Level 3 smelled wrong.
Not blood. Not smoke.
Clean.
Too clean.
White corridors stretched endlessly under soft lighting, walls lined with medical interfaces pulsing calm blues and greens, heart rates, neural graphs, artificial serenity designed to lull patients into trusting their captors.
Aine walked through it like a stain that wouldn't wash out.
Her shoulder burned where the bullet had grazed her earlier. Her ribs protested with every breath. She ignored both.
"Host," Sera said quietly,
"this wing is designed for observation, not treatment."
Aine's eyes flicked over the glass rooms lining the hall. Patients lay inside, some sedated, some staring vacantly at the ceiling, others twitching faintly as machines hummed around them.
"They're specimens," Aine said flatly.
"Yes."
The lights ahead dimmed.
Aine stopped.
She listened.
A heartbeat too many.
—
Three figures stepped out from intersecting corridors.
Not guards.
Doctors.
White coats. Augmented visors. Calm faces reinforced by synthetic calm suppressors embedded at their temples.
Each carried a compact firearm and a shock baton.
"Subject has breached containment," one said dispassionately. "Lethal force authorized."
Aine sighed.
"Doctors," she said. "You should've stayed in classrooms."
The first raised his weapon—
Bang!
Aine moved before the muzzle flash finished blooming.
She twisted sideways, the round tearing fabric instead of flesh, and hurled her knife—
Clang!
It smashed into the man's visor, shattering it as the blade punched through bone.
He dropped without a sound.
The second lunged, baton crackling—
Clash!
Aine caught the strike on her forearm guard, sparks spraying as she drove her knee up—
Crack!
The man folded, coughing blood.
The third fired wildly—
Bang! Bang!
Aine closed the distance in three steps.
She grabbed his wrist, twisted—
Crack!
The gun hit the floor.
She slammed his head into the glass wall—
Wham!
Once.
Twice.
Thud!
The corridor fell silent again.
"Non-combatants," Sera noted.
"…legally."
Aine wiped her blade clean on a fallen coat.
"Complicit," she replied. "That's enough."
—
The name glowed softly on the door ahead.
PATIENT: FAY BRIGHTWOOD
ACCESS: RESTRICTED
Aine didn't slow.
She planted her palm against the biometric panel and crushed it—
Clang!
Metal buckled. Sparks flew.
The door slid open.
The room beyond was small. Quiet. White.
Machines hummed softly around a single bed.
And there—
Fay Brightwood lay motionless beneath thin sheets.
Pale. Fragile. Tubes threaded into her arms and neck. Her chest rose shallowly, each breath measured and assisted.
For a fraction of a second—
Aine froze.
Not from fear.
From recognition.
She felt it immediately. The pull. The ache. The sense of missing snapping violently into place.
"…So that's you," Aine whispered.
"Vital signs unstable," Sera said, voice low.
"Neural degradation accelerating."
Aine stepped closer.
Fay's face was peaceful in a way that made Aine's stomach twist. She looked untouched by violence, untouched by the world Aine had grown up in.
Aine reached out and brushed her knuckles lightly against Fay's fingers.
Warm.
Alive.
Barely.
Her jaw clenched.
"I'm here," Aine said softly. "You don't get to die."
—
The machines spiked.
Alarms shrieked—
BEEEEEP! BEEEEEP!
The room locked down.
Steel shutters slammed over the exits—
Clang! Clang!
Aine spun.
"Of course," she muttered.
The wall opposite Fay's bed slid open, revealing a reinforced chamber beyond.
Figures emerged.
Five Gene Knights. Mark III units. Leaner than the last, faster, eyes burning with artificial aggression.
One stepped forward.
"Subject retrieval in progress," it said in a distorted voice. "Resistance will be terminated."
Aine positioned herself between them and the bed.
Her stance lowered.
Her breathing steadied.
"You don't take her," she said. "You don't even look at her."
The Knights charged.
The floor shook—
Boom!
Aine met them head-on.
She seized a fallen rifle and fired—
Bang! Bang! Bang!
One Knight staggered, chest armor cracking.
Another swung—
Clash!
Steel rang as Aine blocked with the rifle, the impact snapping it in half.
She drove the broken stock forward—
Crack!
A skull caved in.
A Knight tackled her—
Wham!
They smashed into a wall, medical equipment exploding outward—
Clang! Boom!
Aine headbutted—
Crack!
She twisted, broke free, and slammed a blade into the Knight's neck—
Thud!
The last two flanked her.
"Host—behind you!" Sera snapped.
Aine spun—
Bang!
She fired blind, the shot tearing through an eye socket.
