The concrete was an intimate enemy. Kael knew its every cold, unforgiving patch. He pushed himself up, muscles screaming a protest that had long since become background noise. The metallic tang of failure was thick in his mouth. Across the vast, shadow-draped expanse of the Forge, the training drone he'd missed hummed a tune of smug indifference. Seven seconds. He'd lasted seven seconds that time before the Hound's instincts had overwhelmed him, turning his controlled lunge into a clumsy, feral stumble.
An improvement of two seconds. Pathetic.
"Again."
Jax's voice was not a command. It was a law of physics. It echoed in the cavernous room, a sound as hard and worn as the scarred equipment lining the walls. Kael didn't bother looking at his mentor. He knew what he'd see: the same impassive expression, the same coiled stillness of a predator that had never known a moment of doubt in its life.
Kael got to his feet, the kinetic spear feeling heavy and useless in his grip. This wasn't working. He'd spent days learning to build the cage, to firewall the beast's rage. He could contain it, yes. He could sit in quiet meditation and feel its chaotic energy swirl harmlessly in the bypasses he'd constructed in his mind. But the moment he tried to use it, to let a fraction of that power out to fuel his movements, the cage door blew off its hinges.
"You're fighting it like a brute," Jax growled, circling him now. His boots crunched softly on the gritty floor. "You're trying to wrestle the beast into submission. You can't. It's stronger than you. It's older than you. Its instincts are burned into its very essence. You will never beat it at its own game."
"Then what the hell am I supposed to do?" The words ripped out of Kael, raw with frustration and the burn of lactic acid.
Jax stopped in front of him. "Stop trying to be a warrior. You're not one. Your file says you're a technician. A mechanic. So stop trying to punch the machine and start trying to understand how it works." The veteran's eyes, chips of obsidian in his scarred face, bored into him. "The Hound… it didn't think about pouncing. It just did. It didn't think, it reacted. Stop trying to fight like a man and start moving like a predator."
The words landed differently this time. Not as an insult, but as a diagnosis. Understand how it works. He'd been trying to force the Echo's instincts into a human mold, to make a wolf's gait work on two legs. It was a fundamental design flaw. He wasn't a warrior. He was a technician. And he was trying to run incompatible software.
He closed his eyes, taking a deep, shuddering breath. He didn't try to find his calm, meditative state. He let the frustration, the pain, the exhaustion just be. And beneath it all, he reached for the current. His Flow. Not the beast's chaotic torrent, but his own quiet, analytical stream.
He wouldn't try to borrow the Hound's agility. He would surrender to its rhythm.
He wouldn't force its instincts into his body. He would let them flow through him, and his mind, his Core, would be the riverbank that guided their path.
"Again," Jax said, his voice a low rumble.
Kael opened his eyes. He didn't tighten his grip on the spear. He loosened it. A drone, as if sensing the shift, zipped in from his left, its flight path a dizzying, erratic curve.
Kael moved.
It wasn't a step. It was a pounce. A low, explosive movement that came not from his legs but from his hips, from his core. His human brain, the one that calculated angles and foot placement, went silent. Another part took over, a part that understood momentum and pursuit on a cellular level. The spear wasn't a tool in his hand; it was a fang at the end of a striking snout, an extension of pure, predatory will. The drone zigged. He was already there.
The impact was a satisfying, percussive crunch of plastic and metal. A wave of exhilaration, clean and sharp, washed over him. He didn't stop. Another drone swooped low from behind. He didn't turn. He dropped, spinning on the ball of one foot, his body moving with an impossible, fluid grace. The spear came around in a seamless arc, connecting with the second drone.
He was in perfect sync. The world was a symphony of sensory data, but it wasn't overwhelming. It was clear. The hum of the drones, the subtle shift of air currents, the steady, powerful thrum of Jax's Aethel Frame across the room—it was all just information. There was no rage. No hunger. Just a pure, crystalline clarity. A perfect, predatory awareness, guided by the calm, analytical mind of a technician.
And then, in the heart of that perfect, violent harmony, a memory bled through.
It wasn't a memory of a kill. It wasn't the thrill of the chase or the satisfying crunch of bone.
It was peace.
The cool, damp earth under his paws. The scent of pine and something wild, something ancient and musky. The comforting weight of the pack moving around him, a silent, coordinated dance of shadows. And above, hanging in the deep indigo of a silent sky, were two pale, luminous moons.
The vision was so vivid, so profoundly, unexpectedly peaceful, it shattered his concentration like a stone through glass. The connection snapped. He staggered back, the spear clattering to the floor. The world came rushing back in, loud and clumsy. He was just Kael again, his heart hammering, his lungs burning, his body slick with sweat.
He looked up, expecting a sharp rebuke for the hesitation. But Jax was silent. The veteran's head was tilted, his expression one of intense, focused thought.
"What was that?" Jax's voice was strangely subdued, the usual gravelly rasp softened by something else. Curiosity.
"A memory," Kael breathed, the words inadequate. He shook his head, trying to clear the impossible image of that twin-mooned sky. "It wasn't… angry. It was quiet."
Jax was quiet for a long time, his gaze distant. The silence in the Forge stretched, heavy with unspoken questions. Kael could almost feel the gears turning in his mentor's mind.
"The Echoes are more than just instincts, kid," Jax said finally, his voice a low murmur, almost to himself. "They're fragments of a soul. Even a beast's." He looked at Kael, his eyes sharp and serious again. "That peace you felt. That's an echo, too. Something buried under centuries of rage."
Before Kael could ask what that meant, Jax walked over and clapped a heavy, solid hand on his shoulder. The gesture was so unexpected it made Kael flinch.
"You're not just caging the beast anymore," Jax said, and for the first time, there was a sliver of something that sounded like grudging respect in his voice. "You're listening to it. You've learned to hold the leash. Now, the real work begins."
He turned and walked toward the blast door, leaving Kael alone on the concrete floor. Kael looked down at his own hands, no longer seeing them as just a technician's hands, or a clumsy fighter's. They were something else now. They had held a weapon and felt a monster's power. And through them, he had touched a memory of a world that shouldn't exist, a peace he couldn't explain. The monster inside him wasn't just a monster. It was a ghost. A ghost that remembered a different sky.