The ruins of Haven are smouldered behind them. Ash drifted like snow, settling on the fractured skyline where the Resistance’s last stronghold once stood. The storm clouds glowed with the reflection of fire — red, orange, and cold white from the searchlights sweeping the devastation.
Ethan stood at the ridge, his cloak torn, his left arm bandaged in rough cloth. The pulse of the Core within him was quiet now — dormant but present, like a second heartbeat.
Dr. Myles knelt by a broken console they’d salvaged from the command bunker. Sparks hissed from the device as she tried to restore power. “The Facility moved faster than we expected,” she muttered. “They must’ve been tracking our data nodes from the start.”
Hannah, grim-faced and blood-smeared, tossed a piece of broken drone casing int
