The wind howled through Voss Station like a mourning animal.
Aria scribbled shaky notes across Dominic's forearm using the neural-ink stylus. Words wouldn't come anymore. Aphasia had claimed her voice completely.
Her fingers trembled as she wrote:
**“Synaptin. Last buffer agent. Vault location?"**
Dominic stared at her script, then spoke softly, “Only sample left is in Helix Tower's genetic vault. We'd never get it in time."
She nodded.
Then flipped his wrist and wrote:
**“Alternative?"**
He hesitated.
“There's a fabrication drone in the sub-basement. It can build a synthetic synaptin substitute—if we input the correct genome."
She raised a brow.
“But the only viable genome source," he added, “is you."
She blinked.
“You still carry raw unedited sequences from your PENUMBRA day