The final Knight roared and charged.
Aine met it with a kick—
Boom!
Both of them skidded across the floor.
She rose first.
She always did.
She grabbed its head and twisted—
Crack!
The body dropped.
Silence crashed down like a held breath released.
—
Aine stood alone, blood dripping from her gloves, chest rising steadily as she turned back to the bed.
Fay's vitals flickered wildly.
"Host," Sera said urgently,
"her condition is destabilizing. She won't survive prolonged movement without intervention."
Aine reached down and disconnected the machines with ruthless precision.
Alarms screamed again—
BEEEEEP!
She scooped Fay into her arms.
Light.
Too light.
Aine's jaw tightened.
"I've got you," she murmured.
As she turned toward the exit, emergency lighting pulsed crimson.
Viremont was no longer trying to contain her.
They were trying to kill everything in this wing.
"Structural purge incoming," Sera warned.
"Host—this facility is choosing eradication."
Aine adjusted her grip, shielding Fay against her chest.
"Then they've made their last decision."
She stepped forward into the chaos and City A felt the weight of a Princess who refused to let go.
—
The corridor detonated behind her.
Boom!
A shockwave ripped through Level 3 as fire roared down the hall, swallowing white walls and shattering glass into lethal rain. Aine lunged forward, turning her body to shield Fay as debris hammered her back—
Clang! Clatter!
She hit the floor hard, rolled once, then came up moving.
"Route," Aine snapped.
"Left junction, maintenance spine," Sera replied instantly.
"You have ninety seconds before the purge seals the wing."
Aine sprinted.
Her boots pounded the tiles, rhythm precise, breath controlled. She vaulted a fallen gurney—Thud!
—and skidded through a sliding door as it began to close—
Clang!
Metal scraped her shoulder. Pain flared. She didn't slow.
Ahead, the maintenance spine narrowed into a steel throat lined with exposed conduits. Red lights strobed. Sirens howled.
Then the air changed.
Aine felt it a half-step before it happened.
"Down," she said, and dropped.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Suppressive fire tore overhead, chewing through pipes. Steam exploded—
Hissss!
Three Black Veil–grade operators poured in from above, rappelling down in synchronized motion. Not Viremont grunts. Contractors. Professionals.
They landed and split, weapons up—
Clash!
Aine slammed into the first with a shoulder check that sent him spinning into a bulkhead. She pivoted, drew, fired—
Bang!
The second operator staggered as the round punched through his visor.
The third came fast, blade flashing—
Clang!
Steel met steel. Sparks burst as Aine parried one-handed, Fay cradled tight against her chest. The man pressed, brutal and efficient. Aine stepped inside his guard and drove her elbow up—
Crack!
Bone gave. She followed with a short blade across the throat—
Thud!
Silence returned—briefly.
The floor bucked.
Boom!
A blast door ahead slammed down, sealing the corridor.
Aine skidded to a stop, eyes flicking left, right, options collapsing.
"Host," Sera said, urgent but steady, "vent shaft above. Structural integrity compromised, one chance."
Aine didn't argue.
She leapt, planted a foot on the wall, and kicked upward—
Clang!
The vent grille buckled. She ripped it free and hauled herself up, muscles screaming as the corridor beneath erupted—
Boom!
Fire chased her heels as she crawled, dragging Fay through smoke and heat. The shaft shook, metal groaning—
Crrrack!
"Almost," Aine growled.
She burst out into open air as the vent spat her onto a rooftop—rain-slick, wind howling, city blazing beneath.
A VTOL gunship rose from below, cannons swiveling.
Target lock.
Whrrrr—
Aine turned, back to the edge, Fay shielded by her body.
She hurled a compact charge.
Boom!
The explosion clipped the gunship's wing, sending it spiraling away in a screaming arc—
Bang! Bang!—secondary detonations flared as it vanished into the city.
Aine didn't watch it fall.
She ran.
A black aircraft swept in low, engines screaming. A ramp dropped.
Marcus Vale's voice cut through the rain. "Now!"
Aine jumped.
Hands grabbed her. The ramp slammed shut.
Clang!
The craft surged skyward as the Black Chrysalis burned behind them, alarms wailing, smoke clawing at the night.
Inside, Aine knelt, breath steady at last. She adjusted Fay gently, checking her pulse.
Still there.
Weak, but there.
"Extraction successful," Sera said softly.
"Host… you did it."
Aine looked down at her sister, rainwater dripping from her hair onto Fay's pale cheek.
"Not finished," she said quietly. "Just begun."
Outside, City A burned brighter—and Viremont learned the cost of touching what belonged to the Princess.