The medical tent buzzed. Not just with machines this time, but with tension thicker than the antiseptic smell. Leo lay back on a cot, the ghostly trails in his vision a little less smudged. ⌈ SANITY: 3% ⌋ The number had crept up. Barely. The desperate fight, the need to protect Mia, the sheer focus required to throw that drone... it hadn't broken him. It had scraped away some of the suffocating fog. He felt raw, scraped thin, but present.
Mia sat beside him, looking pale but fierce. Her hands rested in her lap, faint white light still shimmering around her fingertips like dying embers. The medics had checked her – exhaustion, minor strain, but no permanent damage from pushing her power so hard.
The tent flap slammed open. Commander Vance stormed in, Sergeant Brennan a grim shadow behind him. Vance's face was like thunder. He ignored Leo completely, his furious gaze pinning Mia.
"Explain," Vance demanded, his voice dangerously low. "The Agents. The drones. Your... light show."
Mia met his gaze, her chin lifted. "They came for us. The drones cut through the door. The Agents followed. They were going to take us. Leo distracted them. I... I stopped them." Her voice wavered slightly but held firm. "I protected us."
"Protected?" Vance scoffed, pacing. "You unleashed an unknown energy blast inside Bastion! You damaged infrastructure! You took down two System Enforcers!" He stopped, leaning close. "Do you have any idea what that means? You've painted the biggest target imaginable on this settlement! They won't send drones next time, Chen. They'll send an army! Or something worse!"
"The Agents were already inside, Commander," Brennan spoke up, his voice level. "Before the drones even hit the outer shield. My guess? They slipped in during the chaos of the Fracture collapse or earlier. They were hunting them regardless. Mia stopped them from taking two high-value anomalies. That bought us time."
Vance whirled on Brennan. "Time? For what? To wait for the hammer to fall? Her power is volatile! Uncontrolled! It attracts them like a beacon!"
"It's defensive," Mia insisted, clenching her fists. The white light flared slightly. "It only hurts things that try to hurt us!"
"And what defines 'hurt', girl?" Vance snapped. "A perceived threat? A loud noise? Commander Vance giving an order you don't like?" He pointed a finger at her. "That power is a weapon. A dangerous one. And it needs to be controlled. Now."
He turned back to Leo, his eyes cold. "And you. Still clinging to the edge. Did you use your... glitch?"
Leo shook his head slowly. "No. Just... threw a broken drone." His voice was rough but clear. "Mia lit it up."
Vance studied him, suspicion warring with grudging assessment. "Hmph. So the broken tool found a different use. For now." He straightened, addressing both of them, his tone shifting to cold command. "Effective immediately: Mia Chen, you are reassigned. No more Research division. You report directly to Sergeant Brennan for combat training and power conditioning."
Mia's eyes widened. "Combat training?"
"You have a weapon," Vance stated flatly. "You need to learn to use it. Safely. Effectively. Brennan will teach you control. How to summon it without exhausting yourself. How to aim it. How not to bring the roof down." He glanced at Brennan. "Keep her isolated. Training ground Beta. Minimal contact."
Brennan nodded. "Understood, Commander."
"Leo Chen," Vance continued, his gaze like ice. "You remain confined to quarters. Medically supervised rest. No visitors except Mia, under Brennan's escort. You do nothing. You think nothing strenuous. Your only job is not to shatter completely. If your Sanity drops below 3%, you get sedated. Permanently, if necessary. Am I clear?"
Leo met Vance's eyes. The threat was real. But so was the logic. He nodded. "Clear."
"Good." Vance turned to leave, then paused. "The artifact. The fragment. It wasn't found in the hut debris. Any idea where it went?" His eyes scanned both siblings, then lingered on Brennan.
Leo shook his head. Mia did the same, looking genuinely confused. "It was lost in the cave-in, wasn't it?" she asked.
Vance's gaze fixed on Brennan. "Sergeant?"
Brennan kept his face impassive. "No sign of it near the hut, Commander. Drones or Agents might have vaporized it in the fight. Or... someone scooped it up in the chaos before my team secured the area." He shrugged slightly. "Lots of confusion."
Vance stared at him for a long, tense moment. Brennan didn't flinch. Finally, Vance grunted. "Find it, Sergeant. That thing is priority one." He stormed out of the tent.
The heavy silence returned, broken only by the beeping machines. Brennan let out a slow breath. "Alright. Mia, get some rest. Leo, same. I'll arrange your move back to the secure hut. Enhanced guard." He gave Mia a meaningful look. "Training starts tomorrow. 0600. Be ready. It won't be easy."
He left. Mia slumped back in her chair, exhaustion hitting her fully. "Combat training? Leo, I don't want to be a soldier."
Leo reached out, taking her hand. The faint white light around her fingers felt warm, comforting. "Not soldier," he rasped. "Strong. Safe. Brennan... okay." He trusted the sergeant's steady pragmatism more than Vance's cold fear or Silvana's fanaticism. Brennan had seen the cost. He understood survival.
