The silence in the safehouse was louder than the storm outside.
Rain battered the windows in rhythmic fury as Kaela sat on the edge of the bed, elbows resting on her knees, hands clenched into trembling fists. Her boots were muddy, bloodied at the soles. She hadn't spoken a word since they returned. Ava paced behind her, a ghost wrapped in a silk robe—her hair still damp, a bruise forming high on her cheekbone.
"What aren't you telling me?" Ava finally asked, voice barely above a whisper.
Kaela didn't look up.
There it was again—the fracture forming between them. The unspoken truths layering like frost between their breaths. Ava's warmth was always a room away now. Her trust was fragile, her stare sharper.
"I asked you something," Ava said, firmer this time.
Kaela stood slowly, turning just enough for Ava to see the blood on her collar. Not hers. Not today.
"You were never supposed to see that file," Kaela said. "The one labeled Omega-42."
Ava's eyes widened. "But it had your name—Kaela, that file had your birthdate. Your DNA code was embedded in the—"
"I know," she snapped. Then softer, almost broken: "I know."
A long silence followed. Thunder cracked overhead.
"They experimented on me too," Kaela said finally. "Long before they ever found you."
Her voice was iron wrapped in sorrow, every word carved out of guilt. She pulled down the collar of her shirt, revealing the faint glow of tech veins beneath her skin. Not as visible as Ava's, but there—proof that the program didn't begin with Ava.
"They made me their prototype," Kaela said. "I wasn't meant to survive. But I did. And then they erased everything... until you came along."
Ava's breath caught in her throat. She took a step back as the air between them thickened with dread—and something else. Recognition. Horror. Grief. A part of her wanted to scream. The other part wanted to reach out.
"So everything... everything you did for me..." she whispered.
"Wasn't just protection," Kaela murmured. "It was redemption."
Another beat of silence. Then Ava walked to her, close enough to hear Kaela's uneven breathing. Close enough to see the tears she fought to keep buried.
"You should have told me," she whispered. "We could've fought them together."
"I didn't want you to see me as one of them," Kaela said. "But now you know the truth. And if you still want out—if you want me gone—say the word."
But Ava didn't. She only reached for Kaela's hand—calloused, trembling, real—and held it tightly.
"We fight this," she said, her voice shaking but certain. "Together."
Outside, lightning lit up the sky. But inside, for the first time in days, Kaela's armor cracked.
And something else bloomed quietly between them.
Hope.