The days before a mission always felt shorter.
Objectively, Aiden knew that wasn't true. The clocks in the transfer station ticked at the same pace as anywhere else. But planning compressed time, cutting it into slices of tasks and contingencies until there was no room left between them.
"Again," he said.
Kael exhaled, eyes narrowed at the twisted ring of scrap metal hanging from a cable in the middle of the room.
The Network had turned one corner of the safehouse into a training pit chalk marks on the floor, scorch‑stains on the walls, buckets of sand and water lined up against one side.
Kael raised his hand.
Lightning jumped.
It wasn't a dramatic arc this time, not the wild, lashing force Aiden had seen when the collar first came off. It was a tight, controlled bolt that snapped from Kael's fingers to the metal, searing through it and leaving a smoking gap.
The ring swung, half‑molten.
Aiden checked the monitor Taro had cobbled together from stolen Department tech and underground ingenuity.
"Output spike, then drop," Aiden said. "Better than last run. You pulled back faster."
Kael shook out his hand, jaw clenched.
"Feels like trying to thread a needle with a lightning storm," he said. "But sure. Let's call that progress."
"You're keeping the discharge narrow," Aiden said. "We'll need that. Twelve‑North's shields are layered. Overload them too broadly and the system just reroutes. Hit the right node and the rest stutters."
Kael gave him a sideways look.
"You're frighteningly enthusiastic about breaking your old workplace," he said.
"It was never mine," Aiden said. "Just somewhere I wore a uniform."
He reset the ring.
Across the room, Lysa argued quietly with two scouts over a map, tracing entry vectors and fallback paths.
She'd been in "mission mode" since they decided on Twelve‑North sleeping in snatches, mind three steps ahead, temper held tight.
"Again," Aiden repeated.
Kael groaned.
"Do you have any idea how dehydrating it is to electrocute things all afternoon?" he asked.
"We'll rotate," Aiden said. "Precision, then endurance. We're not going in unless you can spike three times in a row without losing control."
"Three," Kael said. "You're generous."
"Two to take down shields," Aiden said. "One to deal with whatever they put in front of us when the lights go out."
Kael opened his mouth, then shut it.
"Fair," he said.
He lifted his hand again.
This time the bolt hit slightly wide, clipping the ring and biting into the cable.
Sparks showered down.
Aiden dragged a shield up on instinct, a shimmering veil of bending light that caught most of the debris before it hit them.
When the flash faded, he let it drop.
Kael stared.
"You still do that?" he asked.
Aiden frowned.
"Do what?"
"Move without thinking about it," Kael said. "Like your body remembers being an agent even when your brain is busy betraying things."
"It's not betrayal if the target deserves it," Aiden said automatically.
Kael's mouth twitched.
"You keep saying that like you're trying to convince someone," he said.
"I am," Aiden said. "Mostly myself."
Lysa walked over, boots crunching faintly on old grit.
"How's your living thunderbolt?" she asked.
"Annoyed," Kael said. "But less likely to accidentally fry our own side."
"Good," she said. "Try not to electrocute anyone we like."
"We like people now?" Kael asked.
"Occasionally," Lysa said.
She turned to Aiden.
"Walk me through the access levels again," she said. "From the perspective of someone who used to have clearance and now very much doesn't."
Aiden wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his wrist.
"Twelve‑North has four main rings," he said. "Outer perimeter is standard security guards, cameras, shields. Second ring is diagnostics and intake. Third is labs. Fourth is core containment high‑risk Deviants, prototype collars, anything they're not ready to show even to their own."
"And you've been in which?" Lysa asked.
"First and second, once," Aiden said. "Mostly I worked off remote feeds. They don't like field agents seeing too much of the inside."
"Which means we're walking into a partial diagram," Lysa said. "Love that for us."
Kael crossed his arms, eyes distant.
"The intake corridors smell like antiseptic and ozone," he said. "The lights are too bright. The cells in the second ring have windows. The ones deeper in don't bother."
Aiden glanced at him.
"You remember more than layout," he said.
Kael's jaw worked.
"I remember enough to know we're going to find people in there who thought no one was coming," he said.
Lysa didn't soften.
"Then we manage expectations," she said. "This is not a mass breakout. We don't have the numbers, the transport, or the shields. We're going in for proof and specific high‑value extractions if the opportunity's there."
Kael's head snapped toward her.
"'High‑value' by whose definition?" he asked.
"By mine," Lysa said. "People whose survival shifts the balance. Leaders, organizers, anyone with information or power that changes the narrative."
"And the others?" Kael demanded.
Silence stretched.
Aiden stepped in before the edges of the room sharpened too much.
"We'll do what we can," he said. "But if we try to move everyone, we lose everyone. Including us. And then there is no one left to fight for them."
Kael laughed once, harsh.
"You're very good at talking me into hating reality less," he said.
"I'm not asking you to like it," Aiden said. "Just to survive it."
Lysa tapped the map with one finger.
"We're looking at three teams," she said. "Taro on systems, support crew on extraction routes, and you two with me for the spearpoint."
