The pump house door creaked shut behind us, the sound drawn out like a reluctant sigh, the rusted hinges protesting with a slow, grating whine that echoed faintly off the derelict brick walls. It swallowed the last remnants of our escape the fading slosh of retreating waves from the sump below, Aquarius's sodden curse dissolving into the distant murmur of the canal outside. The rain had paused for the moment, holding its breath in the heavy night air, which hung thick with the sharp afterbite of ozone and a faint, briny tang that clung to our clothes, a reminder of the stirred depths we'd just conquered. Inside the pump house, the space felt even smaller than before, almost intimate, charged with the quiet aftermath of our storm-taming raid. My boots left deliberate wet prints on the cracked concrete floor, each step squelching softly as water pooled around them, mingling with the playful splashes from Mira's hurried movements and the measured, precise steps of Lena. It was like an impromptu map etched temporarily into the grime, a testament to our shared chaos, the paths we'd woven through the flood now reduced to fading puddles under the dim flicker of a single bulb hanging overhead.
The mend's warmth still lingered in my veins, a subtle, pulsing counterpoint to the chill seeping from my damp clothes, soothing the raw scrape of adrenaline's gradual fade. But it couldn't quite reach the deeper ache, the one that bloomed slowly in my chest like a bruise forming just beneath the skin, tender and insistent. *Allies,* the word echoed in my mind once more, warmer this time but still laced with a fear I couldn't fully shake: *How much of this light can I hold before my shadows snuff it out? Andi would have loved those waves, splashing through them with that reckless laugh of hers, calling Mira's clones 'her army of Mimas.' She'd have turned the chaos into a game, pulling us all along in her wake. God, what would she think of me now, coiling poison to mend fractures I helped crack in the first place? Would she see the mend as a gift, or just another twist in the venom's curse?*
Mira slumped against a rusted pipe that jutted from the wall like a forgotten skeleton, her breath coming in uneven huffs that fogged the dim light from the bulb, her ponytail a sodden rope slung carelessly over one shoulder, dripping steadily onto the floor. She paused for a moment, wiping a strand of wet hair from her face, her cheeks still flushed with the residue of the raid's intensity. "Storm tamed, glitch squad," she said finally, her voice breaking the hush with a mix of exhaustion and triumph. "Your coil's a beast, Rei. Turned that maelstrom into a puddle party!" Her grin flashed defiant in the low light, but I caught a flicker in her eyes, something shadowed, a glimpse of the duality's hidden cost peeking through her usual cheer. She took a deep breath, steadying herself, then rummaged through her pack with exaggerated flair, her fingers fumbling slightly on the zipper before pulling out a crumpled towel. She held it up like a trophy for a second, then tossed it my way, the fabric arcing lazily through the air, heavy with its own dampness but offered with genuine kindness. "Here, before you turn into a serpent-sicle. Can't have our coil-master catching a chill mid-mend."
I caught it mid-air, my fingers closing around the rough weave, the texture grounding me in the moment, pulling me back from the swirl of thoughts. I draped it slowly over my shoulders, feeling the weight settle like a makeshift cloak, stirring that fragile warmth again, gratitude, raw and unpracticed, blooming in the hollow space Andi had left behind. *She's chaos wrapped in light,* I thought, watching her shake out her own hair, *pulling laughs from me when grief wants to choke them out entirely.* But the doubt coiled tighter in response, Phobos's voice threading a quiet caution through my mind: "It's a spark, Rei, warm, yes, but sparks ignite dry tinder. Guard the flame." Deimos rumbled low in counterpoint, his tone a rough, almost amused chuckle: "Or fan it. Squad's got bite now, Leo's pride next? Let's roar it down."
Lena paced the narrow space between us, her cap tugged low to shadow her eyes, but her steps lacked their usual vigilant edge; they were slower now, more like an unwind than a watchful patrol, each footfall echoing softly against the concrete. She peeled off her soaked jacket with deliberate care, the fabric clinging stubbornly before giving way, and hung it on a protruding bolt that jutted from the wall like an improvised hook. The motion gave us all a moment to breathe, to let the tension seep out into the air. "Clean getaway," she said at last, her voice steady as always, that precision serving as an anchor in the room. "No wards trailing us, council's blind for now. Aries's blackout is rippling outward to Leo; his mane's still singed from those old scraps, and his pride's demanding a patch we just denied him." There was a faint tremor undercutting her words, though, the duality's toll showing through, clones glitching with ghosts she couldn't quite name, parents fogged from memory like half-erased sketches on a water-damaged page. She stopped pacing then, turning to meet my gaze directly, unyielding, with rain still beading on her lashes like tiny, held-back droplets. "You held the red flicker well back there. The sync... it helped?"
