The smell hit Kasper like a punch to the gut—copper polish mixed with something that reminded him of burnt hair. His silver tracery recoiled beneath his skin.
Restraint tables. Copper probes. Screaming.
He shook off the memory. Not now.
The atrium stretched before them like a twisted cathedral. Art Deco columns rose toward a ceiling that pulsed with veins of amber light. Every surface gleamed with enhancement ports shaped like geometric flowers.
"Cristo," Moreno whispered, counting targets behind the columns. "Eight pendejos just standing there like altar boys." His jaw tightened. "My sister Carmen works security downtown. If these cabrones are spreading..."
Torres adjusted his grip on the MAB 38, instructor instincts kicking in. "Coordination patterns suggest neural linking." He'd seen cadets practice similar formations at the Academy—before half his class got converted into Director puppets. "Someone's controlling them remotely."
"Shut up and let me work," Diaz muttered, fingers dancing across her scanner. She needed to crack the facility's systems before her girlfriend Elena's medical clinic got hit by whatever the Director was planning. Enhanced nurses made perfect targets.
Kasper counted the minutes. Eighteen left before lockdown. Get to the neural amplifier three levels down. Destroy it. Get out alive.
Simple plan. The copper smell made his hands shake.
The security forces moved in perfect unison—eight heads turning toward them like sunflowers following death instead of daylight. Their ports flickered in sequence: one-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight.
Like a countdown.
Like the machines at The Farm.
Focus, pendejo. Your team needs you.
"Move!" Kasper barked.
The atrium exploded.
Torres moved like the instructor he used to be, each burst calculated to protect his students—except his students were dead now, converted in the Academy raid. "Center mass, follow through, next target," he murmured, dropping two hostiles with textbook precision.
But they adapted. Fast. Too fast.
Three soldiers emerged from different columns at the exact same heartbeat. Kasper rolled behind a decorative planter as copper-jacketed rounds chewed through stonework.
The copper smell intensified. Restraint tables. They held him down while—
"They're reading us like a damn book!" Moreno's weapon snarled from across the atrium. His modified MAB 38 bore Carmen's initials scratched into the stock. "Every move we make, they're already there!"
Diaz's scanner beeped urgently. "Neural link confirmed. What one sees, they all know." She thought of Elena's smile, the way she hummed while treating patients. Elena, who had enhancement ports for medical precision.
Kasper felt their scanners probing him, trying to predict his next move. Standard military tactics flashed through his mind—advance by fire and movement, establish base of fire, coordinate fields of—
No. That's what they expect. That's what the machines at The Farm expected.
Instead of advancing like doctrine taught, Kasper sprinted directly at the nearest column. The copper smell tried to drag him back to that place, but he fought through it. He vaulted over a barrier and landed behind three soldiers still calculating responses to his previous position.
His KS-23 spoke once.
The specialized round punched through the column's enhancement cluster like a fist through glass. Copper sparks rained across marble as their perfect coordination collapsed.
"Now they're just regular assholes with guns," Kasper announced, voice steadier than his hands.
The cleanup was brutal and quick. Without their hive-mind advantage, the remaining guards fell back on standard tactics. Torres dismantled them with instructor precision—each kill a small revenge for his dead students. Moreno hunted through the columns like the street fighter he'd always been, thinking of Carmen's laugh.
"Clear," Torres reported, checking his ammo. "But we're burning through rounds fast."
"Could be worse," Moreno said, pressing a fresh magazine into his weapon. "Could be more of those synchronized cabrones downstairs."
"About that..." Diaz held up her scanner, face pale. Elena's medical clinic was only two kilometers away. "Building plans show three levels. Reality shows seven. And the lower levels?" She swallowed hard. "Enhancement labs. Processing centers."
The burnt hair smell suddenly made sense.
Kasper's silver tracery went cold. The copper smell brought it all back—they'd strapped him to a table just like the ones beyond that door. Forced machines into his head while he screamed for them to stop.
Focus. Elena needs you to focus.
"Recent thermal signatures," Diaz reported, thinking of Elena's gentle hands checking enhancement ports on patients. "They were operating ninety minutes ago."
Through the secured doorway, maintenance corridors gave way to something from a nightmare. Enhancement stations arranged in perfect circles, copper machinery humming with purpose that made Kasper's adaptation writhe beneath his skin.
Moreno examined one of the integration chambers. His single temple port—the same model Carmen had for her security job—let him interface without triggering alarms. "Madre de Dios. Look at the restraint systems." His voice cracked. "Carmen... if they got Carmen..."
Torres studied the abandoned stations with military assessment. Half his Academy class had disappeared into places like this. "Evacuation protocols. They pulled back but kept core systems operational."
Kasper's scanner beeped a warning. The sound made him flinch—too much like the machines at The Farm. Coordinated footsteps echoed from multiple corridors. Not searching.
Hunting.
"Twelve contacts," Torres announced, thinking of Cadet Martinez, Cadet Volkov, all the bright young faces that never made it home. "Advanced coordination patterns."
"Nexus troops," Kasper said, forcing his voice steady despite the tremor in his hands. "They don't just coordinate—they share consciousness."
"Como los otros but worse?" Moreno asked, Carmen's initials digging into his palm.
"Much worse. They are each other."
The first Nexus soldiers appeared at the entrance, and Kasper saw the difference immediately. These weren't puppets. These were twelve minds functioning as one predator.
They flowed into the chamber like mercury given killing intent. Four advanced while four provided cover while four flanked through side passages—all simultaneously, all perfectly timed.
"Crossfire pattern delta," one announced. Eleven others adjusted instantly.
