Sera's POV
"You can't start a war because of me," I tell Director Kallas.
"I'm not starting it. Commander Lyssa is." He gestures at the screens showing the damaged station. "She attacked an Imperial facility. Killed my people. That's already an act of war."
Another explosion shakes the laboratory. Equipment crashes to the floor.
"SECTOR FOUR BREACH! EVACUATING NON-ESSENTIAL PERSONNEL!"
"How many people are on this station?" I ask quietly.
"Two thousand," Kallas answers. "Scientists. Engineers. Support staff. Most of them have families back on Aelaria Prime."
Two thousand lives. Because of me.
"Then hand me over." My voice doesn't shake. "Save your people."
"No," Kael says immediately.
"It's not your choice—"
"Actually, it is." Director Kallas cuts me off. "Because I'm not handing you over, Sera Vance. Not because I'm noble. Because I'm practical." He pulls up holographic data. "Your 73% integration is the breakthrough we've been seeking for decades. If I can study you, understand how you achieved it, I can revolutionize the entire enhancement program."
"So I'm still just a lab specimen to you." Bitterness floods my voice.
"You're valuable. In this Empire, that's better than being disposable." He looks at Kael. "Commander, I need you to protect her while my team runs diagnostics. Can you do that?"
"With my life," Kael says without hesitation.
"Good. Because Commander Lyssa has just launched boarding parties. They'll breach the station in three minutes." Kallas hands Kael a security pass. "Level Seven. The deep labs. Only accessible with this pass. Take Sera there. Lock down. I'll hold Lyssa off as long as I can."
"You can't fight twenty warships," Luca argues.
"No. But I can call for help." Kallas's smile is sharp. "Lyssa attacking an Imperial facility? Half the military will consider that treason. I'm broadcasting her actions across every official channel. By the time she realizes what I've done, her career will be over."
"Unless she kills everyone who witnessed it," Mira points out.
"Which is why you need to survive. You're my witnesses. My proof." Kallas looks at each of us. "Go. NOW."
We run.
Kael leads us through corridors filling with smoke and chaos. Scientists flee past us. Soldiers rush toward the breach points. The station is dying around us.
"This way!" Kael yanks open a door leading to a stairwell. "Level Seven is at the station's core. Most protected section."
We descend rapidly. My enhanced body doesn't tire but fear makes me clumsy. I stumble on the stairs. Kael catches me.
"Stay focused," he orders. "Control your fear. Use it."
"How?"
"Fear means you're alive. Alive means you can fight." His violet eyes bore into mine. "Fight, Sera. That's all you need to do. Fight to survive."
We reach Level Seven. The door is massive, reinforced metal. Kael scans the security pass and it hisses open.
Inside is a laboratory unlike anything I've seen. Advanced technology covers every surface. Containment chambers line the walls. And in the center—
"Is that another enhancement chamber?" I stare at the familiar medical platform.
"The prototype," Luca breathes. "This is where they developed the original enhancement technology."
"Which means we're sitting on the Empire's most valuable research," Kael says grimly. "Lyssa won't just want Sera. She'll want to destroy this entire lab so no one else can replicate the results."
"Then we defend it." I move to the control panel. "Can we seal this level?"
"Already on it." Mira's fingers fly across keyboards. "Blast doors engaging. This room is now a fortress. But..." She hesitates.
"But what?"
"It's also a prison. Once those doors seal, we can't leave until someone opens them from outside."
"Then we hope Director Kallas survives long enough to let us out," Luca mutters.
The blast doors slam shut with a final, terrible sound.
We're trapped.
Kael checks his weapon. "How many do you have?"
Luca holds up his gun. "One. Mira's unarmed. Sera's still learning."
"Fantastic." Kael tosses me a spare weapon from a wall locker. "Crash course: point at the enemy, pull the trigger, don't die. Any questions?"
"Thousands. But no time for answers."
His slight smile returns. "Fast learner. I like that."
The communication panel crackles. Director Kallas's voice breaks through, strained and urgent.
"Level Seven, do you copy?"
"We copy," Kael responds.
"Lyssa's boarding teams have breached. They're heading for your location. I'm holding the command center but—" Gunfire erupts in the background. "—it won't be long before they break through."
"How many are coming for us?"
"At least fifty soldiers. Elite combat units." Kallas's voice drops. "Kael, listen carefully. In chamber six, there's experimental enhancement serum. It could boost Sera's integration even higher. Make her unstoppable."
