They walked for several streets before anyone spoke.
The crowd thinned gradually, sound peeling away in layers. First the whispers faded. Then the foot traffic. Then the low hum of voices softened into the distant clatter of carts and the hiss of steam vents bleeding into the air.
Seventeen followed a half step behind Myers.
His body still felt wrong.
Not pain exactly. That had dulled into something distant. A tightness in his chest. A faint pressure behind his eyes. His arms felt heavier than they should have, as if the world had added weight while he wasn't looking.
The stone sat inside him, quiet and without sensation.
As if it had never existed.
He tried to steady his breathing. Tried to gather his thoughts. The prayer. The crowd. The way people had looked at Myers.
It all felt like it had happened to someone else.
Finally—
"What was that—"
"During the fight," Myers cut in.
Seventeen blinked.
Myers didn't stop slow.
"Did you feel anything," he asked, more deliberate now, "before you got back up?"
Seventeen frowned slightly, searching his memory.
The blur of motion.
His hand splitting open.
His arm tearing itself out of place.
The moment everything went white and heavy and sharp all at once.
"I don't know," he said. "It's… fuzzy."
Myers said nothing.
Seventeen swallowed and kept trying.
"I remember being on the ground," Seventeen continued. "I remember thinking my arm wasn't there anymore. Like it didn't belong to me."
He flexed his fingers without realizing it.
"It hurt," he added. "A lot. Then it was hard to breathe."
The image shifted.
The crowd above him. Mouths moving. No sound.
Something cold splashing against his face.
Their drinks.
His jaw tightened slightly.
"I remember hating it," he said quietly. "Not losing. Just… being there."
A beat.
"No. Not anger."
He swallowed.
"Hatred."
Myers slowed.
"I hated what I was to them," he said. "Something you throw things at. Something you watch."
The memory sharpened.
"Then I saw it move again," he said. "The Ogrith. It wasn't done."
That part was clear.
Too clear.
"My chest tightened. Everything felt hot. Like I was burning from the inside."
He paused.
"The pain didn't stop,"
A pause.
"I just stopped listening to it."
He exhaled.
"I don't remember standing up," he admitted. "I just… ran."
The street narrowed until the buildings nearly touched. Clean stone gave way to cracked tile and packed dirt. Pipes ran low along the walls, wrapped in old cloth and rusted wire. Water pooled in uneven grooves underfoot.
This part of the city felt unfinished. Forgotten. Like it was pressed together out of necessity rather than design.
Myers finally turned.
The bucket angled toward Seventeen's chest.
"The Core," he said carefully. "It reacted."
A pause.
"Not to pain,"
Another.
"And not to fear."
His fingers twitched once at his side.
"That kind of heat," he murmured, more to himself, "doesn't come from exertion."
Silence stretched between them.
Seventeen tried to make sense of it. The hatred. The heat. The way the world had snapped back into focus when it should have gone dark.
Before he could speak again—
Knock. Knock. Knock.
The sound echoed sharply through the narrow alley as Myers rapped his knuckles against the old wooden door.
"We'll figure it out later," Myers said quietly. "For now—"
A small pause.
"Pay attention."