Kael raised a hand.
"Question," he said. "Why are we trusting me at the front of anything? Have we met me?"
"Because you break things," Lysa said. "And Aiden bends them. I need both."
Aiden didn't argue.
Break and bend.
Flame and order.
He'd seen worse alignments.
***
Taro's corner of the safehouse looked like someone had exploded a tech lab and then tried to rebuild it from memory.
Screens glowed with scrolling code and schematics. Disassembled collars lay in pieces on a table, their runes inert. The air hummed with low‑grade energy from a coil Taro insisted was "perfectly stable."
"You're late," Taro said without looking up.
"We weren't scheduled," Aiden said.
"Emotionally late, then," Taro replied. "Come here."
He tossed Kael a metal band.
Kael caught it on reflex, then nearly dropped it when he realized what it was.
"A collar," he said.
"Prototype," Taro corrected. "Dead. Empty shell. Took me all morning to gut it without setting off any tracer spells. You're welcome."
Kael turned it over, the weight familiar and hateful in his hand.
"Why," he asked slowly, "are you giving me this?"
"Because you're walking into a place full of scanners built to recognize you as a walking hazard," Taro said. "The moment you step through the outer ring, alarms will sing songs in your honor. Unless we fool them."
Aiden leaned closer.
"You want to mask his signature," he said.
"Very good," Taro said. "Gold star. The collars don't just suppress; they identify. The system knows the pattern of every unit it's ever activated. We can't counterfeit that cleanly, but we can parasitize it."
"In Common," Kael said.
Taro rolled his eyes.
"I'm going to turn this shell into a noise generator," he said. "When you wear it loosely, calm down it'll broadcast a familiar, acceptable signal. The system will think you're just another obedient Deviant in transit, as long as you don't push your power too hard."
Kael stared at him.
"You want me to put a collar back on," he said.
"Technically around, not on," Taro said. "It won't lock. It won't suppress. It'll just lie."
The room felt colder.
Aiden watched Kael's knuckles whiten around the metal.
"No," Kael said.
Taro blinked.
"Excuse me?"
"I'm not wearing that," Kael said. "I just got rid of one. I'm not walking into Twelve‑North dressed like their favorite victim."
"It's a tool," Taro said. "An ugly one, but effective. You'll be able to move without setting off half their grid."
Kael shook his head, breathing tight.
"I can't," he said. "You don't—"
He broke off.
Aiden stepped forward, carefully.
"Kael," he said. "Look at me."
Kael didn't.
His eyes were fixed on the circular metal like it might spring to life at any moment.
Aiden took the band gently from his hand and set it on the table, putting himself between Kael and the sight of it.
"It's not the same," Aiden said.
"It feels the same," Kael replied, voice thin. "The weight. The shape. The… expectation."
Taro hesitated, then nodded once, expression losing some of its usual flippancy.
"Psychological trauma acknowledged," he said. "But the tactical problem remains. We need a way to keep you from screaming 'unleashed anomaly' the second we cross their threshold."
Aiden thought for a moment.
"What about external masking?" he asked. "Illusory dampening field layered over his output. Not perfect, but enough to muddle scans."
Taro snorted.
"In an ideal world, sure," he said. "In this world, the moment you start weaving that kind of illusion, their systems will detect the interference pattern. And that's assuming you don't pass out keeping it up."
"So we're back to the band," Lysa said from the doorway.
She'd come up silently, like always.
Kael squared his shoulders.
"No," he said. "We're not. You're going to have to plan around the fact that I'm loud."
"A loud Deviant inside Twelve‑North is a target and a beacon," Lysa said. "They'll throw everything at you. That might help the rest of us. It might also get you killed before you touch a single shield."
Kael met her gaze.
"So give me something worth dying for," he said.
Aiden's breath caught.
"No," he said automatically.
Kael shot him a look.
"I'm not planning on it," he said. "But if we're being realistic about risk, then let's be realistic. I'm the one they want to break. I'm the story they're telling. If my presence buys you thirty seconds at the core, maybe that's the exchange."
"No," Aiden repeated, harder. "We are not building a plan that assumes you don't walk out."
Lysa raised a hand.
"Both of you stop reacting like I just shoved you onto a sacrificial altar," she said. "No one is dying for the aesthetics. We're trying to avoid deaths, remember?"
She looked at Kael.
"If wearing a shell buys us stealth," she said, "we should at least test the idea. Not decide based on disgust."
Kael swallowed.
"What if I freeze?" he asked, voice low. "What if it clamps around my neck and I can't think? What if I'm back there before we even hit the first door?"
Aiden understood that fear too well.
"I'll be there," he said quietly. "If it's too much, we rip it off and improvise. But we should know your limit before we're inside."
Kael closed his eyes.
The room listened to his breathing.
Finally, he opened them again.
"Fine," he said. "We test. Once. If I say no after that, it's no."
Lysa nodded.
"Agreed," she said.
Taro handed the band back with unusual care.
