slightly.

  “She needs you to be Velira. Not… this.” He gestured at the carnage around them. “Not whatever this is.”

  “They took her.” Her voice rasped, barely a whisper, but it made the hair on his neck stand up. “They took what’s mine.”

  “I know. And we’re going to get her back. But she’s going to need her Velira when we do, not a monster.”

  Velira finally turned to look at him, and Jeks had to force himself not to step back. Her eyes held depths of ancient rage that belonged in nightmares, not on a person’s face.

  “You don’t understand what they’ve done.”

  “Yeah, I do.” Jeks’s voice shook, scared shitless, but he pressed on. “They hurt someone you care about. Just like they hurt Kael. Just like they hurt everyone in this fucking city.”

  Her expression softened, ever so slightly.

  “But you saved my brother,” Jeks stepped forward. “You helped me. And you did it without becoming this… thing. Kass is going to need that person. The one who saves people, not the one who just kills them. She’s going to need Velira.”

  “I am not Velira anymore.”

  “Bullshit.” The word came out harder than he’d intended. “You think Kass never fell apart when her crew died? You think she never became something she hated? But she came back from it. She found a way to be human again.”

  “She had others. She had connections. I have nothing.”

  “You have her,” Jeks said softly, holding that terrifying gaze. “And right now, she needs you to remember that.”

  For a long moment, Velira stared at him with those terrible eyes.

  “Where is she?”

  “We’re working on it. But Velira—when we find her, she can’t see you like this. She can’t see what you became.”

  Velira looked down at her blood-covered hands, at the destruction she’d wrought.

  “It may be too late for that.”

  “No,” Jeks said firmly. “It’s not. Because you’re still listening to me. That’s still Velira in there.”

  She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again, they were green instead of black. Still dangerous, still predatory, but recognizably the person who’d saved his brother.

  She simply nodded.

  Jeks’s communicator exploded with static, then Skiv’s excited voice: “Jeks! I found her! Old medical facility, Sector 18! Get Velira and get there now!”

  Velira was already moving toward the exit, her movements fluid with purpose instead of fury.

  “We go,” she hissed.

  And for the first time since this nightmare began, Jeks believed they might actually save her.

  ———

  Kass was swimming up, towards light. The world around her a dark, dense fog. Full of ghosts. Full of voices. Most unfamiliar, but one was from her nightmares.

  “…true vampire? Like from the old-world myths? Highly doubtful.”

  Female voice “She believes it, Apex. Whether true or not.”

  Kass opened her eyes. Light, too bright to look at.

  She didn’t move.

  Nightmare voice, the one called Apex, “I am one of the first. There were three of us made originally. All males. She was definitely made later.”

  Female voice, “That’s the only details she gave me.”

  Kass’s eyes focused, and she was in an entirely different nightmare. She could barely move, but she recognized both speakers. The female, she was the synth that escaped the Aegis Fold Containment facility. The other was the synth she just watched tear her crew apart…again.

  “She’s awake.” Apex said.

  Kass still couldn’t move, couldn’t talk. Could only watch, frozen. Trapped.

  “Just in time. I’m about to turn your girlfriend into my own private army.” He smirked. Looked to the female.

  “Put her back under, find out what ever you can. Once I engage the Wraith, she will be useless. Kill her.”

  “It won’t be a fight.” The female said. “It will be an execution.”

  He laughed, like he did the first time Kass saw him. “You know me so well.”

  Kass slipped back into the murky darkness, the echos of Riot dragging her back under.

  ———

  The medical facility squatted against the Sector 18 skyline like a cancer on the city’s flesh. Three stories of reinforced ferrocrete and broken promises, windows dark.

  Velira crouched behind a concrete barrier, studying the approach, caked in dried blood. Jeks knelt beside her, weapon ready but clearly out of his depth. This wasn’t street-level violence—this was war.

  “Main entrance is reinforced,” Velira said quietly. “Side loading dock looks promising, but they’ll have it covered. Service tunnel access on the north wall—that’s our best entry point. Minimal exposure, direct route to the interior levels.”

  She pointed to specific locations as she spoke, mapping out approach vectors and fallback positions with tactical efficiency.

  “Security cameras are still active, but the patterns suggest automated systems rather than live monitoring. We can move during the sweep intervals, stay in the blind spots.” Her green eyes tracked the facility’s defenses. “Guard positions are likely concentrated around wherever they’re holding—”

  The facility’s main door opened.

  Velira’s assessment died mid-sentence as a figure stepped into the harsh, unnatural light. Tall, pale, moving with a fluidity that had never known weakness. The exo-armor he wore wasn’t the brutal tank-like plating that Red Druj had favored—this was sleek death, form-fitted mesh rippled like synthetic muscle. .

  “Or I can just ask him.”

  She stood, stepping out from behind cover with casual confidence. “Jeks, stay back.”

  “But—”

  “This is out of your league.” She didn’t look at him, her attention fixed entirely on the figure who’d emerged. “Way out of your league.”

  Jeks swallowed hard, recognizing the absolute certainty in her voice. This wasn’t a suggestion—it was an order from someone who knew exactly what was about to unfold.

  “Yeah,” he said quietly, making no move to follow. “Yeah, I know.”

  Velira walked toward the facility entrance, each step deliberate and unhurried. Across the open ground, the armored synth waited patiently.

  Time for the reckoning.

