They say power manifests at sixteen. Some were blessed with the flames in their veins while other spoke to shadows and many could float their coffee mug across the room if they concentrated hard enough.
Cael Marek got nothing.
Born a Null in a society pulsing with gifted teens and twitchy crime fighters, he learned early that logic could silence deeper than laser eyes and that being ordinary was its own kind of weapon.
Now twenty-five and still the only Null in the Department, Cael had grown used to the sideways looks. What he wasn't used to was cases like this.
"Victim's upstairs," said the young officer at the door, barely out of training, his eyes faintly flickering blue. Probably some low-level optic ability. Most of them had something.
Cael stepped past him without a word, boots tapping up the spiral staircase, senses alert.
The room was quiet. Too quiet.
On the bed, the woman lay face down, arms by her sides, golden hair fanned across white silk sheets like spilled light. No blood. No bruises. Not even tension in her muscles. Whoever did this hadn't just killed her. They had crafted her.
Carved between her shoulder blades, precise and deep, was a butterfly. Symmetrical, clean. Not just cut—shaped. As if her skin had surrendered willingly.
He stepped closer.
No blood.
No bruises.
Not even tension in her muscles. Whoever did this hadn't just killed her. They'd crafted her.
"She didn't scream," Cael muttered.
A new voice answered from the doorway. "Because she didn't feel it."
Cael turned.
Officer Rhea Vance. Impeccably dressed, composed, her presence subtle but undeniably charged. Her file said she was enhanced—no detail beyond that. That alone made Cael distrustful. Too many powered officers relied on brute force. But she didn't look like she needed to.
"Third victim," she said, walking in. "Same butterfly, same setup. No forced entry. No surveillance footage. Not even a whimper."
Cael stared at the girl again.
"He's an artist," he said quietly.
Rhea raised a brow. "That tells us something-but is it useful?"
Cael finally looked at her. "Maybe not. But it tells us what kind of monster we're hunting and it's going to be interesting ".
Rhea stepped closer to the body, her heels silent against the hardwood. "You think this is performance art?"
"No," Cael said, crouching beside the bed. "Performance art demands an audience. This—this is ritual. It means something to him, even if we don't understand it yet."
She didn't reply, but he caught the flicker of consideration in her eyes.
Cael glanced around the room. The minimalistic decor, the untouched surfaces, the faint scent of vanilla and static. Nothing out of place. No signs of panic. No resistance.
"Where was she found?" he asked.
"Just like this," Rhea said. "House sealed from the inside. No broken locks, no tampered tech. Her pulse monitor even logged a normal rhythm up until... the moment she died."
He stood up slowly, his gaze still fixed on the butterfly. "Our guy isn't just careful. He's confident. Too confident. He's never rushed. Never sloppy."
"And always picks people who live alone," Rhea added. "No family around. No pets. Clean lives."
"Victims?" Cael asked.
She nodded. "Kyla Renner, twenty-eight. Software analyst. Before that, Sylvia Mora—nutritionist, twenty-six. And ten days ago: Ezra Clarke, thirty-one, schoolteacher."
"Ezra could mimic voices. Kyla could temporarily disable electronics. Sylvia had some kind of sensory boost. Nothing extraordinary."
Cael frowned. "So we've got a killer targeting mildly gifted adults in total lockdown rooms, leaving them carved like art installations with no trace of entry, struggle, or murder weapon."
Rhea met his eyes. "And you're our Null. That's why they brought you in."
Cael bristled. "Because powers haven't worked so far?"
"Because maybe someone who isn't blinded by something has a better shot at catching someone who isn't bound by rules."
He just looked at her and then continued
"So we've got a killer targeting mildly gifted adults in total lockdown rooms, leaving them carved like art installations with no trace of entry, struggle, or murder weapon."
Rhea hesitated—just a flicker—and Cael didn't miss it.
"There's more," she said finally. "Kyla Renner wasn't just a software analyst. She used to be a government researcher."
Cael straightened. "Government? What department?"
Rhea pulled up a file on her holopeid and flicked it toward him. He caught the projection mid-air—an old personnel record with a photo of Kyla, fifteen years younger and wearing a lab coat.
"Division of Cognitive Alteration. Experimental sciences branch. She resigned fifteen years ago, no public reason given. After that, her name vanishes from everything."
Cael scanned the file, noting the redacted lines, the timestamps from long-dead projects. "So she was involved in... what? Brain modification? Power enhancement?"
