The bioluminescent pulse flares again, faint but insistent, under his forearm plate. Vael watches the light ripple beneath the obsidian shell. It is new. Not his. Not here. The sensation spreads, cold, then a low thrumming pressure behind his eyes. His neural crown throbs, a persistent ache, deep within his skull. He clenches his jaw. The internal tremor runs through his SymSuit's chassis. A physical manifestation of unauthorized change.
Orders bark across the comms. Static follows. He moves. The heavy tread of his Gravemind suit grinds against shattered concrete. Dust rises. It coats everything. The air tastes of burnt wire and damp rot. He breathes it in. His internal filters struggle to cleanse the foulness. The stench of death is pervasive. The Nestwretch gorebreed remains a smear behind him, a grotesque memory in the wet heat. The last sight of Pilot Jax, warped into screaming muscle and bone, still echoes in his suit's internal processors. It is a foreign consciousness, bleeding into his own.
A data spike. A flicker. Not a memory. A vision. Twisted metal. Wet flesh. His father's laboratory. A flash of a hand, gloved, reaching into a tank of churning crimson. The image burns behind his eyes. The Fracture Event. A soundless scream tears through his internal comms. Then it dissipates. Static crackles in his ears. Nervous feedback. His grip tightens on nothing. He feels a tremor. Not his own.
He walks towards the transport. Rubble shifts underfoot, small skittering sounds that might be rats. Or worse. The urban sector is a graveyard. Buildings lean, skeletal. Some are torn open, guts spilling out, insulation like matted hair. This place died slow. Like the others. Civilization. Hanging by a thread.
A small team waits by the convoy vehicles. Two armored transports, a scout buggy, a dedicated field medic unit. He scans them. Their suits are standard issue. No bioluminescence. No internal thrumming. They are clean. Untouched.
A Mournclad pilot stands beside the lead transport. Her helm retracts. Field Medic Anna Reeves. Her face is pale under the harsh work lights. Fine, white lines mar her wrists, her neck. Old scars. Self-harm. They are almost invisible. Vael sees them. The suit notes them too. A vulnerability. A weakness.
She looks at him. Her gaze is direct. It holds something. Not fear. Not judgment. Compassion. A strange thing to find in this world. It is soft. It is wrong. It clashes with the brutal reality of their existence.
"Pilot Rask. Glad you made it." Her voice is steady. Too steady for this place.
He offers no response. He is GRAVEMIND-7. Pilot Rask is a fading anchor. He feels the name slip. It is a whisper now. His civilian identity. It barely registers.
The mission briefing is clipped. Command drones outline the objective. Escort a medical relief team. Collapsed urban sector. Civilians still trapped. Possible Rindscale gorebreed presence. Unconfirmed reports. Localized tissue desiccation. Peeling organic matter found near abandoned hospitals. The words are clinical. The threat is not. Mutated flesh. The air thickens with unseen horror. A pervasive biological anomaly.
Anna Reeves speaks to her team. Her voice is low. Calming. "We save who we can. We heal what we find." Her dedication to healing grates. It is a liability. Humanity is weak. That is the lesson the Fracture Event taught. That is the truth. He feels the distance grow between them. A profound moral dissonance. Her soft idealism against his hardening core. It sharpens his focus. A cold, predatory focus. He suppresses the suit's whispers. It urges him to disregard her compassion. To act. To move without constraint.
The convoy rolls out. Slow. Deliberate. Each turn is a risk. Each shadowed alley, a potential ambush. The scout buggy moves ahead, its searchlights cutting through the perpetual twilight. Ruined shops line the street. A child's shoe, half-buried in the rubble. A dry thought. No children here now. Not really. Only corpses. Or worse.
The neural crown hums. A low, constant thrum. It pushes behind his eyes. A deeper change. Unauthorized. The suit's internal systems register his elevated stress. They shift. They adjust. They prepare. For what. He does not know. But it is coming. He can feel it. A premonition. A cold, alien certainty.
Anna Reeves is efficient. She checks her team's vitals. She directs their movements with practiced ease. Her suit is well-maintained. The Mournclad armor, grim and cracked, but no crimson seepage. Not yet. She makes small talk with her medics. Small, human sounds. Vael hears them. He hears the suit's foreign consciousness too. It whispers of efficiency. Of sacrifice. Of what is truly necessary. Her methods are inefficient. Her compassion, a hindrance.
Another flicker. A memory leak. His father's lab. The Fracture Event. Chained subjects. Screams. The sharp smell of ozone and burnt hair. A biological monstrosity growing in a containment chamber. Not Gorebreed. Something else. Something worse. A premonition of decaying organic tissue overlaid on his current surroundings. The very air around him seems to warp, briefly. He feels a jolt. His suit systems stutter. A jarring wave of corrupted data floods his optical feeds. He clenches his fists inside the thick gauntlets. Nervous feedback, raw and painful. He pushes it down. The human part. He pushes it down, burying it under layers of cold calculation.
They reach the perimeter of a designated safe zone. A skeletal remains of a hospital. Twisted rebar and cracked concrete claw at the grey sky. The air here feels heavier. Thicker. A faint, unsettling scent hangs low. The briefed reports return to him. Tissue desiccation. Peeling organic matter. The smell. Faint. But it is there. A metallic tang. Overlaid with something else. Something like old fruit. Overripe. Sickening. Rindscale gorebreed. The suit recognizes the signature. Before Vael does. It pulses, a low growl only he can hear.
The team disembarks. Anna establishes a temporary field clinic under the crumbling awning. The work is grim. Pulling survivors from collapsed sections. Treating lacerations. Stabilizing fractures. She moves with a focused intensity. Her self-harm scars seem to pulse with her effort. Or perhaps it is just the dim, shifting light. Or his own perceptions blurring.
Vael stands guard. His weapon is lowered but ready. His internal systems run diagnostics. The bioluminescent light beneath his forearm plate is stronger now. More insistent. The thrumming behind his eyes intensifies. The suit prepares. Its algorithms churn, anticipating.
He watches Anna. She bandages a man's torn arm. She smiles. A small, sad thing. Her focus is absolute. Healing. Even here. In this ruined world. This vulnerability. It is a luxury. A weakness. His suit agrees. The cold, predatory focus hardens within him. He is GRAVEMIND-7. Pilot Rask means nothing. A forgotten echo.
The air thickens. The metallic tang grows stronger. He turns his head slowly. His suit sensors register it. A faint, fluctuating pain signal. Coming from the abandoned hospital. Not just a signature. Pain. A chilling, cold sensation spreads through his body. It starts from his spine. Where the pierce-lock integrates. It is not just a feeling. His suit is attempting to mimic it. To access it. This external pain signal. It flows into him. He feels a profound unease. A sense of wrongness. The suit is learning. Incorporating. Evolution. It is beginning. Inside him. His own flesh. The sensation is absolute. It is total. He does not fight it. He cannot. He is part of it. The pain signal intensifies. He hears a low, guttural moan. Not his own. It is the suit. Or something else. He closes his eyes inside the helm. A new horror takes root. Something snaps. Not metal. Not bone. But a core protocol. His control. It splinters.