The question landed softly but with a probing edge, slicing through the lingering post-raid haze to expose the vulnerability I'd armored with layers of snark. It stirred the knot in my chest, grief's old, familiar companion, twisting tighter at the mere mention of the whisper. I leaned against the opposite wall, the towel absorbing the slow drip from my hair, and nodded slowly, letting the silence stretch for a beat before the confession pulled reluctant from my throat. "Yeah. It was a close call when the core thrummed like that, felt it pull at me, *weave the storm eternal,* like Jay's echo was tempting the mend into something... possessive. As if the venom wanted to claim the chaos entirely, not just tame it for a moment." The words hung heavy in the pump house's hush, vulnerability laid bare, dredging up Andi's ghost right in the middle of the sentence, *She'd have steadied me with a joke, 'Don't let the rain drown your fire, Rei.' Maybe thrown in a splash for good measure, turning the tension into play.* Grief twisted sharp inside me, a fresh cut amid the mend's soothing balm, but their presence eased it somehow, the corrupt venom threading a quiet warmth through the hurt, turning the chill of isolation into a shared, flickering fire. "Phobos reeled me back in. And you two... the mirrors fracturing the waves, the daggers parting the flow, it grounded me. Felt like... family, for a beat. Like we were all pulling the same thread."
Mira's grin faltered then, softening into something more real, more vulnerable, as she stepped closer, her boots scuffing softly on the floor. She nudged my arm with her elbow, the contact light but electric, chasing away a bit of the chill that clung to me. "Family glitch, then," she replied, her voice dipping lower, the cheer cracking just enough to reveal the fracture beneath. "Gemini's split means we know those whispers all too well, clones glitch with our own ghosts sometimes, parents' faces half-fogged in our minds, laughing one second and then... gone the next, like a signal cut mid-transmission." She paused, her eyes distant for a moment, as if chasing one of those foggy memories, before shaking it off with a small shrug. Lena nodded faintly from her perch on an old crate, her hand brushing my arm briefly, accidental, or maybe not, a spark of solidarity that lingered warmer than the towel's weave against my skin. "We chase the same tide, Rei," she added quietly. "It mends crooked, sure, but together? We ride it out. Or break trying, that's the gift in all this fracture."
The pump house felt truly intimate in that moment, the three of us clustered in its rust-veined hush, the distant patter of resuming rain acting like a curtain, sealing us off from the world's relentless grind. There were no grand oaths sworn, no dramatic henshin glow to mark the occasion, just this quiet, heavy with unspoken layers: their fogged losses mirroring the Andi-shaped void in me, the gods' indifferent harvest binding us in a shared, quiet defiance. Gratitude swelled fuller inside me, a slow tide rising against the persistent doubt, *Not alone in the storm. They choose this, choose me, when the cycle screams at them to run.* But fear lingered still, a subtle shadow threading through the warmth: *What if my cracks flood them under? What if the whisper wakes and drowns out this light we've kindled?* Phobos hummed a soft approval in my mind: "Balance weaves, Rei, for now, let it hold." Deimos chuckled rough in response: "Squad's storm-ready. Leo's roar? We'll coil it silent."
