Samuel let out a long yawn as he casually draped an arm over Elizabeth's shoulders. She didn't flinch, but her gaze remained fixed on the ruins behind them, her mind still turning over everything they'd seen.
"Come now," Samuel said lightly, steering her toward the car. "No use frying your brain over it tonight."
Elizabeth sighed, but after one last glance at the crumbling site, where the monster's remains were already being sealed off by AUAF units that recently arrived, she finally nodded.
"I'm beat," Samuel stretched as he slid into the driver's seat. "Can't wait to hit the bed and forget the world exists."
Elizabeth buckled herself in and gave him a sideways glance. "Didn't you just wake up a few hours ago?"
Samuel flashed a lazy, looped grin, wagging his finger like a professor with a secret.
"Darling," he said, "the more you sleep, the better you grow."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes. "Is that how you got your muscles, then? Napping your way through training?"
He winked. "Exactly."
As the engine purred to life, Samuel adjusted the rearview mirror lazily, while Elizabeth leaned her head against the window, arms crossed but eyes still alert.
The AUAF units outside moved with trained precision, scanning the area and lifting the sealed remains into containment. To any outsider, it looked clean, contained — over.
But Elizabeth knew better.
She watched the site disappear behind them through the side mirror. There was something… off. The monster had been D-rank, yet it fought like something higher. And more than that the energy reading hadn't fully dissipated, not like usual. It pulsed, faint but consistent, even after the creature's death.
Her brows furrowed.
"Hey," Samuel said, voice breaking through her thoughts. "You're doing that thing again. The brooding."
"I'm just being cautious," Elizabeth replied, tone flat but quiet. "Something's not adding up. The energy signature lingered too long."
Samuel exhaled. "Then report it. Let the big brains at HQ worry about it. We're off-duty."
"You know I can't just ignore anomalies." She paused, before pulling her comm device from her coat pocket.
"HQ will probably call for debrief anyway. Might as well beat them to it."
Samuel groaned dramatically. "And here I thought we were finally heading for a peaceful night."
Elizabeth smirked faintly, fingers dancing across the touchscreen as she opened a secure channel.
"This is Agent Elizabeth rose. Field Report — operation smiling D-class monster. Status: Monster neutralized. Classification mismatch confirmed. Requesting deeper analysis of core residue and cross-referencing with previous energy anomalies in Sector 12."
A soft beep confirmed the report was sent, followed by a short pause then a message flashed across her screen:
"Received. Report acknowledged. Hold position for follow-up directive."
Her eyes narrowed slightly. Hold position? That was new.
Samuel glanced at her sideways, sensing the shift in her posture. "Don't tell me they're sending us back."
"No," Elizabeth said slowly, staring at the screen. "They're sending someone else."
Samuel raised a brow. "Another cleanup team?"
Elizabeth locked the screen and placed the device down, her voice quiet.
"No. Someone from the Internal Core Division."
A long silence settled between them.
Even Samuel stopped smiling.
Samuel's expression shifted, the kind of shift that only happened when something genuinely bothered him.
"The Internal Core Division?" he echoed, the casualness in his tone faltering. "They don't usually get involved unless a core's unstable. Or... corrupted."
Elizabeth nodded slowly. "Exactly."
The Internal Core Division a specialized, high-clearance unit within the AUAF. Was known for their obscurity. Even among agents, information about them was scarce. They didn't respond to field anomalies unless something unprecedented happened. Monsters with split cores, rogue energy, or worse… cores exhibiting human signatures.
Elizabeth folded her arms tighter as she stared out the windshield. "They must've seen what I saw. That energy reading wasn't normal."
Samuel leaned back in his seat, his usual nonchalance dampened by a flicker of unease.
"You think it's another mimic evolution?" he asked. "Or one of those hybrid cores HQ keeps denying exist?"
"I don't know." Her voice lowered. "But they're sending ICD, which means we're not the only ones noticing a pattern."
A soft ping on her device made her glance down.
Incoming Message: [ICD Command Unit Vesper]
"Agent Rose. We have intercepted your field scan. You are instructed not to engage further. A recovery team will handle the remaining anomalies."
"Effective immediately: All data collected on-site is to be transferred to Division Vesper's encrypted channel. This operation is now classified under Tier-3 Protocol."
— Do not discuss the remnants.
Elizabeth's grip on the device tightened slightly.
Samuel read the tension on her face. "Let me guess. They're silencing it."
"Standard protocol," she said, but her tone was cold.
Samuel snorted. "You know what they say. 'If Internal Core shows up, the truth disappears with them.'"
Elizabeth didn't laugh. She was already transferring the data encrypted and compressed, just as ordered but a part of her hesitated.
Because she'd seen something else. Just before the monster disintegrated, its core hadn't cracked. It had... shifted. Like it was trying to adapt. And for a split second, its waveform had matched a known Ability User registry.
A registry that belonged to someone classified as missing in action.
She didn't log that part.
Not yet.
Not until she understood why a monster was mimicking an Ability User's energy signature and what the Internal Core Division really wanted with that information.