The first snow of December always smells like metal.
Cold. Sharp. Warning me before anything else does.
That’s exactly what the air tastes like when I storm through the underground storage bay beneath Cross Tower — the place only top-clearance engineers and their ghosts are allowed to enter. The fluorescent lights buzz overhead, flickering against the polished concrete. Rows of covered prototypes line the bay like sleeping beasts.
My footsteps echo. My pulse is louder.
I’m holding it.
The mask.
The one he left behind when he dragged me from death.
My fingers clench around the shattered visor as I walk, frost-bitten air stinging my lungs. Every step feels like betrayal crunching under my boots.
And he’s here.
I know it.
I can feel him the way you feel lightning before it hits — st
