"Twere best, if anything is best in evil times. What's soonest done, is best, when all is ill." ― Sophocles

* * * *

The hum of machinery was soft, almost rhythmic, like a breath held just under the surface of silence. But beneath it all—underneath the carefully laid wires, the blinking screens, the whispering wind through the thick trees, was tension, taut and straining, coiled like a viper beneath the skin.

Raul sat hunched before a triad of monitors, the blue light casting shadows beneath his eyes. The glow highlighted the thin scar tracing the underside of his jaw—a faint reminder of older wars. His fingers danced across the keys, precise and tireless, unlocking pathways, rerouting corridors, and closing choke points with a surgeon's precision.

His golden eyes, bright as a predator's, flickered between camera feeds and floor schematics, mentally stitching together the shifting movements of three squads scattered across the Veridale facility's levels. His breaths were short, but steady.

A man trained for this. Built for this.

Beside him, Neil stood like a pale wraith in the gloom, pearl-white eyes half-lidded but alert, his focus tracing the ebb and flow of energy signatures and thermal blips across the compound's sensor overlay. He didn't speak much—Neil rarely did, but his presence was grounding.

Quiet strength. Unshakable calm.

Raul needed that right now.

Behind them, Kailey shifted for what must have been the sixth time in two minutes.

The shadows didn't hide her nerves. Her arms were wrapped tightly around herself, her raven hair uncharacteristically dishevelled, strands clinging to her face from the evening's humidity.

She was supposed to be resting, but instead, she hovered like a ghost at the edge of the screens—pale and jittery, her wide pearl eyes trained on the grainy footage from the facility.

Raul didn't need to look to know what she was watching.

Feed C5. Level 3.

The maintenance disposal chamber just south of the testing labs. From the vent shaft, a figure dropped with catlike grace—tall, lean, and unmistakably Zest. Seconds later, Laura landed beside him, followed by a third figure, her black coat fluttering like raven wings as she touched down.

Sera.

Kailey took a shaky breath. "Do you think they'll be fine?"

Raul didn't take his eyes off the screen. "Sera, Zest, and Laura will be."

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Click. A gate sealed behind Claudia's group on Level 2.

Raul keyed in another command, flicking to the northern junction—Tatius and Ness had just begun drawing guards away, causing a commotion that echoed like falling dominoes across the guard network.

"I'm more worried about the others," Raul added, his voice low. "Especially Lucie. She's the newest to this life. Sure, we've done raids before. Assassinations, even. But this…"

"This is on a whole other level," Kailey finished, her voice barely a whisper.

Neil tilted his head slightly. "Letha's with that group. They'll be fine."

Raul let the moment hang for a beat. He wished he could believe that, too.

Outside, the last sliver of sun dipped below the jagged horizon, and the room fell into deeper shadow. Kailey moved to the supply crates, her fingers twitching as she began checking the rows of gauze, vials, and surgical tools for the third time. The soft click of glass and rustle of canvas was almost meditative. Almost.

"You already checked that twice," Raul said without turning.

"I know. I just…" Kailey hesitated. "Just in case."

She didn't need to explain. They all had their ways of coping. Raul's was data. Neil's was silence. Kailey's was preparation.

"All units hold," Raul spoke into the comm, his voice now sharp. He keyed in a command, and the second-tier firewalls peeled back like skin from bone. "Redirecting guards from Vent Corridor 3B. Letha, Claudia, Lucie, go left at the split, not right. Left leads to the western chamber. It's dark, but empty."

A hiss of static.

"Copy," Claudia's voice responded, calm but clipped. "Lucie's still a little green."

"She's not the only one," Raul murmured to himself.

A ping lit up on Neil's screen. He leaned in closer, eyes narrowing.

Raul paused, sensing the shift. "Something wrong?" he asked.

Neil didn't answer immediately. His fingers moved across the console with uncharacteristic haste. Then, he blinked, and said in a hushed voice, "Uh… There seems to be another intruder entering the facility."

Raul's head snapped toward him, bewildered. "What?"

Kailey abandoned the med crate and darted to Neil's side. On the grainy, low-light feed, a lone figure was moving through one of the dim outer corridors—moving with a practiced, fluid ease that didn't match any of the facility guards.

Black cap. Black coat. No insignias. No radio chatter.

"Who the hell—?"

"Not one of ours," Raul muttered. "Not a hunter either. Too smooth."

"Should we assist them, whoever they might be?" Neil asked, tilting his head slightly toward the headset mic.

Kailey's eyes remained fixed on the shadowy figure. Something about the way the person moved… It tugged at something deep in her memory. The gait, the poise. Something oddly familiar.

"…No." Sera's voice came after a long pause through the comm. "We can use them as distraction if need be."

"Clever," Raul muttered, watching the feed. "Too many unknowns to risk contact."

Kailey leaned closer to the screen, a frown deepening. "Still… I think I've seen them before…"

"Keep an eye on him, Neil," Raul ordered. "We'll treat him like a roving hazard. Adjust patrol predictions accordingly."

Neil gave a nod and returned to his scanning. "Done."

A sudden voice crackled to life.

"Heads up though," Claudia said, her voice tinged with grim weight. "We won't be able to avoid the patrols forever."

Raul's jaw clenched. He could already see it—more guards pulling from deep storage bunkers, redirected from above. The longer this went on, the more likely the hunters would start activating failsafes. Traps. Gases. And whatever monstrosities that are in this facility.

Goddess forbid they run into one of those.

"Copy," Raul said, typing faster. "Get ready for engagement. If it comes down to it, don't hesitate."

The words sat like ice in the back of his throat.

This facility… It wasn't just a lab. A graveyard of innocence. What the hunters were doing here… What Nicolosi allowed, no, encouraged, was beyond war.

It was genocide.

The Gifted weren't even seen as people in these walls. They were raw material. Organ donors. Test tubes. Abominations.

Raul's stomach turned.

Onscreen, Zest's silhouette flickered into view as he and Laura emerged from the disposal chamber, Sera trailing just behind. The corridor ahead was eerily quiet, lit by buzzing overhead lights that blinked in irregular rhythms, like dying fireflies.

The third level is quiet. Too quiet.

"There aren't many patrols on Level 3," Kailey noted softly, stepping up beside Raul.

"That's where the testing labs are," Zest's voice came through, sardonic but grim. "No sane person would want to be there."

No sane person. Raul thought of Nicolosi then—his voice on the propaganda broadcasts, calm and righteous, describing the Gifted as infections, not people. Parasites. Mutations.

But what he couldn't understand, what none of them could, was that power wasn't the threat.

The threat was hate. And it was already winning.

Raul's hands hovered over the keys, ready for the next move. A sharp breath cut through his focus, and he glanced at Kailey again.

She still watched that figure—the unknown one, still moving deeper through the compound.

Still wondering.

Still afraid.

Raul returned his gaze to the screens.

This night wasn't close to over.

And the fire was only just beginning.

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