They did not return them to the special cohort wing.The stretchers took a different route — colder corridors, denser clusters of crystals, heavier portable arrays locked in place over both frames. Miko’s Bond stayed flattened under the stronger field, but the shape of Killy’s residual was still there, coiled inside it like something the skill had refused to release.He kept his eyes on the ceiling strips and counted the turns.Emergency isolation was a smaller wing with thicker walls and fewer cells. Only six panels. Stronger suppression fields. No long observation windows. The workers placed Miko in the second cell and Killy in the third, side by side this time instead of across a corridor. The panels sealed with a deeper magnetic hum than before.The portable arrays stayed outside, angled to cover both cells at once.Miko dragged himself into a sitting position. His ankle had swollen again from the restraints. Blood still ran slowly from his nose; he let it drip onto the floor. Thr

The heavier arrays stayed active through the entire next cycle.Miko felt the difference in every breath. The suppression field no longer simply pinned the Bond — it pressed into the spaces around it, trying to pry the residual lock away from Killy’s matrix. Every time the Bond tightened to keep the faint shape of her residual, the field answered with a sharper pulse. Blood ran from his nose in thin, steady lines. He stopped wiping it away.Beside him, Killy sat with her back against the shared wall, knees drawn up, smoke rising in short, controlled breaths. The new pressure was affecting her too. Her residual flickered weakly under the continuous load, and every flicker made the Bond in Miko’s chest coil harder to hold it.They did not talk much. The field made speaking costly.When technicians entered the wing, they came in larger groups. Portable scanners were pressed to both panels at the same time. Numbers were compared in low voices. Once, a technician muttered, “Lock is still h