We lingered longer than strictly needed, the plan for Leo's pride unfolding in murmured fragments over the energy bars Mira had pilfered from her pack, crinkly wrappers rustling as we passed them around, the sweetness a small comfort against the brine still on our tongues. His lair was a gilded coliseum buried in the city's underbelly, the pride's core fueling mane-regen for the council's lions, a hub of roaring vanity we'd need to shatter. Clones to fracture the echoing roars, daggers to pierce through the pompous displays, my storm-mend to corrupt the heart at its center. Laughter bubbled up tentative between us, Mira mimicking Aquarius's drowned bluster with exaggerated gestures, her voice pitching low and gurgling, drawing a rare, dry quip from Lena that landed like a well-aimed strike, easing the knot in my chest further, turning what felt like a fracture into something more like a foundation. *This,* I thought as the moments stretched, the ache softening bit by bit, *this is what Andi would fight for, connections that defy the fog, lights that pierce right through the thrones.*
Eventually, paths diverged, the moment breaking as we unchained our bikes from the shadows outside, the metal clinking softly in the resuming rain. Mira and Lena vanished toward their shadowed side of Blacksand, a final wave from each lost to the gathering mist, their figures blurring into the gloom. I pedaled solo then, the rain resuming its whisper against my skin, washing away the canal's salt but leaving the night's imprint etched deep in my soul. The boarding house rose weary from the haze, its porch sagging under the weight of endless drips, the floorboards groaning a familiar welcome as I stepped inside, leaving puddles pooling on the linoleum like unshed regrets. The room enveloped me in dimness, stale with the ghosts of yesterday, the mattress yielding with a soft sigh as I shed my layers one by one, skin prickling in the abrupt dry air. The pendants cooled against my bare chest, the Star Fragments unzipped and placed carefully on the nightstand, their glow a soft, steady vigil in the enveloping dark.
Sleep clawed at me insistently, but my thoughts meandered restless for what felt like hours, the raid replaying in fragmented loops that fractured further into introspection: Elara's vines wilting like defeated hopes, Aquarius's waves lapsing into silence, the twins' sync anchoring my coil through it all, gratitude mingling with the tide of grief, Andi's laugh a phantom echoing in the waves. *Allies mend the hollow,* I pondered, turning over in the sagging bed, *but what if I'm the leak that lets it all drain away? The fog stole her clean; what if my venom fogs them too, turns their light to shadow?* The whisper lay dormant, its echo faint, a reminder of power's barbs: *Unite... or erode alone.* Ophy's mist ghosted briefly in the corner before fading, his voice a half-heard hiss that lingered: "Mend holds, bearer. Pride roars next, coil the fall." I nodded to the empty air, exhaustion finally claiming me, pulling me under into dreams laced with green-silver threads: mirrors striking in slow tandem, cores blooming with venom-flowers, thrones coiling under a building rage. No crimson surges this time, just a quiet weave of fear and fire, allies steady at my flanks. Dawn's grind loomed inevitable, school's drone, the warehouse's rust, but for now, in the rain's gentle lullaby, the fracture felt less like a wound and more like a map: scarred, yes, but leading somewhere worth the slow bleed.
Dawn broke reluctant the next day, the sky still bruised and low with unspoken threats, clouds hanging heavy as if reluctant to release their burden. 6:30 AM WIB stirred the boarding house with distant creaks from other rooms, the neighbor's radio murmuring softly about endless rain, Blacksand weeping perpetual for its hidden wars, the sound filtering through the thin walls like a shared secret. I rose slowly, the mattress relinquishing me with a protesting sigh, my muscles eased by the mend's subtle work but my mind still clung with introspection like morning dew on leaves. The pendants warmed against my skin as I dressed, the tracksuit stiff from yesterday's damp, the Star Fragments pocketed with their insistent pulse, *Synergy: 20% now, a quiet climb.* The mirror spared me crimson this morning, showing only tired eyes staring back, shadows deeper under them, reflecting the war I carried inward: *Allies mend the fracture, but what if I'm the crack that spreads? Andi would scorn this god-chase, the normal world spinning on without her, while I dive deeper into the storm.*
The bike ride cut through the lingering haze, the streets glistening under a weak sun that struggled to pierce the clouds, vendors' carts steaming against the chill, the low rumble of life resuming its indifferent rhythm around me. Class blurred by as before, equations a distant hum in the background, my thoughts drifting inevitably to the twins: Mira's spark, a light in the grind that stirred something hopeful yet dangerous within me; Lena's steady gaze, a mirror to Phobos's caution, pulling confessions from me that I hadn't voiced in years. Lunch found me on the swings again, acorns crunching underfoot like brittle resolve, the chains' creak a solitary meditation that stretched the minutes, *Trust them fully? Or leash it tighter, spare them my unraveling?* The quest pinged faintly in my HUD: *Pride's Fall, Leo's roar calls.* Vague but insistent, it pulled me toward the next fracture, a slow-building anticipation.