  ——

  They met in the space between the concrete barriers and the facility entrance, two predators sizing each other up.

  “The Wraith,” the armored synth said, his voice carrying a smooth cultured tone that also made her skin crawl. “I was expecting someone more… impressive.”

  “Disappointed?” Velira replied, circling him.

  “Mildly.” He rolled his shoulders, the exo-armor’s servos whirring softly. “I’ve killed dozens of your kind. You’re all the same—fast, strong, predictable. Recognize this?” He patted Drujment, holstered at his hip. “She didn’t even get the chance to draw it on me.”

  They moved at the same time.

  The synth was faster than Red Druj had been, his sleek armor enhancing rather than hindering his synthetic speed. But Velira flowed around his strikes like water, centuries of experience reading in every dodge and counter.

  His armored fist whistled past her head. Her elbow found the gap between his chest and shoulder plates, drawing a grunt of pain. They separated, circled, engaged again.

  “You fight well,” he admitted, blocking a strike that would have shattered human bones. “But you’re still just another synthetic imitation of me.”

  Velira said nothing, studying his armor’s weak points.

  The synth laughed, pressing his attack. “Did you know I killed your little girlfriend’s previous crew? Bunch of pretend revolutionaries who thought they mattered. They screamed beautifully.”

  Anger flickered in Velira’s expression, but she remained focused.

  “And now she’s dead too,” he continued, landing a solid hit that sent her staggering. “Bled out in her cell while you were stumbling around in the dark, killing weak humans. All this violence for nothing.”

  That was the breaking point.

  Velira’s control shattered like glass. She moved with inhuman fury, no longer fighting tactically but with pure, ancient rage. Her hands found his helmet, claws digging into the armored seams.

  “Impossible—” he started.

  She tore the helmet away, taking part of his ear with it in a spray of black blood.

  The synth roared, kicking her with enough force to send her flying across the facility’s entrance plaza. She hit the ferrocrete hard, rolled, came up smirking.

  He threw back his head and laughed, touching the ruin of his ear. “Superior synthetic engineering. I told you this wouldn’t be much of a fight.” The synth reached for Drujment in his holster, confidence radiating from every movement. Velira rose slowly, wiping blood from her lips.

  His hand closed on empty air…

  “You were right,” she said quietly, her voice carrying deadly calm. “This wasn’t much of a fight.”

  His expression shifted from triumph to confusion as Velira raised the heavy pistol, silver-tipped ammunition gleaming in the chamber.

  “Now…” She paused, remembering something important. “Boom time, ass-face.”

  Drujment’s roar echoed across Sector 18, followed by a wet impact as the synths brains painted the facility wall.

  When the echoes faded, Velira stood alone in the plaza, holding the smoking weapon that belonged to Kass. Behind his concrete barrier, Jeks realized he’d been holding his breath for the entire fight.

  “Holy shit,” he whispered.

  ———

  Velira moved through the medical facility in a panic, her footsteps audible on the sterile floors. Black and red blood still painted her pale skin, a reminder of justice…or vengeance. But the victory felt hollow, poisoned by his final taunt.

  She’s already dead.

  He seemed confident in his words. She hoped he was lying.

  Room after room yielded nothing but empty medical equipment and the lingering smell of fear. Each door she opened felt like another nail in the coffin of hope she carried.

  Then she found the room.

  Restraints hung loose from a surgical bed, IV lines disconnected and leaking fluid on the floor.

  And there, slumped against the far wall where she’d dragged herself, was Kass.

  Alive.

  Breathing.

  Eyes fluttering open as Velira approached.

  “Velira?” Kass’s voice was thick with confusion, but it was the most beautiful sound Velira had ever heard. “Are you…are you real?”

  Velira dropped to her knees beside her, hands hovering just short of touching, afraid that contact might shatter this impossible moment. “You’re alive,” she whispered, the words carrying the weight of every prayer she’d whispered, every life she’d just taken.

  “You look like hell,” Kass said, looking at her with heavy lidded eyes.

  Velira broke—half laugh, half sob—every emotion erupting at once. “And you look…perfect.”

  Kass reached out with a shaking hand, brushing against Velira’s cheek. Her fingers came away bloody, but she didn’t seem to care.

  “You’re covered in blood.”

  “Not mine.”

  “Good.” Kass tried to smile, though her eyes were still glazed. “Did you kill him? The one with the voice?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good,” Kass repeated, leaning heavily against the wall. “He killed them all. Phoenix, Torch, Zara, Nico, Juno… all of them.”

  Velira could hear the heartbreak in each of those names, the ghosts that had haunted Kass for years. “I know. He told me.”

  “And now he’s dead.”

  “Very dead. Drujment silenced him forever.”

  Kass smiled weakly.

  They sat in silence for a moment, both processing the fact that they were alive and together, when everything had seemed lost.

  “Can you walk?” Velira asked finally.

  Kass struggled, “I don’t think so. Everything’s… buzzing. I feel like blasting jelly.”

  “We need to leave. Jeks is waiting outside.”

  “Jeks?” Kass blinked. “What’s Jeks doing here?”

  “Being brave,” Velira picked Kass up gently. “And…Helping me remember who I am.”

  As they moved slowly through the facility’s corridors, Kass leaning heavily into Velira’s strength, neither of them spoke about what came next.

  For now, it was enough to be alive.

  To have survived another night in a city that would tear you apart. Even if you were the one tearing.