Kael couldn't sleep.
He stared at the flickering lights above the shelter's ceiling, counting every pulse like a heartbeat.
The others had drifted off in scattered corners—Juno in the far alcove, Ryke near the shutter gate, Mira curled up in a chair with her drone offline on her lap. They looked like they could breathe, even here. Even now.
Kael didn't.
His core sat next to him on the ground, dim but warm.
It pulsed sometimes. Not in rhythm. Just… when it wanted to.
He reached out to touch it—fingertips brushing against the metal.
And for the first time…
It didn't pull away.
A dull static filled his ears.
Then the shelter faded.
Not into blackness—but into a place underneath.
He stood now in a vast corridor of steel and shadow. Red lights blinked along the walls. Every panel looked ancient—built before Lunaris was even a name. Code ran across the floor like veins. Some of it was broken. Some of it was alive.
"You're not the first," a voice whispered.
Kael spun around.
Nobody there.
"You're just the first that hesitated."
The voice wasn't threatening.
It was sad.
Suddenly, he saw them.
Five shadows walking through the corridor ahead. Valiants. Fully armored. Moving in perfect sync—strong, confident, unified.
And then—
One of them stopped.
Turned.
Looked right at Kael.
Their faceplate cracked in slow motion, falling away in sharp fragments.
The person underneath was him.
But older.
Tired.
Eyes empty.
"If you keep waiting for the suit to save you," his older self said,
"You'll die wearing it."
Kael sat up with a gasp.
Still in the shelter.
Still night.
The core blinked once beside him.
He looked around. Everyone else still asleep.
But his hands were shaking.
Later that morning, Ryke called them all to the center.
"I picked up something strange last night," he said. "Far side of Zone 12. A signal loop buried in an old comm relay."
Juno narrowed her eyes. "Nullborn?"
"Worse," he said. "A trace ping from the Obelisk Core."
Mira leaned forward. "That thing still exists?"
"It never stopped."
Kael stepped closer.
"What's it doing?"
Ryke looked at him.
"Looking for something."
The room fell quiet.
Kael glanced at his core.
It didn't flicker this time.
It stayed awake.