A world away, in a realm of curated opulence and hidden decadence, a different kind of chill was in the air. Sophie (Kyles sister) adjusted the hem of her conservative knee length dress, feeling intensely out of place. The invitation had been a shock, delivered by a courier in a pristine uniform to her modest university laboratory. A summons, really, from Derek West himself. The request was framed as a philanthropic interest in her groundbreaking research into quantum state stabilization a field she knew Star Labs was heavily invested in. The West Estate was less a house and more a monument to obscene wealth. It was all sharp, modern angles of glass and polished steel, perched on a cliffside overlooking the city, a kingdom looking down on its subjects. A silent butler, his face an impassive mask, led her through cavernous rooms where art worth more than her entire department's annual budget hung on walls. And everywhere, there were women. They lounged on pristine white sofas, s

The alarm wasn't a sound; it was a physical force, a piercing shriek that vibrated through the metal floor and into their bones. The violet light from the central machine began to strobe erratically, casting the nightmarish scene in frantic, frozen snapshots. "Damn it, Kyle! What did you do?" Axel yelled, already in motion. Her bionic legs whirred as she launched herself at the new wave of skittering horrors pouring from the hidden tunnel. Her axes, 'Vengeance' and 'Retribution,' became a blue plasma blender, severing limbs and cleaving chitinous heads from bodies. "I got us our evidence!" Kyle shouted back, yanking the data spike from the machine and securing it in a pouch on his belt. "Now we just have to live to deliver it!" "Living would be great! Highly underrated activity!" Johnny chimed in, his voice strained as he threw up another wall of ice, momentarily blocking the tunnel entrance. The ice immediately began to crack under the onslaught of claws and acidic spit

The bellow that ripped through the swamp wasn't a sound; it was a physical pressure wave that flattened the reeds and sent water rippling away from its source. From the deepest, darkest part of the murky water, a behemoth emerged. It was a leviathan of rot and rage, a monstrous fusion of gator, boar, and nightmare. Its body was a mountain of matted vegetation, slick mud, and splintered bone, all held together by pulsing veins of violet energy. Its mouth, large enough to swallow their ship whole, was lined with jagged, moss covered tusks and teeth. A single, massive eye burned with malevolent purple light in the center of its forehead. "Okay," Johnny yelled, his voice cracking slightly. "That's new! That's definitely new!" "Shut up and freeze its legs!" Axel screamed, already launching herself forward. Her bionic legs propelled her up onto the back of a smaller swamp thing, using it as a springboard to bring her axes down in a twin arc on the behemoth's flank. The plasma blade

The General’s voice crackled through the comms again, strained but sharp with a newfound, desperate resolve. “Vector 15, new directives. The situation is FUBAR, but we’re not rolling over. We’ve mobilized every black budget project, every retired specialist, every off the books asset we have. Twenty teams. We’re calling them the Ashen Sparks. They’re being deployed now, each to one of the active sites. Their orders are the same as yours were: infiltrate, disable the machine, gather intel.” A new map overlay appeared on their screen. Twenty green dots each representing a newly formed team blinked into existence, moving toward different red dots across the globe. “Your team is the only one with field experience against these anchors,” the General continued, his voice grim. “You’re our template. Our best hope. We’re sending you the coordinates for the nearest active site an abandoned hydroelectric dam in the Gevudar Gorge. The Ashen Spark team assigned there is green. They’l

The Vector 15 cut through the clouds, leaving the Gevudar Gorge and its horrors behind. The mood inside was a fragile thing, woven from equal parts exhaustion, relief, and the lingering dread of what they now knew was possible. The news from Command was the best they could have hoped for: the global network of anchors had been severely damaged. The simultaneous activation had been blunted, the "scream" of the clock reduced to a troubled murmur. "Course is set for home base," Carter said, her voice soft from the co pilot's seat. She input the final coordinates, then leaned back, the tension in her shoulders finally easing a fraction. Rush, beside her, gave a curt nod, his focus on the long range sensors, ensuring their path was clear. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, they weren't racing toward another fight. They were going home. Kyle sat amidst the quiet hum of the ship, the General's final, gruff order echoing in his mind. Come back home. But home to what? A wor