REN PLUTO
The tunnel was silent.
No. Not silent.
Ren could hear it.
Sobbing.
A wet terrified "I'm gonna die" sound from the darkness back the way he'd come.
The witness. The kid with the knee.
Ren didn't care. Let him run. Let him tell the world.
If they can't find the body, it didn't happen.
That was the law. And Thorne's body was currently on its way to whatever hell waited at the end of this tunnel.
Ren looked at his new white shining 448 rank. He'd just fed the machine.
Kieran.
The reason he was in this shithole. The reason he'd just been jumped. The little rat who'd squealed.
Ren grabbed the pry bar. Slick with... stuff. He didn't care. Used it to haul his aching shattered body to his feet.
A goddamn mess. Covered in blood. Marked.
He picked up his phone. Screen cracked. Light a weak flickering pathetic thing.
Good enough.
He stalked back down the catwalk. Boots thudding on the grate. A hunter's-fucking-stomp.
"KIERAN!"
His voice wasn't a yell. A roar. Shredded raw guttural sound echoing off pipes like a grenade.
"I KNOW YOU'RE HERE, YOU FUCKING 499 RAT!"
Pissed. Rage back. Cold clean focusing fire.
"THORNE'S GONE!" Voice cracking. "HE'S GONE. YOU THINK HE WAS YOUR PROBLEM? YOUR PROBLEM IS ME!"
A sound. A scuttle. Like a rat in a wall.
Ren whipped his light over.
A small maintenance alcove. Junction of pipes.
A pair of wide terrified glowing eyes.
Ren was on him. Crossed ten feet in two strides. A limping bloody nightmare.
He was tiny.
Ren had expected something. Not this.
The kid was a... a kid. Small. Greasy hair plastered to forehead. Oil stains on fingers. Swimming in a uniform two sizes too big.
But not a freshman uniform.
The piping on the blazer... silver. Not dull gray like his own.
This was him. The Fallen Sophomore.
Kieran. Rank 499. The very bottom.
"I didn't—" Kieran stammered. Teeth chattering. "I didn't mean to. I swear. Thorne made me. Takes my food. Said he'd just scare you. Just talk to you."
"He talked." Ren growled.
He grabbed the kid. Not by throat. By front of blazer. Hauled him up. Slammed him against brick. Head hit with dull thud. Pry bar clattered to grate. Deafening.
"You're lucky." Ren hissed. Face inches from his. Smelling fear. Sour unwashed terror. "Lucky I still need you. Or you'd be in the water with him."
Kieran just... broke.
Not a rat. A baby. Started sobbing. High-pitched ugly please-don't-kill-me wail.
"I'll do it! Anything! I swear! Please... please, 448... please..."
"Shut up." Ren snarled. "Shut up or I'll make you."
He let go.
Kieran slumped. Slid down wall. Boneless weeping pile of 499 trash.
Ren hated him. Hated his weakness. Pathetic.
He reached into pocket. Hand slick. Pulled out the locket. Covered in blood. His. Thorne's.
Didn't care. Wiped it on torn blazer.
Crouched. Motion sent white-hot spike of agony up shoulder. Ignored it.
Shoved locket in Kieran's face.
"The girl who left this." Ren growled. "Said there's a message inside. Read it."
Kieran looked at the locket. Eyes—red-rimmed, full of tears—went wide.
He knew it.
"S-Sarah's..." He whispered. Reached out trembling oil-stained hand. "Sarah's locket. You found it?"
"She left it." Ren's voice impatient. "Said it was a glitch. Way to crash the chair. Now read it."
Kieran's whole face changed. Fear still there. But underneath... awe.
"I can't." Stammered. "Not a note. Micro-dot. Code. Military. She was smart."
"Then decode it." Ren snarled. "Now."
Kieran moved.
Not a sniveling rat anymore. A professional.
Scrambled to a small hidden pack Ren hadn't seen. Unzipped it. Not full of food. Not full of weapons.
Full of tech.
Small handheld reader. Mess of wires. Goddamn soldering iron.
His lab. His power.
Kieran's hands—shaking like leaves—suddenly... still. He took the locket. Didn't break it. Used tiny precision tool to pop the back. Extracted the micro-dot.
Fed it into his handheld.
