The silver ball dissolved into Kaito's palm like quicksand, its liquid metal slipping through his fingers with an unsettling heat. Their battleground alleyway smoked from the battle—the ground glazed and shattered where Lena's photon shots had heated the ground to superheated temperatures, the air thick with ozone-fragrant released energy.
She knelt next to the unblemished orb that had stayed intact, her gauntleted fingers just inches from its curve. "It's humming," she whispered harshly. "As if something's alive in here."
Kaito's eyes blurred as data from the sphere flooded into his nervous system:
- CELESTIA SUB-LEVEL 7 (Detention Block Delta)
- SUBJECT: MIRA SOLARA (Vitals unstable, mnemonic saturation 62%)
- COUNTDOWN TO NEURAL OVERWRITE: 08:14:21
The figures scorched behind his shut eyes.
"It's a map in the brain," Seraphina's voice seemed to ring out through his auditory cortex, echoing through his jaw. "Kael's showing us where he's brought her. Insufferable arrogant son-of-a-bitch."
Her gold-burning gauntlets stretched dark shadows out onto her etiolated complexion. "We are leaving. Now,"
Kaito grabbed her wrist so she couldn't storm off. His fingers wrapped too hard—he could feel the delicate bones shift beneath his grasp, catch a glimpse of wincing before she shielded it behind indignation. "Not until we're smart," he said, releasing his fingers. His new eye conjured a shaky hologram between them—Celestia's guard shift rosters, thermal signatures, airvent routes. "Dawn's the only shift their security team takes. Go in sight-unseen, we'll be dead. Mira'll be dead."
Lena's nostrils flared. He expected her to hit him. Then her shoulders slumped, the fighting drained out of her in a sigh. "Fine. But we're leaving at first light."
The rear room of Granger's Rare Tomes smelled damply of mildew and old paper. Water spots trailed along the ceiling, and beneath stacks of antiquated books on antiquated skills—Telekinetic Theory Vol. III, The Ethics of Cloning, Aegis Founding Principles.
She scraped at her emaciated gauntlets with a frayed rag, movement brutal and repetitive. The blood curled away in crimson spirals. "She was in math class," she suddenly said. "They took her out of fucking math class."
He spoke not a word. His left eye kept scanning Celestia bulletins off a hijacked tablet, twisted characters flashing too fast for a human to read.
"Rest," Seraphina whispered. She materialized in a spectral pressure along his spine—not a touch, really, so much an impression of one. "Your mnemonic integration kicks in when you are tired,"
He ignored her. The veins along his forearm darkened as he studied security blueprints, dark tendrils spreading like cracks in ice.
Lena let the cloth fall. "Stop that."
"Like you weren't falling apart," she said, pointing to his arm. "That's spreading, and you're going around like it's a fuckin' rash."
His hands were clenched and unclenched. A light metallic hue had begun to surround his knuckles. "I'm taking care of it."
"Ah?" Lena knocked a chair over. The chair clattered against a bookshelf, and a cascade of paperbacks cascaded onto the floor. "You're managing? While your blood dissolves floors? While you've got—" She stopped the words, but somehow they still hung there anyway. While you've got Seraphina haunting your thoughts like a ghost.
A movement out of the corner of his eye—Seraphina's form shrouded in the doorway, ethereal as mist. "She's frightened," she whispered. "She's not mad. She's afraid."
Kaito was aware. He had viewed the file on Lena's sister—age twelve, power manifestation: photokinetic resonance. An ideal subject for Kael's experiments.
He took Aegis yearbook off the table, its cover bent out of shape from being in water. He flipped it open to a random page—a photo of Seraphina at fourteen already showing off that razor-sharp grin, violet eyes daring the camera to capture what was beyond.
Lena got very quiet. "You miss it too," she whispered, softer now. "Pretending normal."
Kaito closed the book. "We were never ordinary,"
"Remember this?" Seraphina's voice enwrapped his recollection, pulling him in.
Two Months Ago – Aegis Cafeteria
The cafeteria exploded in a fit of laughter as Rin slammed a bottle of Reaper's Kiss hot sauce onto the table. "Ten seconds, Swift. You can't handle it."
Kaito stared at the bottle. Legend sauce—notorious extract of bioengineered chili peppers, banned in three districts. A cluster of Celestia exchange students in the corner watched with disinterested amusement.
"Five seconds," said Kaito
Rin's grin became wolfish. "Deal"
The sauce burst forth like a flame of liquid. Kaito's eyes whitened, his throat closing up—then a carton of milk was in front of him. Lena, shaking her head. "Idiot."
He drank avidly. Glancing up, he saw Seraphina gazing from afar at the Celestia table, tapping deliberate rhythm on her cup.
Knock. Knock
Morse. Kael is watching
Present
The memory disintegrated under his mnemonics, overlaying it with tactical data—guard patrol routes, weak points in the architecture, the amount of pressure it took to snap a human neck.
Lena snapped her fingers in front of him. "Hey. Stay with me."
Kaito blinked. The walls of the safehouse shimmered, then stabilized. "I'm here."
They had a rudimentary plan in place at 4:30 AM.
1. Lena would trigger a false photon surge near the east gate of Celestia—her biometrics remained in their database since she had once been a cadet.
2. Kaito would infiltrate during the guard shift change, his complexion shifting to be the same texture and thermal profile as a Celestia uniform.
3. Seraphina's Ghost can disrupt security feeds—if Kaito's body is able to cope with the energy loss without destabilizing further.
She studied the holo-schematics intently, gritting her jaw. "And after we've found her?"
"We're running," he said.
"That's not a plan."
"It's the only segment that counts."
She grabbed his wrist, bruising her fingers. "If you're not here by noon," she spat, low and menacing, "I'm going to blow the whole goddamn tower."
Kaito withdrew her fingers one finger at a time. "I know."
The pale pink sky bled around Kaito as he strolled toward Celestia's spires, his own shadow trailing behind—a limb too long, too many limbs, a glint of silver where his spine would be. Somewhere in his wake, Lena breathed out into the empty alley.
"Go home, you idiot."
And for the first time, Kaito couldn't be certain home was still there.