Rhea nodded. "Or suppression. This branch dealt with volatile cases—Nullification trials, failed gene manipulations, psychic containment. Half of it's still classified."
"And now she's dead," Cael muttered. "Killed by someone who didn't even leave a print."
He looked at the butterfly again, and this time it felt more like a warning than a calling card.
They were barely back at HQ when the briefing room lights flickered—again.
"Building's short-circuiting," muttered the tech assistant as she walked by, balancing a tablet stack and a half-eaten protein bar. "Or someone with bad vibes is back."
Cael ignored the comment, but the lights did always act up when he was around. Nulls and high-tech didn't exactly get along.
Rhea leaned against the far table, arms crossed, watching him with a flicker of amusement.
"You break every room you enter, or am I just lucky?"
Cael raised a brow. "I could say the same about you. You have a presence."
She didn't smile, but he saw the corner of her mouth twitch. Maybe. Almost.
Before she could reply, a cheerful voice broke the tension.
"Detective Marek! Lieutenant Vance! Heard you got yourselves a butterfly."
Detective Lem Torres strolled in, his sleeves rolled up and his hair in organized chaos. His power? He could smell lies. Unfortunately, it meant he never shut up.
"Lemme guess," Lem grinned, pulling up a chair. "Scene was pristine. Locked-room mystery. No sign of struggle, no blood, no forced entry, right?"
Cael blinked. "How do you—"
"I read the file. And also, Rhea's eyebrows do this little lift when she's annoyed. She's annoyed when the crime scene is too neat."
"I'm not annoyed," Rhea said flatly.
"See? The lie smells like toasted almonds."
Cael sighed and turned away. "Why is he still allowed near people?"
"Because I'm adorable and once saved the captain's dog."
Lem tossed a holopeid onto the table. "Also because I got something. Third victim, Ezra Clarke? There's a pattern."
Cael looked up.
"His smart mirror was still recording ambient data. No footage of the killer, but... get this—his pulse dropped before he died. Not a spike. A drop. As if he was sedated or—"
"—at peace," Rhea finished. "Just like Kyla."
Lem nodded. "And Sylvia. Her heartbeat never even flinched."
Cael leaned forward. "Three people. All lightly powered. All in isolated homes. No trace of pain, no panic. And all died as if... they didn't even notice."
He tapped the side of the holopeid, thinking.
"Maybe this isn't about power. It's about... silence."
Rhea tilted her head. "Meaning?"
"They weren't screaming. They weren't fighting. They just... let go. Whoever this killer is, he doesn't just take lives. He makes them surrender."
---
Back in the hallway, Rhea matched Cael's pace as they left the room. The corridor lights flickered again. She didn't flinch.
"I still don't get you," she said finally.
"Good," Cael replied. "Means I'm doing something right."
She gave him a sideways glance. "You ever try smiling?"
"I do. Just not when I'm surrounded by serial killers and human mood detectors."
"Fair."
They paused outside the evidence archive. Rhea hesitated before speaking.
"You ever think the killer's picking these people because of something they did? Not who they are?"
Cael looked at her, more serious now. "You mean Kyla's past."
"And maybe Ezra's too. His school got government funding—he was in an accelerated gifted program as a teen. Sylvia? Military family. She might've been in trials."
"And you think someone's... what? Cleaning up?"
She didn't answer. Just stared at the butterfly file in her hand.
---
Later that night, Cael sat at his desk, the soft hum of streetlights outside barely touching his concentration. He stared at the still image of Kyla Renner's body—the carved butterfly, clean and symmetrical.
He zoomed in.
There was something... off.
Not in the carving. In the skin.
It was marked, yes. But around the edges—tiny discolorations. Scarring?
No. Tattoo removal.
Someone had erased something. The butterfly wasn't the first mark on her back.
And whoever did it… made sure only their symbol remained.
His holopeid pinged. A new case file. Another death.
Same butterfly.
And this time... the victim was found smiling.
The fourth victim was a man named Dr. Callen Pryce. Age forty-two. Once a defense consultant, now an unassuming librarian who lived alone and rarely went outside.
Butterfly. Same precision. Same peace.
But this time, he'd died smiling.
---
"Found something," Rhea said, tapping rapidly on her holopeid as Cael stood over the fourth body. "I ran their files through cross-departmental filters. All four victims—Kyla Renner, Sylvia Mora, Ezra Clarke, and now Dr. Pryce—had something in common."
