The walk back into Phoenix HQ felt different this time.
The war room wasn't full of static and fire. No alarms blared. No plans were being screamed across tables. Just eyes.
Watching her.
Weighing her.
Cassel stood at the head of the room, arms folded. His expression gave nothing away.
Ash took a breath. Then another.
And stepped forward.
"I accessed Project Seraph," she said, her voice calm but cold. "The girl in the footage was me."
A flicker ran through the crowd.
"Echo didn't just use DaeCorp," she continued. "They created it. Just like they created me. I wasn't recruited by force. I was made in a lab before I ever stepped into a ring."
Cassel's eyes narrowed. "And now you bring this information to us. Why now?"
"Because now I know."
Someone in the back muttered, "How can we trust her?"
Ash heard it. Didn't flinch.
She looked at Haru, who gave a silent nod.
She turned back to the room.
"You don't have to trust me. But you've seen what I've fought for. You've seen what I've bled for. And I'm still here."
Jin stepped forward.
"She didn't just survive Echo," he said. "She defied their programming. That makes her the only person we know who's seen the inside and walked out free."
Another voice: "Or she's still under their control."
Ash's fingers twitched at her side. Not to strike — but to hold.
Haru stepped forward now, placing himself beside her.
"No one else here has risked what she has. Not for strangers. Not for people who wanted her dead. I have."
He looked directly at Cassel.
"And I still would."
Cassel exhaled slowly.
"Then what do you propose, Ash?"
She met his gaze head-on.
"We use me."
A stunned silence followed.
"I'm their failure. That means I'm their crack. I can think like them. Predict them. Maybe even beat them at their own game. But not if I'm treated like a virus."
"You want to lead," Cassel said, half a statement, half a question.
"I want to end this."
Later, in the darkened hallway that led to the bunk rooms, Haru followed close behind.
"You didn't have to do that alone," he said quietly.
"I didn't," she replied. "You were there."
He hesitated, then asked the question that had been hanging in the air since they left the outpost.
"What did it feel like? Seeing all that?"
Ash leaned against the wall, arms crossed, gaze distant.
"Like drowning in a mirror. Like I recognized myself and didn't know whether to reach out or let her fall."
She looked at him now.
"You ever feel that way?"
"Every day."
She stepped forward, brushed her fingers across the side of his jaw.
"I don't want to lose who I am again."
"Then don't," he whispered. "Stay here. With me. With them. With you."
The intimacy between them wasn't always soft.
Sometimes it was sharp — born from shared wounds and quiet defiance.
But in that moment, it softened.
Ash leaned into his chest. Felt the steady thrum of his heart like a grounding tether.
He didn't promise it would be okay.
He didn't have to.
The next day, Phoenix command voted.
It wasn't unanimous — far from it. But it was enough.
Ash was granted leadership over the infiltration op.
Her first mission: turn the weapon she once was into a key that would dismantle Echo from the inside.
Not as a pawn.
But as a rogue queen.