The St. Lazarus Hydro-Electric Dam was a monolith of concrete holding back a billion tons of black water. In the storm, it looked less like a power plant and more like a tombstone for the river.
Maya killed the headlights of the rust-bucket sedan a mile out. They walked the rest of the way in the driving rain, sticking to the shadows of the transmission towers.
"No guards at the perimeter," Maya noted, scanning the chain-link fence. "That's bad. That means they don't need them."
Caleb adjusted his sunglasses. The water running down the lenses distorted the red text scrolling across his vision.
[LOCATION: THE FORTRESS]
[SECURITY LEVEL: MAX]
[ACTIVE EFFECTS: REALITY DISTORTION FIELD]
"The fence isn't electrified," Caleb said, reaching out a hand. "It's barely rendered."
He touched the metal mesh. His hand passed straight through it like smoke.
"Texture glitch," Caleb explained, stepping through the solid-looking steel. "He's allocating all the processing power to the interior. The outside is just low-res wallpaper."
Maya hesitated, then followed him. She shivered as she walked through the metal. "That felt... wrong. Like walking through a ghost."
They sprinted across the wet concrete of the spillway toward the massive intake doors. These were real—heavy, rusted steel. Locked.
Maya raised her gun to shoot the lock, but Caleb stopped her.
"Save the ammo," he said. "This is a level 50 zone. You're going to need every bullet."
He placed his palm on the electronic keypad. It wasn't powered by electricity; it was powered by the local network. He didn't hack it. He simply broadcast his user ID—the one he had tried to hide for three years.
[USER: S_VANE_JR]
[ACCESS: INHERITED]
The light turned green. The heavy doors groaned and slid open.
"Daddy's home," Caleb muttered.
They stepped inside.
The Turbine Hall was cavernous. Five massive generators the size of houses sat in a row, spinning with a deafening, subsonic hum. The air was dry and smelled of ozone and hot copper.
But something was wrong with the physics.
Caleb felt it immediately. His stomach dropped. His footsteps felt too light.
[ENVIRONMENTAL HAZARD: LOW GRAVITY]
[GRAVITY: 0.6G]
"Whoa," Maya stumbled, floating slightly as she took a step. She grabbed a railing to anchor herself. "What is happening? The air pressure?"
"Gravity scaling," Caleb said, bouncing lightly on his toes. "He's tweaked the physics engine. We're on moon gravity."
"Why?"
"Efficiency," Caleb scanned the room. "Less friction on the turbines. More power output. He's overclocking the dam."
"We're sitting ducks in here," Maya said, trying to move normally but drifting like an astronaut. "If anyone shoots at us, we can't take cover fast enough."
As if on cue, the high-intensity floodlights above the generators snapped on, blinding them.
A voice echoed through the hall—not the synthesized voice of the Admin, but a mechanical, prerecorded announcement.
"INTRUDERS DETECTED IN SECTOR 1. DEPLOYING MODERATORS."
From the catwalks above, figures dropped.
They didn't use ropes. They jumped from fifty feet up, landing in a heavy crouch that cracked the concrete floor. There were three of them.
They looked human, but they were dressed in sleek, white tactical armor that had no seams. Their faces were covered by smooth, black glass visors displaying a single red icon: [X].
[ENEMY: THE MODERATORS]
[CLASS: ELITE]
[WEAPON: HAPTIC GAUNTLETS]
"They're not bots," Caleb warned, backing up. "They're people. But he's overwritten their motor functions. They don't feel pain."
The Moderator on the left moved. It didn't run; it launched itself. In the low gravity, it flew across the gap like a superhero, a fist glowing with blue energy aimed straight at Maya's head.
"Maya, dodge!"
Maya didn't dodge. She couldn't—the low gravity made her movements sluggish. Instead, she anchored her foot against the railing and fired.
BANG-BANG.
The bullets hit the Moderator's chest plate. Sparks flew, but the figure didn't stop. The momentum carried it forward.
The blue fist connected with the railing, shearing through the steel like a plasma torch. Maya was thrown backward, tumbling in slow motion through the air.
"Aim for the visor!" Caleb shouted.
The second Moderator turned toward Caleb. It raised a hand, and the air in front of it rippled.
[ATTACK: FORCE PUSH]
Caleb knew this mechanic. He dropped flat just as a wave of compressed air blasted over him, blowing out the windows behind him.