Cael looked up. "Besides dying beautifully?"
"They all worked for the Division of Cognitive Alteration."
Cael froze. "The same division Kyla quit fifteen years ago?"
"Exactly. But they didn't all work there at the same time. Different roles. Different years. But they all touched the same project at some point."
She flicked her pad, and a classified file hovered between them.
Project HUSH.
Cael narrowed his eyes. "Subtle."
Rhea's voice dropped to a whisper. "There's almost nothing on it. It's scrubbed from public logs. Redacted into oblivion."
"And now the people involved are dying," Cael muttered. "No panic. No resistance. Just... gone."
"Silently," she added. "Like the project name."
---
The captain's office was on the top floor—glass walls, immaculate desk, and a view of the city that made Cael's apartment feel like a basement in comparison.
Captain Ryland Cho was tall, broad-shouldered, and clean-cut—military posture, old-school ethics, and sharp gray suits that made him look carved out of policy. His power, if he had one, was a closely guarded secret. Just like everything else about him.
"You've got something?" Cho asked, voice calm but curt.
Rhea stood straight. "Yes, sir. All four victims have links to a classified research branch. Project HUSH. They were involved, directly or indirectly."
Cho's jaw tightened, just slightly. Not enough for a rookie to notice. But Cael wasn't a rookie.
"Those records are sealed," Cho said. "They're not your concern."
"They're our victims," Cael replied. "That makes them our concern."
Cho turned slowly toward him, hands folded behind his back.
"Detective Marek, I respect your instincts, but this is bigger than department paygrades. You're to focus on solving the murders, not digging up ghosts from a project that no longer exists."
"Respectfully," Rhea said, "ghosts don't carve butterflies into people's backs."
A long pause.
Then, Cho's tone softened, almost too deliberately. "I'm not trying to tie your hands. Just… focus your energy where it'll count. We're under pressure from above. The public's watching. Four gifted citizens dead? They want a monster, not a mystery."
Cael stared at him.
Too smooth. Too calm.
He wasn't deflecting because he didn't know something.
He was deflecting because he did.
"Permission to continue investigating the Project HUSH angle?" Cael asked evenly.
Cho didn't answer right away.
Then, with a small smile: "You always were a stubborn one, Marek. Fine. But quietly. No leaks. And if you find something you can't handle…"
He glanced between them, that smile still polite but somehow... off.
"...you'll bring it to me first."
---
As they left the office, Cael muttered under his breath, "He's hiding something."
Rhea didn't deny it. "Maybe. Or maybe he's just used to watching people die for secrets he's not allowed to question."
"That supposed to be comforting?"
"No. Just... perspective."
---
Later that night, back in Cael's apartment, the cracked holopeid buzzed with an auto-decrypted tool slowly unpacking fragments from Kyla's wiped files.
Lines of corrupted text scrolled past.
Until one line stopped him cold:
"Subject #017 – Null Resistance Response: Failed. Suggest decommission."
He stared at the file number.
17.
That was his case ID.
It was something familiar but still far away, it was something he feels like he needs to remember but he shouldn't.
Before he could breathe, the file deleted itself.
---
The fourth body was cold.
Dr. Callen Pryce had died lying flat on the floor of his small, spotless apartment, arms folded neatly over his chest. Butterfly, same as the others. Only this time, the edges of his lips curled upward—not in terror or peace, but something else.
A smile.
Wide. Glassy. Wrong.
---
"This place gives me the creeps," Lem muttered, glancing around the apartment. "Feels like a dentist's office got abandoned in the middle of a nervous breakdown."
Rhea knelt beside the body. "Same method. No struggle. Pulse stable. No sign of sedation."
Cael scanned the room. Books stacked with surgical precision, everything color-coded. Framed photos of nature scenes—trees, snow, sunlight through fog. All fake. Stock images.
He stepped into the study. On the far wall, post it notes covered a corkboard in perfect rows. Every single one said:
"Smile through it."
---
"I did some digging," Cael said later, back at HQ. "Pryce didn't just quit his post in the research division. He was removed."
Rhea looked up sharply. "For what?"
He tossed a file onto the table. It landed with a slap. "Unethical behavior. Rumors, mostly. Nothing official. But it kept popping up in old complaint logs."
She picked it up, eyes scanning.
"He used to tell test subjects—children—to smile when they were in pain. When they cried, he'd repeat it. Smile. Smile. Smile. One girl broke her arm during a kinetic trial. He told her to pretend it didn't hurt. 'Make it beautiful.'"