Not a baby anymore. A genius. Fingers flying across tiny keypad. Muttering to himself. High-speed technical mumble Ren couldn't follow.
"Old-world encryption... asymmetric... she piggybacked on campus network file... she's good... really good..."
Ren just... watched. Leaned good shoulder against wall. Adrenaline gone. Just cold. Shoulder screaming. Bleeding.
Needed this done.
"Got it." Kieran whispered. Voice full of terrified holy awe.
"Read it." Ren commanded.
Kieran turned the handheld. Not reading. Translating.
"Not a map." He whispered. "A theory. Sarah's final project."
He looked at Ren. Eyes huge.
"The Chair." Voice shaking. "Not a computer. A harvest. A symbiote. Reads trauma. Feeds on the spikes."
Ren's heart a cold dead stone. "The weapon, Kieran. Where's the weapon?"
Kieran swallowed. Read the next line.
"Has a flaw. Fatal one. Can't process paradox. Designed for pure-state emotion. Pure fear. Pure rage. Pure grief."
Kieran looked up. Face dawning horrified understanding.
"But if you can feed it two at the exact same time. Same intensity. Love and rage. Hope anddespair. It's a glitch. A contradiction. It can't process. It'll—"
Kieran's voice died.
"It'll what?" Ren snarled.
Kieran looked at him.
"Crash." Whispered. "The whole system. The Chair. The network. The Coudhayes harvest. All of it. One paradox at the right moment. It's a kill switch."
Ren just... stood there.
Contradictory high-intensity emotions.
Love and rage at the same time.
That was it. That was the bullet.
"How?" Ren's voice raw. "How do you make someone feel both?"
Kieran shook his head. "Not someone. You. Has to be you. Has to be the one in the Chair. The trauma has to be yours. The contradiction has to be yours. That's what Sarah figured out. That's what she died for."
Ren's mind raced. His stepfather's ring. His mother's face. The rage. Always the rage.
But love? What did he have to love?
Nothing. No one.
The locket. Sarah's locket. She'd left it for a reason.
He looked at Kieran. "There's more. What else did she leave?"
Kieran scrolled. His face went pale.
"There's a location." He whispered. "Sub Level Twelve. A maintenance shaft behind the incinerator room. She... she hid something there. More notes. Maybe... maybe a way to trigger it."
Sub Level Twelve.
Where the journal said they'd taken Eunice Choi.
Where Sarah had gone before she disappeared.
Ren snatched the handheld reader.
"Hey! That's my life! I need that!" Kieran scrambled. Reaching.
Ren just... looked at him.
Rank 448. Covered in blood. Holding a pry bar.
Kieran's hand froze mid-air. Dropped.
"We're done." Ren growled. Shoved reader into pocket next to journal.
Turned to leave. Had the key.
"Wait!" Kieran's voice a desperate squeak.
Ren stopped. Didn't turn.
"The kid." Kieran stammered. "The one who ran. Tate. He's gonna talk. Heard him. Going right to faculty. Gonna Severance you. Get his hundred points. You're still dead, 448!"
A witness. The Severance Clause.
Ren stood there. Back to the rat.
Thought about the body. The splash.
The glowing white 448 on his wrist.
"Let him talk." Ren's voice a cold dead rasp.
He turned his head. Just enough to look at Kieran over shattered shoulder.
"He can't Severance a ghost. And Thorne's body? It didn't happen."
He stalked off. Leaving Kieran in the dark.
Bleeding. Marked. A target.
But he had the locket. The reader.
And finally... finally a bullet for their gun.
The climb back to Sub Level 4 was a nightmare.
Each step up the rusted stairs sent lightning through his shoulder. His vision kept greying at the edges. The blood on his hands had dried to a dark crackling film.
He didn't stop.
Didn't dare.
The witness—Tate—was ahead of him somewhere. Crawling. Bleeding. Desperate.
If Tate reached faculty first, if he made his Severance play, Ren was finished. The whole unit was finished. The door. The journal. The locket. All of it.
Move.
He pushed harder. Ignored the pain. Ignored the black spots.
Sub Level 4 hallway. Dark. Dripping. Empty.
He limped to Suite 734. Pressed his good hand to the door. It held. Maven's patch. Maven's miracle.