Mia squeezed his hand. "Okay. For us." She looked at him, her eyes searching his face. "You seem... a little better? Less foggy?"
Leo managed a small, weak smile. "Little. Quiet... different." Not the crushing emptiness. A fragile calm. ⌈ SANITY: 3% ⌋ was a foothold. A place to stand. Barely.
***
Life settled into a new, tense rhythm. Leo returned to the secure hut. The guards outside doubled. Brennan brought food and water, his face always serious, always scanning. Leo rested. He watched the weak sunlight through the barred window. He listened to the sounds of Bastion – distant shouts, machinery, the hum of the shield. He tried not to think too hard. He focused on the quiet. On breathing. On being still. The ghost trails were faint lines now, almost ignorable.
Mia trained. Hard. She left with Brennan before dawn, returning hours later, sweaty, tired, but with a new set to her shoulders. She told Leo snippets.
"Brennan's tough," she said one evening, massaging her sore arms. "But fair. He doesn't push the light. He pushes *me*. Running. Dodging. Balance. 'Power's useless if you're flat on your back,' he says." She demonstrated a stance Brennan taught her – feet planted, hands raised, palms out. "It's about focus. Control. Making the light do what I want, when I want. Not just when I panic."
She showed him small tricks. A tiny spark of light dancing on her fingertip. A brief, soft glow that illuminated a dark corner. "Brennan says start small. Build control. Save the big blasts for... well, for Agents." She smiled faintly. "It feels better. Less scary."
Leo watched her. Pride warmed the cold hollow inside him. She was learning. Adapting. Getting stronger. Protect Mia. She was protecting herself. Protecting him, in a way.
One afternoon, Brennan arrived with Mia, but didn't leave immediately. He looked tense. "Scout patrol didn't come back," he said quietly, checking the window. "Sector Echo. Near where we found that... broken man. The Reaver victim."
A chill went down Leo's spine. The sense of being watched had faded since the Agent attack, but now it prickled faintly again. "Agents?" Mia asked, her hand instinctively curling, white light flickering briefly.
"Maybe," Brennan said. "Or something new the Pulse seeded. Either way, Vance is locking down. No one goes outside the shield without his direct order." He looked at Leo. "How's the quiet?"
Leo considered. The fog was thinner. The quiet felt less like emptiness, more like... listening. "Okay," he said. "Thinking... slow. Clear." He tapped his temple. "Beast... sleeping."
Brennan nodded, seeming to understand. "Keep it that way." He turned to leave, then paused. He glanced at the guards outside the door, then back at Leo and Mia. He lowered his voice almost to a whisper. "The fragment. It wasn't vaporized."
Leo and Mia froze. Brennan met their eyes. "I found it. In the head of the Agent you blew up, Mia." He didn't reach for it, but his hand rested near his pocket. "It was embedded there. Like it was drawn to their tech... or they were drawn to it."
"Why didn't you tell Vance?" Mia breathed.
"Because Vance sees tools. Weapons." Brennan's gaze was steady. "This thing... it's more. It's connected to the Veil. To the System. To you two. Handing it to Vance now is like throwing fuel on a fire he doesn't understand." He looked at Leo. "And you... you're not ready. Not yet. Maybe not ever, to mess with it again." He paused. "But it's here. Hidden. Safe. For now."
Leo stared at him. Brennan had the key. The dangerous, powerful key. And he was keeping it secret. Protecting them. Protecting Bastion from Vance's rashness. It was a huge risk. "Why?" Leo rasped.
Brennan sighed, a sound like grinding stones. "Because down in that cave, kid, when you told me to use pipes, not lasers... that was smart. Not glitch-smart. Just smart. And Mia, blasting that drone you threw? That was teamwork. Real survival." He looked between them. "This Tower wants to break us. All of us. Maybe... maybe you two broken pieces fit together different. Make something stronger." He straightened up, his voice returning to its normal gruff tone. "Rest up. Training tomorrow, Mia. Double session." He left, leaving Leo and Mia stunned.
Brennan was their ally. And he had the fragment.
***
The next morning, Mia left early for training. Leo sat by the small window, watching the grey dawn light creep over Bastion. The quiet inside him felt different. Less fragile. More... aware. He noticed small details – the way dust motes danced in a sunbeam, the faint pattern in the metal wall, the steady rhythm of the distant shield generator. ⌈ SANITY: 3% ⌋ felt like standing on very thin ice, but he could see the shore.
Suddenly, a wave of pure, icy terror slammed into him. Not his own. Mia's.
He gasped, clutching his chest. He felt her panic, sharp and bright, cutting through the quiet. Across the settlement, near Training Ground Beta.
Mia!
He was on his feet before he thought, stumbling to the door. He slammed his fist against the reinforced metal. "GUARD! SOMETHING WRONG! MIA!"
