2026-09-29 15:58:35
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Chapter 82: The Unique Core
"Hello your parents were involved in a serious car accident. Please come to Brooklyn General Hospital immediately. Hello? Hello?!"Chase hung up, expression gone flat, staring at the chaos around him with nothing left in the tank hollowed out completely."I can save your parents."A familiar voice, low and strange, cut through the silence.Chase's expression didn't shift at all."I can save them. All I need in return is your""Get out.""?!""You think I don't know this is an illusion?""WHAT?!"He'd played every beat of this scene with total sincerity, exactly as though it were real. And yet here he was, calling it out directly. When did he even clock it?The world around Chase began dissolving. Part of him had genuinely wanted to believe it was just a dream, but the sensations, the memories underneath it none of that had read as fabricated in the moment. Real enough that he'd wanted to stay inside it, doing everything in his power to undo a loss he already knew he couldn't touch.He
Chapter 81: The Accident
"Chase where are you going? I can't hold this whole crowd back on my own!"Chase had only said he had somewhere to be, expression suddenly serious, and left without further explanation. Miles let him go, though not without a pang of regret chances to see Scarlett Vance this close didn't come around often.Chase kept calling his parents, over and over. No answer.Dread built fast, thick enough to feel like actual suffocation.He drove straight home and tore through the study, hunting for any reference to the project they'd mentioned. If he could find it, maybe he could still stop whatever was coming.Nothing useful turned up on the desk.It hit him then, hard, how little attention he'd ever paid to his parents' actual work. He'd coasted through life carefree, and they'd carried every real burden quietly, running the same exhausting cycle of due diligence and risk analysis on his behalf, without him ever once asking how any of it worked.His eyes landed on the safe.His birthday, first
Chapter 80: Replay
"Dad, Chase has a fever, his forehead's burning up!"The familiar voice pulled Chase's eyes open slowly."...Mom?""His father get the car ready, we need to get him to the hospital now! He's burning up bad!""Mom, I'm fine..."Chase pulled her into a hug before she could argue further, and years of buried longing broke loose all at once, tears spilling freely though Susan, wrapped up in his arms, didn't seem to register anything unusual about it at all.Martin was already pulling his coat on by the door, hurrying back in to scoop Chase up and carry him to the car."Dad!"Chase turned and hugged him too, hard. It had been so long since he'd felt either of their arms around him."Chase, buddy?"Martin felt a flicker of quiet happiness his son hadn't hugged him like this in longer than he could remember.He registered the fever heat radiating off Chase and moved to lift him regardless.Chase stopped him easily. Martin blinked, thrown. When did my kid get this strong?"Dad, I'm fine. Real
Chapter 79: I Don't Want to Negotiate
Zoe felt like crying and couldn't even manage that much.She'd had a bad feeling the second she got called into that meeting room, and Grant's briefing had only made it worse."You've survived multiple direct encounters with Subject One. You have the most communication experience with him out of anyone here, and your teleport ability makes you the obvious pick for the job. We need you to negotiate. This is time-sensitive go now."Zoe nearly laughed out of sheer disbelief. Nobody listened when I said don't provoke him. Now that provoking him blew up in everyone's face, suddenly peaceful coexistence sounds appealing?And none of the actual leadership is walking over there themselves. Just hand it to the expendable recon girl instead. Like she didn't already know exactly how dangerous this errand was.She left the meeting room taking each step slower than the last.She could already see the black column rising in the distance. The Auriga might well be a warzone by now. Walk in there, and
Chapter 78: The Possibility of Evacuation
Lulu, Chloe, and Denise braced hard against the door frame and whatever heavy furniture they could grab, fighting to hold their ground.The rest of the stronghold, sensing something was badly wrong, rushed toward the top floor only to get stopped hard by the three of them, shouting for everyone to stay back.The energy pouring off Chase's body bore no resemblance to anything they'd witnessed before. Nothing quiet about it this time. Nothing gentle.Previous dormancy episodes had released a soft, mist-like black haze harmless to the touch, barely registering against skin.This time, lightning crackled through the black energy pulsing out of him, hitting the room like an actual magnetic storm. Windows shattered outright, debris torn loose and flung skyward through every exit the pressure could find.Piper had been posted on courtyard watch when the disturbance behind her yanked her attention around.Dense black energy had blown out the hotel's windows entirely, rocketing upward hard eno
Chapter 77: A Feast Fit for a King
Piper lowered her arms, and the blinding light was gone.She found herself standing right back in the hotel courtyard.No award ceremony. No champagne toast. No monster crawling out of a bathroom mirror.Just a handsome young man in front of her, red eyes fixed on hers.Behind him: Graves, Elliot, and Reed, all three drenched in blood.Her scattered thoughts snapped into focus fast. Subject One.Piper lunged at Chase without a second's hesitation and doubled over instead, coughing blood."The soul contract from the illusion is real. Come at me, and it comes back on you."Chase had originally planned to run all four of them through the same illusion simultaneously, but Reed had partially resisted midway through his recon-tier perception sharp enough to catch that the whole scenario was constructed. Chase had simply converted him into a controlled asset directly instead; not especially difficult once identified.As long as Piper stayed under, the other three were never a real threat reg
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