The DPF skimmer was a sterile, humming cage. Riven sat on a cold alloy bench, the throbbing in his arm a dull counterpoint to the sharp, antiseptic smell of the air. They had patched him up with a sterile gel bandage, but no one had spoken to him beyond terse commands. Through the viewport, he watched the ruins of the industrial sector fall away, replaced by the sleek, towering spires of Aetheris's central command district. The world outside looked orderly, untouched. It felt like a lie.
Mira sat across from him, her posture rigid, her gaze analytical. She had removed her helmet, revealing a face that was younger than he expected, all sharp angles and unwavering intensity.
"The pendant," she said, her voice cutting through the engine's hum. "Where did you get it?"
Riven looked away, out at the passing city. "It was my mother's." The truth, or the truth he'd always believed. A fragment of the story Marrow had tried to shatter.
"Your mother," Mira repeated, her tone flat, disbelieving. "And the rifts? The demon that specifically targeted you in that warehouse? Coincidence?"
"I'm a relic hunter. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time." He clung to the narrative of his old life like a lifeline. To accept anything else was to fall into an abyss.
Mira leaned forward, her eyes narrowing. "I felt the energy pulse from your location twelve hours ago. I've been tracking you since. That wasn't a demonic rift. It was a reaction. The Archivist, Marrow… what did he tell you?"
Riven's head snapped toward her. "You know him?"
"He's a person of interest. A historian obsessed with the Great Division. He's been declared unstable." She studied his face, reading the conflict there. "He filled your head with stories, didn't he? About Sparda. About heirs and destinies."
Riven fell silent. He could still hear Marrow's voice. You were born in Nethyra. He clenched his jaw. A story. It had to be.
"I don't believe in fairy tales, Captain."
"I don't care what you believe," Mira countered, her voice dropping, becoming almost confidential, yet no less intense. "I care about the fact that a Level 5 Cataclysmic Breach—a type we've never seen before—opened directly on your coordinates. I care that the demonic forces on the other side displayed tactical coordination we've never witnessed. They weren't just breaking through. They were searching." Her eyes locked onto his. "They were searching for you."
Before Riven could form a denial, the skimmer shuddered violently. A deafening alarm blared. Crimson emergency lights replaced the steady white glow.
"Report!" Mira barked into her comm.
"Captain! Incoming rift—it's forming ahead of us! It's… it's blocking our path to Command!"
Through the main viewport, the air in front of them tore open. But this rift was different. It didn't spew forth a horde of monsters. Instead, a single figure stepped through, landing gracefully on a floating platform of obsidian that had manifested mid-air.
Jake Kaelith.
He stood, perfectly poised, his coat undisturbed by the wind whipping around the skimmer. His violet pendant glowed softly. He didn't look at the skimmer's weapons now training on him. His eyes, calm and terrifyingly familiar to Riven, found the viewport, looking directly at his brother.
His voice, amplified by some unseen power, resonated through the skimmer's hull, smooth as polished glass and just as cold.
"Hello, brother," Jake said. "You've been lost for a long time. It's time to come home."
Panic erupted inside the cabin. Riven felt the blood drain from his face. The world tilted. Brother. The word was a physical blow. He stared at the man—the demon—floating outside. The sharp jawline, the shape of the eyes… it was like looking into a distorted, nightmare version of a mirror.
"All weapons, fire!" the pilot screamed.
Plasma bolts lanced toward Jake. He didn't move. A shimmering, hexagonal barrier of violet energy materialized before him, absorbing the blasts without a ripple.
Jake's smile was a thin, cruel line. "You keep interesting company, Riven." His gaze flickered to Mira for a fraction of a second, a look of mild curiosity that was more insulting than hatred. Then his eyes were back on Riven, full of a possessive, terrifying intensity. "But these toys cannot protect you from your blood. From your name."
Riven found his voice, a raw, broken thing. "I don't know you!"
"You will," Jake promised, his voice dropping to a intimate, chilling whisper that seemed to be meant for Riven alone. "I will peel away every lie they've wrapped you in until only the truth remains. Our truth."
He raised a hand. The space around the skimmer warped, the very light bending. The engines whined in protest, their power failing.
"Brace for impact!" the pilot yelled.
The last thing Riven saw was Jake's unwavering gaze, a promise of relentless pursuit, before the world dissolved into violent, twisting motion and the screech of tearing metal. As the skimmer plummeted, Riven's final, coherent thought wasn't of demons or dimensions.
It was of a red sky, and a boy's voice, calling his name in a memory that was no longer a dream but a ghost from a life he refused to claim.