The crushed GPS tracker fell from Santiago’s fingers, the tiny, glowing shards vanishing into the shifting sands of the desert. He stood tall, the blood from the base of his neck cooling against his marble skin, but before he could even take a step toward the waiting transport, the world tilted. The roar of the Directorate ship’s engines didn't fade; it was replaced by a high-frequency scream that originated from the center of his skull."Santi? Santiago, talk to me! Your bio-signs just hit the ceiling!" Aisyah’s voice crackled through the comms, but she sounded like she was speaking from the bottom of a deep well."I’m... I’m fine," Santiago grunted, clutching his head. "Just a bit of a headache. Must be the extraction.""It’s not the extraction, you idiot! I’m looking at your neural map. There’s a second signal. Something is piggybacking on the Ptah protocol. It’s not the Directorate. It’s... it&rsquo

The smoke from the foundry furnace was still thick enough to choke a normal man, but Santiago’s lungs—or whatever the System had replaced them with—didn’t even burn. He kept Aisyah tucked close to his side, her weight a grounding reality against the ethereal hum of his own body. They had only taken five steps toward the loading dock when a rhythmic, metallic clicking echoed through the girders."Santiago, stop," Aisyah whispered, her hand clutching the front of his scorched jacket."I hear it," Santiago said, his voice a low vibration. "System, thermal overlay. Now."[ALERT: HIGH-DENSITY BIOMECHANICAL SIGNATURE DETECTED.]"Is it that silver guy again?" Aisyah asked, her eyes darting toward the shadows."No," Santiago replied, his eyes flaring with a deep, violent violet light as he scanned the rafters. "The Successor was... messy. This thing feels cold. It feels like a machine."From the upper catwalk, a figure dropped. It didn't land with the heavy, bone-shattering thud Santiago usua

The desert wind howled outside, but inside the van, the air was suffocatingly hot.Santiago hit the metal floorboards with a heavy, bone-shattering thud. His skin was smoking, glowing with a chaotic, violent violet-gold light that threatened to singe the very fabric of his clothes."Santiago!" Aisyah screamed, sliding the door open. "Santi! Where were you? You just... you just vanished in that pillar of light!""Get back, Aisyah!" Santiago choked out, his fingers clawing into the steel floor. The metal groaned and warped under his grip as if it were soft wax. "Don't touch me!""What do you mean, get back?" she yelled, shielding her face from the blistering wave of heat coming off his chest. "You're literally glowing! Your skin is splitting open, Santi!""I know! It’s too hot!" Santiago gasped, his teeth grinding together. "It’s not just the arm this time. It’s everything. It feels like someone poured liquid lead straight down my t

"Put that case down over there, Santi. Gently," Aisyah said, her voice echoing in the damp, tiled underground room.Santiago lowered the heavy iron container, his fingers leaving shallow, dusty grooves in the rusted metal. "I'm being gentle," he replied, his voice humming with a soft, metallic vibration. "As gentle as a two-ton statue can be.""Well, try harder. I need that monitor intact. If you break it, we're doing this in the dark.""Doing what, exactly?" Santiago sat on a rusted iron crate, the metal groaning under his unnatural weight. "I thought we were supposed to be searching the city for those thoracic blueprints. We only have forty-eight hours.""We can't search anything if your brain turns to mush first," Aisyah said, unpacking a sterile tray of surgical tools onto a folding table. "Sit still. I need to run a quick diagnostic before we do anything else.""My head doesn't hurt anymore," Santiago said, though he kept his eyes locked on th

"Hold still, Santi. Just... shut up and hold still." Aisyah's hands shook as she pressed the manual scanner closer to his blackened elbow."I’m not saying anything," Santiago grunted, his voice tight as he leaned his back against the half-melted workstation. "But the black stuff is crawling up. I can feel it. It’s like ice water dragging through my veins.""Yeah, because your synthetic cells are literally being digested," Aisyah muttered, her fingers flying across her diagnostic tablet. "The scan is messy, Santi. The corrosion from Kael's daggers is eating through the carbon-weave. The stabilizing serum we injected earlier isn't doing a damn thing.""Can't you just inject more?" Santiago asked, looking down at his left arm. The beautiful, translucent marble skin had turned into a charred, jagged mess of pitch-black rot. "Double the dose. Triple it. I don't care.""If I triple the dose, your entire nervous system will freeze," Aisyah snapped, l