"Or kill her," Kael snaps.
"Probably. But right now, you're facing fifty trained warriors. You need an edge."
I look at the chamber Kallas mentioned. Through the glass, I can see vials glowing with liquid silver.
"What would it do to me?" I ask.
"Push your integration to 90%, maybe higher," Kallas explains. "You'd be faster, stronger, nearly invincible. For about thirty minutes. Then your body would start breaking down. The enhancement would consume you from inside."
"So I'd die anyway."
"Yes. But you'd take Lyssa's entire strike team with you first."
Kael grabs the microphone. "Absolutely not. We'll find another way."
"There is no other way!" Kallas shouts. "I'm looking at tactical scans. Fifty elite soldiers versus four people, two of whom can't fight. You're dead in five minutes unless Sera does something."
"I won't ask her to commit suicide—"
"You're not asking. I am." I take the microphone from Kael. "Director Kallas, if I take the serum and survive the next thirty minutes, can you reverse the breakdown process?"
Silence.
"Director?"
"There's a 40% chance I can stabilize you before permanent damage occurs," he finally admits. "40% is better than the 0% chance you have without it."
I look at Kael. His face is a mask of controlled fury.
"Don't," he says quietly. "Please. Don't throw your life away."
"I'm not throwing it away. I'm using it." I move toward chamber six. "You said I reminded you what it means to feel. Well, you reminded me what it means to have someone worth fighting for."
"Sera—"
"If I die, at least it'll be my choice. Not theirs." I open the chamber, pulling out a vial of silver serum. It's warm in my hands. "That matters."
"It matters that you LIVE!" Kael's voice cracks. "Staying alive matters more than winning!"
"Not if everyone I care about dies anyway."
Pounding on the blast doors. Lyssa's soldiers have arrived.
"They're cutting through!" Mira yells. "Two minutes until breach!"
I hold the vial up, watching the silver liquid swirl. "How do I use it?"
"Injection port on your left arm," Kallas instructs. "The nano-machines will do the rest. But Sera—once you inject it, there's no going back. You'll have thirty minutes. Use them wisely."
"Sera, WAIT!" Kael grabs my arm. "There has to be another option. Let me think—"
"We're out of time to think." I pull away gently. "I'm not asking permission, Kael. I'm telling you what I'm going to do."
"Then I'll inject it instead," he argues desperately. "I'm already enhanced. I can handle—"
"You're at 60% integration. It would kill you instantly." I find the injection port on my arm. "I'm the only one with a chance."
"A 40% chance!"
"Better than zero." I meet his eyes one last time. "If I don't make it... thank you. For seeing me. For caring. For making my last days mean something."
"Don't talk like you're already dead—"
I inject the serum before I can change my mind.
The effect is immediate and catastrophic.
Fire explodes through my veins. Every nerve ending screams. My enhancement, already pushed to 73%, suddenly surges higher. The golden glow in my eyes blazes bright enough to light the entire lab.
I fall to my knees, gasping. It feels like my cells are being rewritten at the atomic level. Like I'm being unmade and remade into something beyond human, beyond Aelarian.
Beyond anything.
"Integration spiking!" Kallas's voice sounds far away. "85%... 87%... 90%!"
My body convulses. The metal beneath my skin spreads, covering more of my arms, my neck, racing up toward my face. I'm more machine than flesh now.
"Sera!" Kael is beside me, holding me as I shake. "Stay with me! Fight through it!"
"It hurts," I gasp. "It hurts so much—"
"I know. But you're strong enough. You survived 73%. You can survive this."
The pain crests and suddenly... stops.
I open my eyes. The world looks different. Sharper. I can see individual molecules in the air. Hear heartbeats three rooms away. Feel the vibrations of soldiers cutting through the blast door.
I stand. My body moves like liquid lightning.
"How do you feel?" Luca asks nervously.
"Powerful." My voice sounds different. Layered. Enhanced. "Like I could tear this station apart with my bare hands."
The blast door explodes inward.
Fifty soldiers pour through, weapons raised. They see me glowing like a small sun and some of them actually step back.
Commander Lyssa follows them in, her cruel smile firmly in place.
"There you are, little human. Time to—" She stops, actually stops, staring at me. "What did you DO?"
"Became something you can't control," I say calmly.
I move before she can react.
One second I'm standing next to Kael. The next I'm in front of the nearest soldier, disarming him before he can blink. My enhanced speed makes everything else look slow, like the world is moving through honey.