The afternoon bell rang like a mercy, releasing me early into preparations: hoodie swapped for drier layers, pack slung with deliberate care, Ophy's warning echoing in my mind, *Pride boils the unwary.* The ride looped past the warehouse, its gate a sentinel of rust standing silent, then veered toward Leo's gilded underbelly, a sprawling coliseum hidden in the city's depths, where the pride-core fueled mane-regen for the council's lions. The air grew thicker with a gilded haze, distant roars rumbling like thunder on the horizon. Mira and Lena waited at the rendezvous, an abandoned arena wing, flecked with gold dust in the shadows, their forms familiar and steady.
"Rei, pride on time," Mira teased, emerging from the gold-dusted gloom with a splash of energy, her grin undimmed by the oppressive atmosphere. Lena nodded from the doorway, her eyes scanning the pride's edge with careful sweeps. "Leo's lair, roars for cover, pride to crush the unwary. Core's in the pit, guarded by mane-storm. We mirror the boasts, you coil the fall." Her voice held that assessing edge, but softer now, the sanctum's bond lingering like a quiet thread between us.
I nodded, the plan unfolding slowly in my mind: clones to fracture the roars, daggers to pierce the pomp, my storm-mend to corrupt the heart. We lingered briefly in the pump house's hush, no, this was the arena wing now, but the feeling echoed, the rain threatening distantly, the air thick with promise and the quiet fear of its cost. *Allies,* the word settled warmer, *but fractures mend crooked.* Phobos approved faintly: "Weave them in, Rei, balance the roar." Deimos growled eager: "Or ride it. Pride loves a coil-crush."
The pit waited below, a gilded labyrinth of echoing roars and grated passages, Leo's laughter booming like thunder's jest. We descended carefully, boots padding softly on the pride-veined floors, the air sharpening with mane-scented power. Mira blurred first, her clones rippling into the roar, holographic sprites boasting on the waves, drawing mane-wards into futile chases that bought us time. Lena's daggers gleamed as she traced the grate locks with precision, parting the metal with a hiss lost to the rush. I followed, pendants warming against my chest, HUD chiming softly: *Fall Breach. Synergy: Amped Allies.*
The core chamber revealed itself gradually, a cavern of echoing roars and bioluminescent gold clinging to the walls, the crystalline heart suspended in a mane-vortex, Leo presiding, his golden armor shimmering like sun-pride, claw raised to weave tempests over a tranced Taurus, hide scarred from prior clashes. "Glitch cub," he boomed, his voice rolling out slow and deep, roars surging at his call, manes coiling like living lions. Lena slashed a path through the foam, her daggers biting into the mane to still the eddies one by one; Mira's clones multiplied the chaos, whips cracking illusions that splintered the roars into echoes.
I gripped the pendants tightly, the mend's hum syncing with the roar's rhythm, hesitation stretching a long beat, the whisper faint: *Fall... unite pride...* I crushed it deliberately, channeling Andi's quiet strength into Phobos, the coil extending to lash a roar mid-rise, venom misting to blacken the flow, turning the surge to sluggish rot. Leo roared in response, his claw thrusting mane-veined gold, but Lena flanked him steadily, daggers severing the bolt's path; Mira's echoes overwhelmed, chaos mirroring his own in a drawn-out dance.
Closer now, the core's throb pulled at me, a maelstrom heartbeat syncing with mine, fragments in my pocket resonating with a low hum. The whisper swelled: *Weave pride... mend eternal...* My eyes tingled red, but the twins' sync anchored me, Lena's nod through the spray, Mira's laugh defying the drown. I twisted the coil deep, rage at erased lives pouring slowly into Deimos, the dual strike blooming venom that shattered the orb in a cascade of fractured roars. Shards absorbed, HUD beeping: *Upgrade: Pride Mend, Venom Tames Roar, Amplifies Allies.*
Leo staggered, his armor flickering to a sodden man, roars dying to laps. "Eclipse... falls against you," he muttered, his voice fading. Guards surged, but clones bought our escape, retreating through the grates into the night. Back in the arena wing, breathless and dripping, Mira fist-bumped: "Pride fallen, your coil's a beast!" Lena smiled faintly: "Crack roars wider. Next: Libra's scale, to tip the balance."
I grinned, the mend's warmth easing the ache, grief for Andi softer, allies' light brighter. *Quest: Fall Complete. New: Scale's Tip.* Roar fallen, but with them, it felt navigable, fractures mending, one shared breath at a time.