He scrambled on all fours—easier in low gravity—toward the cover of a turbine. The Moderator landed on top of the generator, looking down at him.
Caleb had no gun. He had no armor. He only had the Overlay.
He looked at the spinning turbine below the Moderator's feet.
[OBJECT: TURBINE 3]
[RPM: 5000]
[STABILITY: 98%]
Caleb grabbed a heavy wrench from a tool rack nearby.
"Hey!" he yelled at the Moderator.
The figure looked down.
"Ban this."
Caleb threw the wrench. Not at the Moderator—he'd miss. He threw it into the exposed intake vent of the spinning turbine.
CLANG-GRIND-SCREECH.
The wrench hit the fan blades at 5000 RPM. The result was catastrophic. The turbine didn't just break; it exploded. Shrapnel flew upward like a shotgun blast.
The Moderator standing on top didn't have time to react. The casing beneath it disintegrated. The figure was launched into the ceiling by the force of the explosion.
[ENEMY DEFEATED]
[XP GAINED: WHO CARES]
"Caleb!" Maya shouted. She was floating near the ceiling, holding onto a crane hook. She had managed to grapple away. "One down! Two left!"
The first Moderator—the one who had attacked her—was climbing the wall like a spider, magnetic gloves clamping onto the steel. The third was rushing Caleb through the smoke.
"Gravity is meaningless if you don't have friction!" Caleb yelled.
He looked at the floor. He focused his mind. He couldn't change the gravity, but he could mess with the surface data.
Ice. Oil. Teflon.
He projected the concept of Zero Friction onto the patch of floor between him and the charging Moderator.
The Moderator hit the patch. Its feet flew out from under it. Unable to stop, it slid uncontrollably past Caleb, crashing face-first into the spinning driveshaft of Turbine 4.
CRUNCH.
[ENEMY DEFEATED]
"Behind you!" Maya screamed.
Caleb spun around. The final Moderator dropped from the ceiling, landing silently behind him. It grabbed Caleb by the throat and lifted him one-handed.
The visor was inches from Caleb's face. He saw his own reflection in the black glass.
The grip tightened. Caleb couldn't breathe. His health bar plummeted.
[HEALTH: 40%... 30%...]
[STATUS: CHOKING]
Maya was too far away. She was lining up a shot, but she couldn't fire without hitting Caleb.
Caleb kicked at the Moderator's chest, but it was like kicking a statue.
Think. Think.
The Moderator's suit. It was networked. It had to be receiving commands from the Admin to coordinate the movements.
Caleb reached out and grabbed the Moderator's helmet with both hands.
He didn't try to rip it off. He initiated a Handshake Protocol.
He forced his own neural signal into the Moderator's receiver. He screamed a command into the suit's local network.
COMMAND: /DANCE
It was the stupidest, most childish hack in history. But it was a valid emote command in the Aether Dynamics code library.
The Moderator froze. The grip on Caleb's throat loosened.
For one surreal, terrifying second, the deadly super-soldier did a stiff, robotic shimmy—a default "idle dance" animation.
Caleb dropped to the floor, gasping for air.
BANG.
Maya's shot took the Moderator in the visor. The glass shattered. The figure collapsed, the dance command terminating in a twitching heap.
Silence returned to the Turbine Hall, broken only by the alarm klaxons and the smoke from the destroyed generator.
Maya dropped from the crane hook, landing heavily next to Caleb. She helped him sit up.
"Did you..." she panted, reloading her weapon. "Did you make him dance?"
"It was a tactical emote," Caleb wheezed, rubbing his bruised throat. "Don't judge my methods."
"I'm not judging," Maya said, offering him a hand. "I'm terrified. But I'm not judging."
They looked toward the far end of the hall. A massive elevator shaft stood there, labeled CONTROL CENTER.
"He's up there," Caleb said, getting to his feet. "Top of the dam. The High Tower."
"Low gravity is gone," Maya noted, stomping her boot. "The explosion must have reset the local physics."
"Good," Caleb said. "Because from here on out, we're not dealing with physics."
He looked at the elevator doors. They were glowing with a pulsating red light.
"We're dealing with Lore."
Caleb walked to the elevator and pressed the button.
"Ready for the final cutscene?" he asked.
Maya racked the slide of her gun. "Skip the dialogue. Let's just finish the level."
The doors opened. They stepped in.
[ZONE: THE PENTHOUSE]
[BOSS: SILAS VANE]
[SAVE POINT: NONE]