"No charge," he said. "No lock. It's a dead ring with clever wiring. You put it on and take it off yourself. No one touches it but you."
Kael held it for a moment.
His hands shook only a little this time.
He lifted the band toward his neck.
The air in the room seemed to stop.
The metal touched his skin.
Kael flinched, every muscle tightening.
For a second, Aiden thought he'd rip it away.
Then Kael took a slow, deliberate breath and settled it loosely around his throat.
It didn't click shut.
It didn't hum.
It just sat there, a ghost of what it had once been.
"How does it feel?" Aiden asked.
"Like a bad memory," Kael said. "But… lighter."
Taro watched the scanner.
"Signature masking at seventy percent," he said. "We can boost that with a little extra work. As long as he doesn't light up like a festival lantern, the system will think he's collared. Mostly."
"Mostly," Kael repeated. "Wonderful."
Aiden stepped closer, fingers itching to pull the band off and throw it into a furnace.
Instead he forced himself to stay still.
"Can you move?" he asked.
Kael took a step.
Then another.
His shoulders stayed tense, but his breathing didn't spike.
"I can," he said. "I don't like it. But I can."
Lysa exhaled, tension she hadn't acknowledged easing slightly.
"Then we keep it in the plan," she said. "Optional. If it starts hurting more than it helps, we abandon it. Understood?"
"Understood," Kael said.
He caught Aiden's eye.
"Don't look at me like that," he said. "You're the one who wanted nuance."
"I changed my mind," Aiden said.
Kael almost smiled.
"Too late," he said. "Welcome to complicated."
***
That night if it was night above; the tunnels didn't care Aiden couldn't sleep.
The safehouse hummed with muted activity even during supposed rest periods. People whispered over maps. Runners came and went. Somewhere, someone tuned an old radio through static, chasing a scrap of music that never quite resolved.
Aiden slipped away to a quieter tunnel.
He wasn't surprised when footsteps followed.
"Thought you might be here," Lysa said, joining him where he stood looking up at a slab of concrete that used to be a ceiling and now felt like sky.
"You have a talent for finding people who want to be alone," he said.
"It's called paying attention," she replied. "You taught half the under‑twenties here how to move without tripping over their own feet. They watch you. So I do too."
He huffed.
"I'm not a leader," he said.
"No," Lysa agreed. "You're something more dangerous. You're an example."
He glanced at her.
"That supposed to be comforting?" he asked.
"It's supposed to be accurate," she said. "You're what happens when someone inside says 'enough.' Kael is what happens when someone outside survives long enough to be angry. Together, you're a question the Order can't answer without exposing itself."
"And Twelve‑North is where they keep the answers," Aiden said.
"Some of them," Lysa said. "Enough to hurt."
Silence settled, heavy but not hostile.
"What happens after?" Aiden asked. "If we pull this off. If we get proof out, free some people, make noise. What does that look like?"
Lysa considered.
"Chaos," she said. "The Board scrambling. Agents like Lin forced to pick a side. Some will double down. Some will walk. The city will see things it can't unsee. None of it will be neat."
"And us?" he asked.
She shrugged.
"Alive, if we're lucky," she said. "Hunted harder. Maybe celebrated in places that only exist in whispers. There's no version of this where you get your old life back."
"I know," Aiden said.
"Do you?" Lysa asked. "Then let me ask you this: if your father stood in front of you after Twelve‑North and offered a clean slate, would you take it?"
The answer came faster than he expected.
"No," he said.
It surprised him a little.
Not the word.
The lack of ache behind it.
Lysa nodded, satisfied.
"Good," she said. "Because they're never going to offer it. But knowing you wouldn't take it means you're not walking into this hoping for a redemption arc written by someone else."
He looked at her.
"What about you?" he asked. "What does victory look like in your head?"
She smiled without humor.
"Fewer people in cages," she said. "More people believing the cages exist in the first place. And a world where kids like Kael grow up hearing 'dangerous' and 'necessary' in the same breath without anyone pretending those words cancel each other out."
"That's bleakly specific," Aiden said.
"It's realistic," she said. "We don't get utopias. We get marginally less horrible tomorrows."
He thought of Kael wearing the dead collar like a ghost and choosing to keep it on anyway.
"Sometimes marginally is enough," Aiden said.
"For tonight," Lysa replied. "Tomorrow we aim higher."
She pushed off the wall.
"Get some rest, Lioren," she said. "Tomorrow we run final drills. After that, there's no more time to practice."
He watched her go.
When the tunnel was quiet again, he closed his eyes and, for the first time, pictured Twelve‑North not as a blueprint or a tactical problem, but as a place that could end them.
Then he pictured it flickering, shields dying, doors opening.
He went back to the safehouse.
Sleep came in fragments, but it came.
The last thing he saw before it took him was Kael, lying a few meters away, one hand resting lightly on the loose band around his throat not clutching, not tearing it off.
Just touching it.
Remembering.
Preparing.
Somewhere above, the city turned, oblivious.
In forty‑eight hours, oblivious would no longer be an option.