"Power and water systems are failing citywide. The Ability Response Base is actively clearing infected in affected zones survivors are advised to follow any base team on sight for safe escort to the facility.""Guys, look the official base is running full rescue operations now!"Poppy angled her phone toward the group, volume cranked so everyone could hear."Well, that's new," Lulu said, popping a strawberry off a cake slice without much interest. "They used to only take people with a real ability. I guess enough bodies have piled up that they finally lowered the bar.""Either they're not hurting for supplies anymore, or they suddenly need a lot more hands," Sean offered."Makes sense but why hasn't anyone found us? We've had, what, two actual walk-ins total?""Pure luck, honestly," Jamie said. "There's basically nothing solid about this place online just rumors. If word ever really got out how good it is here, I'd bet people would be lining up outside the gate."He still counted him

Warren's read on the target kept sharpening the closer they got, though the signature itself barely shifted position at all.First time he'd ever run into anything reading quite like this. He'd initially chalked up the fuzziness to distance every other power source he'd ever tracked, human or infected, resolved cleanly in his mind as a distinct point of colored light.Chase read differently. Black fog, dense and swirling, with fragments of multiple colors bleeding through the murk.That was exactly why Warren had flagged multiple layered abilities in the first place.But as the distance closed, the fog never cleared. If anything, it read more like staring into black water no bottom visible, no matter how close he got."Captain something's off. We're basically on top of it and I still can't get a clean read.""Ha! Lucky us, Warren. Shame the rest of the team doesn't get material this good to learn from."Adrian's easy confidence came from somewhere real the kind of calm only a genuinel

Chase flew back toward the base humming under his breath, six gold cores tucked away and a genuinely good mood settled over him.Today had been a solid haul, good enough that he was willing to let the memory of a few low-tier recruits slide without much guilt.Not really my fault, either way. I gave them every opening to walk away. They're the ones who escalated.If he were still human, he'd probably have real respect for someone like Adrian that particular flavor of confidence that only comes from genuinely being the strongest person in every room you've ever walked into.Different sides now, though. Next encounter, I'm not holding back the way I did today.The red core's raw offense had been genuinely dangerous but spread thin across too many abilities, none of them individually deep enough to close the gap. He'd walked in more nervous than the fight actually warranted, and came out having picked up a serious new recon tool in the process.He could now sense being possessed by an o

Lulu loosed another arrow. Vera dodged it clean this time, then had to snap her attention back the instant the arrow having missed curved and came back around toward her.Vera kept dodging, forced into a second pass she hadn't planned for.Lulu used the window to scramble upright, dragging her bleeding left leg as she retreated.She fired again, and this time managed to hold two separate arrows on independent, redirected paths at once the outer edge of what she could actually process.Tracking both simultaneously left her head swimming, but she held the line, certain that landing even one clean hit meant the win.If Chase actually wanted me dead, he wouldn't have signed off on healing me afterward.She caught sight of her own wounds and winced, briefly worried about scarring then remembered exactly whose healing ability was on standby and let the thought go.Vera's body moved with absurd flexibility, and between her already-blunted pain response and unchanged speed post-injury, she d

"What are you waiting for? Get in the car."The rescue team finished clearing the last of the nearby infected and turned to find the man they'd just saved standing frozen in place, staring at nothing.Seconds earlier, he'd been sobbing gratitude, telling his daughter over and over that they'd made it. Now he just stood there, motionless."Hey! We don't have all day are you coming or not?"Victor kept staring at the scene around him, unable to process it. The warmth of his daughter's small hand in his own was the first thing that actually broke through and with it, the impossible realization that he was standing exactly where he'd been standing before any of it happened.Before the base. Before any of it.He broke down crying on the spot, ignored the team's impatience entirely, scooped Nina up, and ran."Captain what's with that guy? He just bolted without even getting in the truck. Should we go after him?""Let him go. Plenty of other survivors need us more than someone who doesn't wa