I take down five soldiers in three seconds.
"OPEN FIRE!" Lyssa screams.
Fifty weapons discharge simultaneously.
I dodge. Not all the shots—that's impossible. But enough. The ones that hit me deflect off my enhanced skin. At 90% integration, I'm nearly invulnerable.
I'm a weapon. A living, breathing weapon.
And for the next thirty minutes, I'm unstoppable.
I tear through Lyssa's elite soldiers like they're made of paper. Every movement is precise, economical, deadly. My enhanced mind calculates trajectories, predicts attacks, optimizes every strike.
It's not even a fair fight.
Within two minutes, half of Lyssa's strike team is down.
She backs toward the door, eyes wide with something I've never seen in her before: fear.
"Fall back!" she orders. "FALL BACK!"
The remaining soldiers retreat, dragging their wounded. Lyssa disappears through the broken blast door.
Silence fills the lab.
I stand among the unconscious soldiers, my body still glowing with power I can barely comprehend.
Kael approaches slowly. "Sera? Are you... you?"
I look at my hands. They're shaking despite all the power. "I think so. But Kael..." I meet his eyes. "I can feel it. The serum. It's burning through me. Kallas was right. I'm running out of time."
"How much time?"
"Twenty-seven minutes." I can feel it precisely, like a countdown in my head. "Then my body starts breaking down."
"We'll get you to medical. Kallas can stabilize—"
"If he's still alive. If Lyssa doesn't kill him first." I take a shaky breath. "We need to end this. Now. While I still can."
"End it how?"
I look at the broken blast door. At the corridor beyond where Lyssa fled.
"I'm going after her. I'm going to finish this."
"That's suicide! The station is full of her soldiers!"
"I have twenty-seven minutes of being practically invincible." I pick up a weapon. "Time to make them count."
"Then I'm coming with you," Kael says immediately.
"No. Stay here. Protect Luca and Mira. If I don't come back—"
"You're coming back." His voice is hard. "Because I didn't watch you inject that serum just to lose you to Lyssa. So if you're going, I'm going. Non-negotiable."
I want to argue. But there's no time.
"Fine. But stay behind me. At this level, I'm faster than you can track."
We move into the corridor. Bodies litter the floor—casualties from the fighting. The station is a war zone.
My enhanced hearing picks up voices ahead. Lyssa, shouting orders.
"—don't care how many you have to sacrifice! I want that human DEAD before she—"
I round the corner at superhuman speed.
Lyssa and twenty more soldiers spin toward me, weapons raising.
"Too slow," I say.
And then I show them what 90% integration really means.
The fight is brutal and one-sided. I'm too fast, too strong, too enhanced. Within minutes, Lyssa stands alone among her fallen soldiers.
Her perfect face twists with rage and desperation. "This isn't over! The Council will hunt you forever! You'll never be safe!"
"Maybe not," I agree. "But you won't be there to see it."
I move to end this.
Then the countdown in my head hits twenty minutes.
And my body starts to fail.
Pain rips through me. The enhancement is turning on itself, consuming my cells. I fall to one knee, gasping.
"Sera!" Kael rushes to my side.
Lyssa sees her chance. She pulls a hidden blade and lunges.
Time seems to slow. I see the blade coming. See Kael turning to intercept. See my hand reaching up too late.
The blade sinks into Kael's shoulder as he throws himself between us.
"NO!" My scream is anguished.
Kael falls, blood streaming from the wound.
Lyssa raises the blade again, aiming for his heart.
Something inside me SNAPS.
My enhancement surges one final time. Beyond 90%. Beyond measurement. My body blazes with golden light so bright it's blinding.
I grab Lyssa's wrist, stopping the blade inches from Kael's chest.
"You will NEVER hurt him," I snarl.
I throw her across the corridor. She hits the wall hard enough to crack metal.
Then I collapse beside Kael, the enhancement finally burning out.
"You idiot," I gasp, pressing my hands to his wound. "Why did you do that?"
"Because you matter," he whispers. "More than you know."
The world is going dark. My body is shutting down.
The last thing I hear before everything fades is Director Kallas's voice over the speakers:
"Medical teams to Corridor Seven! Multiple casualties! And someone tell me if the human is still alive because the High Council just broadcast an emergency message—they're revoking Commander Lyssa's authority and opening an investigation into her actions. We might have just won."
But I don't hear the rest.
Because everything goes black.