The call came a week later, in the dead of night. The communicator vibrated with a silent, urgent pulse. Leo's stomach clenched as he answered.
"Valerius." The captain's voice was clipped, tense. "We have a Class-3 Echo event at the old Grantham Orphanage. It's metastasizing. Civilians are trapped. I'm sending a car. Be outside in two minutes. This is not a drill."
The line went dead. Leo's hands were shaking. A Class-3. He'd read about them. Echoes that could physically interact with the world, solidifying past trauma into lethal force. He pulled on a dark jacket, his mind a whirlwind. What could he do? What skill could he possibly multiply here?
A sleek, black, non-descript vehicle slid to the curb. The back door opened. He got in. Inside, apart from the driver, were two Sweepers. One was a woman with intense eyes and a scar across her cheek, her hands resting on a heavy rifle. The other was a hulking man who looked like he could bench-press a car.
"The rookie," the woman said, her voice laced with skepticism. "I'm Kaelen. That's Rourke. Captain says you're special. Don't get in our way."
They arrived at the orphanage. The building was a weeping sore in the cityscape, reality warping around it. The air was cold, and the sound of phantom children crying and screaming echoed from within.
Valerius was at a makeshift command post, his gaze fixed on a thermal scanner. "The Echo is a repetition of a fire," he said without looking up. "The heat is psychosomatic but lethal. We've lost contact with a three-person sweep team inside. Your job, O'Connor, is to get them out. Kaelen and Rourke will clear a path. You find them and breach whatever psychic lock is holding them."
Leo felt a surge of panic. "How?"
"Figure it out. That's your talent." Valerius finally looked at him. "Or they die."
Swallowing his fear, Leo followed Kaelen and Rourke into the hellscape. The interior was a nightmare. Hallways stretched and contracted. Walls bled hot ash. Phantom flames licked at them, and while they weren't real fire, they projected searing pain.
Rourke roared, his body glowing with a faint kinetic barrier, bulling through the psychic phenomena. Kaelen fired precise shots that seemed to "calm" the distortions. They were professionals, a well-oiled machine. Leo was the clumsy, terrified spare part.
They found the missing team in the main hall. They were on their knees, trapped in a perfect, horrifying circle of repeating fire. Their eyes were wide, locked in a terror-loop, reliving the children's final moments.
"The core is too strong here!" Kaelen yelled over the psychic wail. "We can't break the resonance!"
Leo stared at the trapped Sweepers. He couldn't fight the fire. He couldn't dispel the Echo. But he could *move*. He focused on the most basic action. *Running.* But not for speed. For *stability*. To ignore the disorienting, painful environment.
*[Skill Recognized: Environmental Navigation - Basic Lv. 1]*
*[Intent: Sustained Application. Multiplier: x15.]*
The world snapped into a different focus. The shifting corridors became predictable. The psychic heat became a data point, not a sensation. He saw a path, a series of steps through the least volatile parts of the room, leading directly to the trapped men.
"Cover me!" he shouted, and before Kaelen could argue, he moved.
He wasn't fast. He was deliberate. He stepped through patches of screaming air, his mind processing the chaos as a simple navigational hazard. He reached the first Sweeper, grabbing his arm. The man flinched, but Leo's grip was firm, his movements certain.
One by one, he pulled them from the circle, leading them back through the path only he could see. The mental strain was immense, a constant pressure against his sanity, but he held on.
As the last man was clear, Rourke unleashed a massive concussive blast at the epicenter of the Echo. The orphanage shuddered, and the phantom sounds faded into a ringing silence.
Back outside, leaning against the vehicle and breathing heavily, Leo looked up to see Kaelen staring at him. The skepticism in her eyes was gone, replaced by a slow, dawning respect.
"Not bad, rookie," she grunted. "Not bad at all."
Valerius approached, a rare, unreadable expression on his face. He had seen it. Leo had passed the test. He was now, for better or worse, one of them.