Rhea flinched. "So the smile on his face—"
"Someone made him mean it."
---
"Which means," Lem added from the corner, holding a bag of cheese puffs like it was a crime scene tool, "this killer's got a serious poetic streak."
Cael crossed his arms. "Or a grudge. And a sense of irony."
Rhea lowered the file slowly. "It's not just about the victims' powers. It's about what they did. Who they were."
Cael nodded. "Not random at all. A message. Each one crafted to reflect their sins."
Lem looked between them, suddenly thoughtful. "Okay, but then… Ezra Clarke? Schoolteacher. Local volunteer. Helped his neighbors during blackouts. What's his sin?"
Cael opened a file and turned the screen toward them.
Unusual Entry: Clarke requested transfer from the original HUSH site after five months. Cited "extreme stress" and "uncontrolled vocal mimicry" as reasons.
That wasn't the odd part.
The odd part was what came after.
Subject Journal Log – Internal Use Only:
"He can sound like anyone. That's not the problem. The problem is he starts using voices of people we haven't met yet."
Rhea leaned in.
Cael spoke quietly. "He predicted the voice of another researcher before she was ever hired."
"Precognition?"
"Maybe. Or something else. Something... broken."
---
Later that evening, Cael sat at his desk, surrounded by old files and unanswered questions. The smile on Pryce's face haunted him—not just because it was eerie, but because it looked forced.
He opened one of the recovered photos from an old HUSH lab. Blurry, distorted. Kids strapped to chairs. Dark hallways. Observers behind glass.
And there, in the corner—just visible—
Pryce, holding a clipboard.
And next to him, a young man in a lab coat with short, spiked hair.
The image was damaged, face half-obscured. But something about it made Cael's stomach twist.
A name tag partially visible.
"R—"
Before he could zoom, the screen fizzed and went black.
---
Dr. Callen Pryce's death lingered with Cael longer than it should have.
Not because of the butterfly. That part was becoming almost expected.
It was the smile.
Something stretched across the fourth victim's face that didn't belong to the dead. Not peace. Not serenity.
Obedience.
---
Back at HQ, Rhea flicked through documents on her holopeid, frustration tight across her usually unreadable face.
"I kept looking. There's a deeper connection between the victims. Not just the department. Not just the butterfly."
She turned the screen toward Cael.
PROJECT HUSH – Internal Test Subjects: Null Variance Trials. Status: Terminated.
Cael stared.
Null Variance Trials.
They were experimenting on Nulls.
"You're sure this isn't a mistake?" he asked, his voice flat.
"Not a mistake," she said. "A cover-up."
She tapped to expand the file. More names appeared—coded IDs, dates, incident logs.
"All four victims weren't just researchers or facilitators," Rhea said. "They were HUSH enforcers. Part of a task team designed to push Nulls past their breaking points. See if trauma could awaken dormant abilities."
Cael's mouth went dry.
"They tortured Nulls," he said quietly. "Teenagers. Kids. Seventeen, eighteen, twenty. People like—"
"You," Rhea finished.
---
Captain Ryland Cho's office felt colder this time.
He listened as Rhea outlined the discovery—project names, redacted logs, confirmed connections.
He nodded slowly, then walked to the window, arms crossed.
"What you've uncovered," he said, voice even, "was never supposed to be unsealed. Project HUSH was terminated over a decade ago, and for good reason."
"You mean it failed," Cael said, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice.
"No," Cho said. "I mean it should've failed."
He turned, slowly. "I didn't approve of what they did. But I wasn't in charge then. I only got the files after they burned the labs and erased the records."
"So you knew," Rhea said. "And said nothing."
"I've said nothing," Cho replied, "because those who survived deserved to forget."
There was a pause.
Too long.
Cael narrowed his eyes. "We're not just chasing a killer. We're chasing someone who remembers."
Cho didn't flinch, but his tone dropped an octave. "And if they were one of the test subjects, then they're not just hunting ex-researchers. They're settling a score."
---
Back in the hallway, Cael felt his pulse in his ears.
"I could've been one of them," he said, mostly to himself.
"You were," Rhea answered, not unkindly.
He looked at her sharply.
She held up her pad. A file slowly decrypted, line by line.
Subject #017: Null Response Volatility – Unyielding. Terminated from trial at age 18. Memory containment advised.
"You don't remember it," she said. "But you were there."
Cael said nothing. He didn't trust his voice.