The pre-assault night stretched long and quiet.
Two hours until dawn. Two hours until we moved against Kokabiel. Two hours of waiting, planning, and trying not to think about everything that could go wrong.
I found Kiba on the academy roof.
He sat on the ledge, sword across his knees, staring at the blade like it held answers he couldn't find. The moonlight caught his face - tired, haunted, older than his years.
"You should be resting," I said.
"So should you."
Fair point. I moved to sit beside him - close, but not crowding. The Enhanced Analysis tracked his vitals, his posture, the micro-expressions that painted a picture of a man on the edge.
"You're thinking about tomorrow," I said.
"I'm thinking about the past." His fingers traced the sword's edge. "About the people I couldn't save."
Silence stretched between us. Below, Kuoh slept, unaware of the war about to break over it.
"Tell me," I said.
Kiba's voice came out flat. Distant. The voice of someone describing a nightmare they'd never woken from.
"The Holy Sword Project. Thirty children. I was eleven."
Thirty.
"The Church wanted to create artificial holy sword wielders. People who could wield Excalibur fragments without being born with the gift." His grip tightened on the blade. "They chose orphans. Children no one would miss."
"Efficient," the Fragment observed. "And monstrous."
Quiet.
"As you wish."
"The experiments were... extensive." Kiba's expression didn't change, but something in his eyes died. "They injected us with synthesized holy energy. Tested our compatibility. Pushed our bodies past breaking points." He paused. "Most of us didn't survive the first year."
"How many?"
"By the end, twelve remained. The Church called us 'promising candidates.'" The word tasted like poison in his mouth. "We weren't candidates. We were children. We had names. Dreams. We had each other."
I stayed silent. This wasn't a moment for words.
"The project was deemed a failure when none of us reached the required threshold. Valper Galilei - the head researcher - convinced the Church leadership that we were defective." Kiba's voice cracked. "Defective. That was his word."
"What happened?"
"Mass execution." The words fell like stones into still water. "They gathered us in a chamber and released a poisonous gas. Watched through glass as thirty children - my family - died screaming."
My chest tightened. The Enhanced Analysis provided context I didn't want - survival rates, exposure times, the clinical details of organized murder.
"I should have died with them." Kiba's hand trembled on his sword. "But my body... rejected the gas. Some quirk of the experiments. I was the only one who lived."
"You escaped?"
"I crawled out through a drainage pipe. Wandered for weeks, half-dead, until Rias found me." For the first time, something warm flickered in his expression. "She gave me a reason to keep living. A new family. A purpose."
"And now Valper is here."
"Now Valper is here." The warmth vanished, replaced by cold steel. "And I am going to kill him."
The silence stretched.
I understood vengeance. I'd felt it myself - the satisfaction of killing Chronos, the Dohnaseek-tainted pleasure of watching an enemy fall. I knew what it meant to want someone dead so badly it consumed everything else.
But I also knew where that path led.
"I lost something too," I said.
Kiba looked at me - really looked, for the first time since I'd arrived.
"My mother's voice." The words came harder than expected. "The Fragment took it as payment. I remember what she said - every word, every conversation - but I can't remember how she sounded. The warmth. The tone. The way she'd drop her register when she was serious." I touched my chest. "It's gone. Like someone dubbed over my memories with silence."
"That's..." Kiba trailed off. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be. It was a price I chose to pay." I met his eyes. "We carry ghosts, Kiba. You and me. The question is whether we let them drive us or whether we honor them."
"Honor them how?"
"By surviving. By protecting the people still alive. By making sure what happened to your family - what happened to my mother's voice - doesn't happen to anyone else."
Kiba stared at me for a long moment. Something shifted in his expression - not acceptance, not peace, but something adjacent to both.
"You sound like Rias," he said.
"Worse. I sound like myself."
A ghost of a smile. Gone as quickly as it appeared.
The Watcher struck without warning.
Kiba's story ended. I reached out -
Darkness. Vision.
Kiba charging Valper. Me failing to stop him.
Light lance through his chest. Blood. Death.
"His trauma will break you. 10 days, little thief."
