Noa didn’t move.
Didn’t blink. Didn’t breathe.
Just stood there as the machine behind him buzzed to life, cold steel arms unfolding from the wall like mechanical insects. The syringes filled, one by one, each fluid a different shade of nightmare blue, red, something nearly black.
Ash watched him with a patient smile, the kind of grin that didn’t come from happiness but from complete certainty. He believed in what he was doing. Believed he was right. That was the worst part.
“Ash,” Noa said quietly, voice tight. “You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes,” Ash said, just as calm. “I do. You won’t walk away from them. So I have to cut them out of you.”
Behind Ash, Rook lay unconscious, strapped to a gurney, thin lines of blood trailing from fresh puncture wounds in his arms. His face was pale