The guard outside frowned, peering in. "Settle down, Chen. Sergeant's got her."
"NO!" Leo yelled, the fear for Mia overriding everything. "FEEL IT! PANIC! NOW!"
The guard hesitated, seeing the genuine terror on Leo's face. He keyed his comm. "Sergeant Brennan? This is Post Four. Chen's agitated. Says he feels panic from his sister. Request status check on Training Ground Beta."
Static crackled. Then Brennan's voice, tight with tension: "Under attack! Unknown entity! Request immediate backup! Beta now!"
The guard's eyes widened. He slammed the comm shut and drew his sidearm. "LOCKDOWN!" he yelled to the other guard. "STAY PUT, CHEN!" He took off running towards the training grounds.
Leo paced the small hut, helpless, the icy tendrils of Mia's fear coiling around him. Protect Mia. But how? He was locked in. Useless. He slammed his fist against the wall in frustration. The ghost trails flared violently. ⌈ SANITY: 3% ⌋ pulsed a warning red. Don't break. Not now. She needs you sane.
He forced himself to stop. To breathe. To focus on the thin thread of connection. Mia's fear was intense, but it wasn't despair. She was fighting. He could feel it. A surge of defiant white light, quickly dampened. Brennan's voice shouting orders. The sharp crack of Brennan's rifle. Something snarling – a deep, guttural sound that wasn't human.
Then... silence. The icy terror faded, replaced by Mia's shaky relief, tinged with exhaustion.
Leo sagged against the wall, breathing hard. The ghost trails settled. **⌈ SANITY: 3% ⌋** held. Barely.
Minutes later, the hut door unlocked. Brennan stood there, his uniform torn, a smear of dark, oily blood on his cheek. Mia stood beside him, pale but unharmed, her hands clenched, faint white light still flickering around them. Behind them, four Militia soldiers dragged a strange, twitching carcass.
It looked like a wolf sculpted from shadows and jagged obsidian. Its eyes were pits of red light. Dark smoke curled from its maw and claws. ⌈ OBSERVE: VOID STALKER - LVL 10 ⌋ - Stealth predator. Phase-shifts short distances. Drawn to concentrated energy signatures (e.g., anomaly powers).
"It phased right through the perimeter fence," Brennan said, his voice grim. "Went straight for Mia while she was cooling down after a drill. Almost got her." He looked at Mia with fierce approval. "She held it off with her light. Slowed it enough for me to get a clear shot." He kicked the carcass. "Took three armor-piercing rounds to put it down. Tough bastard."
Mia rushed to Leo, hugging him tightly. "I'm okay," she whispered. "It was scary, but... I knew what to do. Mostly."
Leo hugged her back, relief washing over him. She was safe. She'd fought. She'd won. With Brennan's help. He looked at the sergeant over Mia's shoulder. "Thanks."
Brennan nodded curtly. "Part of the job." He looked down at the Void Stalker, then back at Leo, his expression serious. "It wasn't random, Chen. It phased through solid steel to get to her light. That training session... it must have been like ringing a dinner bell." He met Leo's eyes. "The quiet's over. They know she's here. They know she's getting stronger. And they're adapting."
He pulled a small, dark object from his pocket. Not the fragment. A small data chip, slick with dark fluid. He'd pried it from the Stalker's skull. "Found this. Some kind of... tracker? Or receiver?" He held it up. It pulsed with a faint, sickly red light. "They're not just hunting. They're learning."
Brennan crushed the chip under his boot. The red light died. "Training's over for today, Mia. Rest. Both of you." He gestured to the soldiers to remove the carcass. "Vance needs to see this. He won't like it." He gave Leo one last, meaningful look before leaving. "Keep the quiet, Chen. You'll need it."
The door locked. Leo and Mia sat on her cot. The fear from the attack faded, replaced by a cold dread. The Stalker wasn't an Agent. It was something new. Designed. Sent. To test Mia? To kill her? The System was evolving its hunters.
Mia leaned against Leo. "It knew my moves, Leo," she whispered. "It dodged my first blast like it was expecting it."
Leo put his arm around her. The quiet inside him felt thin again. The shore seemed further away. But Mia was here. Alive. Stronger. Brennan had the fragment. And he was watching.
The storm wasn't coming. It was already here. And Bastion was its target. Their fragile truce with Vance, their foothold on sanity, was about to be tested like never before. Leo closed his eyes, focusing on the sound of Mia's breathing. His anchor. His reason. ⌈ SANITY: 3% ⌋ He would hold on. For her. He had to.
Deep beneath the mountain of rubble, encased in stone and dark energy, a faint pulse echoed the crushed red light of the Stalker's chip. Oracle Silvana's broken lips moved in the absolute darkness. No sound came out, but the thought was clear, carried on the fading resonance of the Veil: "The Arbiter comes..."