I gasped. Pulled back.
[PSYCHIC ASSAULT: PRE-COMBAT]
[ECHO STATUS: 46%]
[Watcher acceleration: CRITICAL]
"Ryder?" Kiba's voice cut through the lingering darkness. "You look - "
"Fine." My hands shook. "Just... processing."
"That's not what 'fine' looks like."
He grabbed my arm. The contact was unexpected - Kiba wasn't usually physical. But his grip was steady, anchoring.
"Whatever you're carrying, share it." His eyes held mine. "We carry things together now."
"Sentimental weakness," the Watcher's voice echoed. "It will destroy you both."
I ignored it.
"The Watcher," I said. "He's in my head. Showing me visions of everyone I care about dying. Trying to push me toward 50% Echo."
Kiba processed this. "And what happens at 50%?"
"Either I integrate with the Fragment and become something new, or I break and become something else." I looked at my hands - still trembling, but less. "He's been using your trauma to accelerate the process. Every time you hurt, every time you rage, he amplifies it. Feeds it back into me."
"So my vendetta is putting you at risk."
"Your vendetta is your choice. I'm just asking you to make it consciously." I met his eyes. "If you go after Valper tomorrow, go because you've decided to - not because the ghost of your pain is driving you."
Silence.
Then Kiba nodded. "Together. We face him together."
"Together," I agreed. "Always."
The Balance Breaker triggered without warning.
One moment Kiba was calm. The next, power exploded from him - holy and demonic energy intertwining, sword after sword manifesting in the air around us. The rooftop cracked under the pressure.
His eyes went wide. Panic.
"I can't - I can't control - "
The swords spun wild. Random. Dangerous.
He's unstable. The emotion triggered it early.
"Help him," the Fragment urged. "Dohnaseek's control. Channel it."
I reached out - not physically, but with the Echo. Let Dohnaseek's discipline flow through me, not as possession but as guidance. The precision. The focus. The ability to compartmentalize emotion and act.
"Kiba." My voice came out steady. Calm. "Look at me."
He looked.
"Breathe. The power is yours. It responds to your will." I placed my hand on his shoulder - grounding. "You are not your trauma. You are not your rage. You are a knight who chose to protect."
The swords slowed. Stabilized. One by one, they fell into formation - no longer wild, but ordered.
Kiba breathed. The power settled into something sustainable.
"How did you - "
"I borrowed some discipline." I smiled slightly. "Don't worry. The original owner doesn't need it anymore."
He stared at me. Then, impossibly, he laughed.
"You're strange, Ryder Cross."
"So I've been told."
We sat on the rooftop until dawn.
The sky lightened from black to gray to gold. Kuoh woke beneath us - students preparing for school, unaware that their world might end before lunch. Normal life, continuing as if nothing was wrong.
"Whatever happens tomorrow," Kiba said, "you're my brother."
The word hit harder than expected. Brother. Not teammate, not ally - brother.
"Same," I said.
"Touching," the Watcher whispered. "9 days. Enjoy them."
I didn't care. I had people worth fighting for. I had control - precarious, fragile, but real. I had a chance.
And in an hour, I'd have a battle.
The assault teams gathered at the ORC.
Rias stood at the center, crimson hair catching the early light. Akeno beside her, lightning crackling between her fingers. Koneko, silent and ready. Asia, clutching her healing hands together. Xenovia and Irina, holy swords humming with power.
And Mira, in the corner, watching everyone with Fragment-sharp eyes.
"Teams," Rias said. "You know your positions. You know your objectives." Her gaze swept the room - settling on Kiba, on me, on each member of her family. "Today, we stop a war before it starts. Today, we protect Kuoh. Today, we show Kokabiel what happens when you threaten our home."
No one spoke. No one needed to.
"Move out."
The sun rose over Kuoh.
Today, we'd face Kokabiel. Today, we'd stop a ritual that could kill angels. Today, Kiba would confront the man who murdered his family.
And the Watcher would watch, waiting for me to break.
But I wasn't going to break. Not today. Not ever.
Together.
Always.