The alarms were screaming now. Not just the clean, calculated tone of a lockdown, but a distorted wail, like the building itself was panicking. Red lights strobed overhead, washing the hall in pulses of blood-colored haze.
Theron pressed his back to the cold wall, breath ragged. His blade felt heavier than it should. The hum of the System wasn't in his head anymore—it buzzed through the floor, the walls, every surface like a heartbeat he couldn't escape.
Seris crouched across from him, her hands glowing faint violet as she traced a rune midair. "Door's jammed," she muttered. Sweat slicked her hair against her temple. "Something's overriding the seals."
Something.
[NOTICE: █████ ACTIVE]
[ALERT: Division Grey Integrity—Failing]
The message burned across his vision, quick as a flashbang. He blinked hard, and the words were gone, replaced by static.
A scream echoed down the hall. Not fear—rage. Kael's voice, somewhere near the security hub, followed by the sound of steel ripping through metal. Shadows flickered at the far end of the corridor, long and wrong, moving like smoke had grown claws.
Seris froze mid-rune. "Shades," she whispered.
"How the hell are there Shades in here?" Theron hissed.
"They're not supposed to be," she said tightly, pushing herself up. "Move. Now."
They sprinted, boots slamming the tile. The walls blurred past in strobes of red, the sterile perfection of Division Grey cracking under its own weight. Lights sparked. Cameras hung dead, their sleek lenses dripping sparks. The hum of machinery faltered, replaced by whispers that weren't whispers.
[ERROR: DOOR OVERRIDE FAILED]
[WARNING: ██ ACCESS DENIED ██]
[NOTICE: CHOOSE]
"Stop saying that," Theron growled under his breath, as if the System could hear him.
They turned a corner—and almost ran straight into a hunter slumped against the wall. His uniform was torn, blood dripping in slow rivulets down his chest. His eyes darted between them, wide and frantic.
"Don't go that way," he gasped. "Sector Delta's gone—everything's out—"
Something yanked him backward. His scream cut off as a black tendril dragged him through a shattered doorway, vanishing into the mist. The sound of tearing followed, wet and final.
Seris grabbed Theron's arm and shoved him forward. "Don't look back!"
They cut through another corridor, only to find a lockdown shutter halfway down, jammed crooked. Sparks lit the air, and the mist pooled just beyond it, writhing like it was alive. A voice drifted through—faint, cold, and familiar.
Not yet.
Theron froze. It was Nine.
Seris grabbed his wrist. "Theron!"
The mist surged, slamming into the shutter, bending it inward with a scream of tortured metal. The building groaned, as if the thing wasn't just breaking barriers but pulling Grey apart brick by brick.
"Keep moving!" Seris snapped, dragging him down an access stairwell.
The lights cut out completely.
Darkness swallowed everything except the faint glow of Seris's runes and the red gleam of Theron's blade. In that darkness, the System wasn't text anymore. It was a whisper in his head, too close.
They'll kill you before they kill it.
Theron stumbled, gripping the railing tight as a wave of nausea hit him. The air felt too thin, his vision splitting into flashes: Nine's pale eyes, the mist wrapping a guard like a puppet, Lyss smiling as alarms painted her in red.
He forced himself to focus. "Where's Hale?"
Seris didn't slow. "If he's smart? Getting to the control core."
"And Lyss?"
"She's not running," Seris said grimly.
They reached the bottom of the stairs and slammed through another door—straight into chaos.
The central training floor was a battlefield. Hunters clashed with blackened Shades that didn't belong to any rank chart he knew. Some of the creatures crawled on walls, their shapes glitching like corrupted data. Runes across the floor flickered weakly, failing containment seals.
Kael was there, his blade glowing bright as he cut a Shade in half with a roar, blood spraying across his face. "Took you long enough," he snarled when he saw Theron. "What, needed a babysitter?"
"Shut up and move," Seris snapped.
Theron didn't answer Kael. His focus locked on the far wall—on Nine's observation chamber, now split open like a cracked egg. The mist wasn't just mist anymore. It was forming… shapes. Tall, shifting silhouettes with too many eyes.
Nine stood at the center of it all, chains still clamped to his wrists, head tilted slightly as he watched the chaos like it was a play written for him alone.
"Theron." His voice wasn't in Theron's ears. It was in his mind, sliding past every barrier. "You're connected to it too. Aren't you curious why?"
Theron's knuckles whitened around his sword. The whispers of the System hissed over Nine's words, a warning—or an invitation.
[NOTICE: LINK DEEPENING]
[ALERT: SUBJECT NINE — MERGING]
[COMMAND: KILL] [COMMAND: JOIN]
Lyss stepped out of the smoke behind Nine, heels clicking against broken glass, firelight dancing in her eyes. She looked like she'd been waiting for this moment.
"Welcome to the fun part," she purred.
The floor cracked beneath them.
And the whole room went black.