He pushed inside.
The room exploded.
"What the FUCK happened to you?"
Nyx was off her bunk, baton drawn, eyes scanning the doorway behind him for threats.
Ravi was on his feet, face white. "Ren—your shoulder—the blood—"
Zelie sat up, eyes wide, that hungry smile flickering.
Jules made a small horrified sound and curled tighter.
Sayer didn't move. Just watched from her corner. Those empty grey-hazel eyes tracking every drop of blood.
And Maven—
Maven was already moving. Grabbing her bag. Her makeshift medical kit. Crossing to him before anyone else could speak.
"Sit." She pointed at his bunk. "Now."
Ren didn't argue. He sat. The world tilted.
Maven's hands—steady now, the mouse replaced by the medic—peeled back his torn blazer. He hissed as air hit the wound.
"Dislocated." She muttered. "Maybe broken. Can't tell with the swelling. You need the infirmary."
"No." Ren's voice was iron.
"Ren—"
"No infirmary. They'll ask questions. They'll scan. They'll find the blood that isn't mine." He looked at her. "Fix it here."
Maven's jaw tightened. She looked at his shoulder. At his face. At the blood.
"I'm not a doctor." Quiet.
"You're an Alchemist." Ren's voice softer than he intended. "Fix it."
She held his gaze for a long moment. Then nodded.
"Ravi. Boiling water. Zelie. Tear strips from something clean. Sheets. Whatever. Nyx. Hold him down if he screams."
They moved.
Maven worked. Her hands sure. Efficient. Talking to herself in that low rapid mumble.
"Clavicle's intact... rotator cuff stretched but not torn... dislocation, anterior... have to pop it back..."
She looked at Ren.
"This is going to hurt."
"Just do it."
She grabbed his arm. Braced her foot against the bunk frame. Pulled. Twisted. Pushed.
Ren's world went white.
He didn't scream. But he came close. Teeth clenched so hard he thought they'd crack. The pain was a physical thing—hot, bright, everywhere.
Then—a pop. A release.
The pain didn't disappear. But it changed. Became manageable. Throbbing instead of screaming.
Maven was already wrapping. Using the strips Zelie brought. Tight. Professional.
"You'll live." She muttered. "Shoulder'll be weak for weeks. Don't use it. Don't be an idiot."
Ren almost laughed. Too tired.
He looked at her. Really looked.
This girl—Rank 500, the mouse, the one the journal said not to trust—had just saved his life. Again.
Don't trust the mice.
The warning echoed.
But Maven wasn't a mouse. She was something else entirely.
And right now, she was the only reason he was still breathing.
The room settled.
Nyx took first watch by the door. Ravi sat with Jules, murmuring quietly. Zelie returned to her bunk, still watching, still calculating. Sayer melted deeper into her corner.
Ren lay on his bunk. Stared at the ceiling.
The handheld reader pressed against his thigh. The locket cold against his chest. The journal a hard square against his spine.
He had the weapon.
Love and rage. Simultaneous. Paradox.
How?
He closed his eyes. His stepfather's face. The ring. The words: Don't you dare come back.
Rage. Easy. Always there.
But love?
His mother. Her face when he left. The way she'd hugged him—really hugged him—for the first time in years. The way she'd whispered: Be safe.
That was something. Maybe enough.
Maybe.
He heard Maven settle onto her bunk across from him. Felt her eyes on him in the dark.
"Ren." Her voice soft. Barely a whisper.
He didn't answer. Didn't move.
"The journal." She said. "The one you found. It said something about me, didn't it?"
Ren's eyes opened. Stared at the ceiling.
"Don't trust the mice." He murmured.
Silence. Long and heavy.
Then Maven's voice. Quiet. Steady.
"Good advice. You shouldn't trust me. I wouldn't trust me."
Ren turned his head. Looked at her across the dark room.
She was watching him. Those huge dark eyes. Unreadable.
"But I'm not your enemy, Ren." She whispered. "I'm just trying to survive. Same as you."
She pulled her blanket up. Turned away.
Ren stared at the ceiling.
Don't trust the mice.
But the mouse had just saved his life.
Again.
He closed his eyes.
Tomorrow, he'd figure out the rest.