Sera Vance didn't sleep that night.
Her quarters overlooked the capital city of Eden-9, a world of floating skylines and silvery towers that hung above the smog of the lower sectors. Beneath those clouds was where she used to work — with the Federal Black Operations Bureau — before she'd "retired." That was the word they'd used. She'd called it running.
Now she stood at her window, watching the electric ribbons of starship traffic lace across the night. Her reflection in the glass grinned back like it knew a joke she didn't.
Her neural implant buzzed.
ALERT: ABILITY GROWTH DETECTED — NEURAL LOAD AT 15.7% ABOVE SAFE THRESHOLD.
"Shut up," she muttered, tapping the alert away. The voice still came, smooth and synthetic.
Unstable adaptation detected. Would you like to initiate suppression protocol?
"No."
Confirmed. Proceeding without limit.
She rubbed her temples. The answers her students gave her were still bouncing around in her skull like shrapnel. Equations she didn't understand now made sense. The holographic lattice they'd shown her — she could still see it when she closed her eyes.
And worse, part of her wanted to see it again.
The Next Morning — 0700 Hours
The Academy's halls were empty except for cleaning drones and the low hum of the main generator. Sera walked in early, expecting to find her classroom untouched.
Instead, the room was alive.
Ryn was sketching fractal diagrams in the air with beams of refracted light. Tava had her tail hooked around one of the ceiling struts, hanging upside down as she read through what looked like an ancient Federal war archive. Kael stood at the window, whispering to the air as if the city itself were answering back.
Morthen was humming — a low, fungal resonance that made the glass tremble. Iri floated silently in her hydration field, eyes closed, hands folded as if in prayer.
Sera stopped at the door. "You're here before me."
Kael turned. "You told us to keep thinking."
"I didn't say to break into classified systems."
He smiled, like it was cute that she still thought those systems mattered.
Ryn flicked a beam of light toward her. It projected an image midair — a map of the Ruinborn swarm zones across the galaxy.
"Look," they said, voice chime-like. "Their migration patterns changed last night."
Sera froze. "Changed how?"
"They moved closer."
Her stomach dropped.
"Correlation or causation?" she asked, already knowing the answer.
Kael's voice was quiet. "You thought about erasing them. They noticed."
Her ability pulsed, as if agreeing. Growth, acceleration, hunger.
A chime sounded — the door slid open.
Dean Orren walked in, a tall Unafflicted man with silver augment lines running along his jaw. He looked perpetually tired.
"Professor Vance," he said, tone clipped. "My office. Now."
She glanced at her students. They were all staring at her — not worried, just… watching.
Like researchers watching an experiment unfold.
Dean Orren's Office
He didn't bother sitting. "I got three reports last night from the monitoring division. Neural spikes across your classroom. Energy readings that tripped planetary defense systems. Want to explain that?"
Sera kept her face neutral. "Faulty scanners. Happens when a Ruinborn frequency echoes through subspace."
"Save it," Orren snapped. "I read your file, Vance. You've got black ops written all over it. I know the signs."
She leaned back. "Then you know I'm not reckless."
"That's not what the readings say. They show a teacher pushing her ability past safe parameters. If you're running unauthorized experiments, the Bureau will come knocking. You remember what that means."
She did. They don't ask questions — they collect assets.
Her implant chimed again, like a heartbeat she couldn't quiet.
Neural load 23.1%. Adaptation phase accelerating.
Orren's voice faded as data scrolled across her vision, unbidden — schematics, energy equations, alien text. Her mind was expanding again.
She blinked and the world split.
For a second, she saw Orren as he really was — his bio-signature mapped in color bands, his thoughts like ripples on water. She could dismantle him with a sentence. Or a thought.
Then it vanished.
"Professor?" Orren asked.
Sera forced a smile. "You're right, Dean. I'll keep my power in check."
He stared at her a moment longer, then nodded and left.
The moment the door shut, she exhaled — half laugh, half panic.
Back in her classroom, the students hadn't moved.
Kael spoke first. "They're watching you now. Everyone is."
Sera looked at him. "Good. Maybe they'll learn something."
Ryn's voice turned crystalline cold. "Are you going to use us?"
Sera smiled — slow, sharp, dangerous. "No. I'm going to learn from you."
Tava's tail curled around her chair, amused. "And then?"
"Then I'll see just how far this growth goes."
Outside, thunder rolled across the shielded sky — except it wasn't weather. It was the rumble of something vast stirring in orbit.