The coordination was perfect. Just like at The Farm.
Torres opened fire first, each shot a prayer for his dead students. His rounds found center mass on the lead soldier, but the others adapted without missing a step.
"They're not reacting," Moreno reported, thinking of Carmen's security training. "They're adapting in real time!"
Kasper raised his KS-23. His hands shook—copper smell, restraint tables, the sound of his own screaming—but he forced them steady. Elena needed him steady.
The shotgun boomed twice. Specialized rounds collapsed the ornate entrance in a cascade of debris. Three Nexus soldiers disappeared under tons of marble, but the remaining nine immediately began flanking through routes they'd already mapped.
"Exit status!" Kasper called, fighting memories that tried to paralyze him.
"Twenty seconds!" Diaz fought security algorithms, thinking of Elena's smile, the way she trusted Diaz to come home. "These systems are learning from my attempts!"
That's when Moreno stumbled.
The copper-jacketed round had found the gap between his vest plates. Blood spread across the geometric patterns marking him as Costa del Sol military.
"Carmen," he whispered, then louder: "¡Mierda! Still got three magazines." His sister's initials pressed into his palm. "Maybe four minutes if more show up."
They would. Kasper could hear them moving through corridors—not just the nine here, but more. Coming for Elena. Coming for Carmen. Coming for everyone.
"Through the exit—now!" Diaz announced.
They moved as a unit. Behind them, the surviving Nexus troops advanced with relentless coordination.
The secured door sealed with a pneumatic hiss that sounded final.
"Lockdown protocols activating," Diaz reported, scanner detecting system-wide changes. Elena's clinic was in the target zone. "All exits sealed in fifteen minutes."
From deeper in the facility, distant combat echoed through vents—other teams engaging enhanced opposition.
"Communications?" Kasper asked, copper smell making his head spin.
Torres consulted his equipment, thinking of every cadet who'd trusted him to bring them home alive. "Sporadic contact. Surface teams report heavy resistance." He paused. "Colonel Martinez requesting immediate extraction for all teams."
"Abandon the mission?"
"Standing orders from President Rivera himself."
Moreno leaned against the wall, field dressing applied with steady hands despite blood loss. Carmen's initials caught the light from his weapon's stock. "So we're trapped with synchronized psychopaths, exits seal in fifteen minutes, and command wants us to retreat to an extraction point that might not exist."
"That covers it."
Diaz's scanner detected massive power fluctuations. Elena's clinic was two kilometers away. Enhanced medical staff, enhancement ports for surgical precision. Perfect targets. "Neural amplification system coming online. Power draw suggests it's targeting every enhanced person within three kilometers."
Including Elena.
Including Carmen.
Including Torres' remaining students at the Academy.
Kasper's silver tracery responded with painful intensity, memories of The Farm trying to drag him down. But Elena's face in his mind—the way she'd patched him up after nightmares, never asking about the scars—kept him focused.
From the lower levels, a sound drifted up that made every enhanced team member recoil. Not mechanical. Not human.
Something being born.
"Options," Kasper said, fighting the tremor in his voice.
"Extract to surface," Torres suggested, but his tone said he was thinking of young faces that deserved better. "Regroup. Request air support."
"There is no surface," Diaz corrected, scanner showing Elena's clinic in the conversion zone. "And that amplification system isn't just coordinating existing troops." Her voice cracked. "It's converting anyone with enhancement ports in range."
"Elena," Kasper whispered.
"Carmen," Moreno echoed.
"My students," Torres added quietly.
The mathematics were simple and horrible. Everyone they cared about was about to become part of the Director's hive mind.
"So we go down," Kasper decided, silver tracery pulsing with pain and memory. The copper smell from The Farm tried to paralyze him, but Elena's face kept him moving. "Find the source. Shut it down."
"Boss," Torres said carefully, instructor instincts warring with tactical reality, "Moreno needs medical attention. Our ammo's at sixty percent. Communications compromised. Every protocol says—"
"Protocol." Kasper's voice went flat. At The Farm, they'd followed protocol. Strap him down. Insert the probes. Follow the checklist while he screamed. "Protocol didn't account for Elena. For Carmen. For your students."
That inhuman sound echoed again, closer now. The facility's ports pulsed in rhythm with it.
Moreno straightened against the wall, Carmen's initials digging into his palm. "My sister's probably making coffee right now, getting ready for her shift. Humming that stupid song she loves." His voice cracked. "I'm not letting them turn her into one of those things."
Torres thought of Cadet Santos, barely eighteen, who still called him 'sir' in the halls. Of Cadet Reyes, who reminded him why he'd become an instructor in the first place. "My students trust me to protect them."
Diaz's scanner showed Elena's clinic, enhanced medical staff preparing for the morning shift. "Elena's probably reviewing patient files, making sure everyone gets the care they need."
Kasper's hands stopped shaking. The copper smell was still there, The Farm's memories still clawed at him, but Elena's face—trusting, gentle Elena who'd never asked about his nightmares—burned brighter than any trauma.
"Then we go save them."
They descended deeper, following corridors where Art Deco styling became oppressive. Geometric patterns flowed along walls like technological arteries feeding something hungry below.
Behind them, lockdown protocols sealed escape routes one by one.
Ahead, something waited that had learned to reshape human consciousness into tools of war.
But Kasper's silver adaptation pulsed with its own rhythm now—not the mechanical precision of The Farm, but Elena's heartbeat when she slept beside him. Moreno carried Carmen's laugh in every step. Torres moved with the weight of young faces depending on him. Diaz fought for gentle hands and morning coffee.
Time to remind the Director that some things were worth more than his perfect order.