Tema woke up choking.
Deep in pain.
Her lungs burned as if they were trying to drink air that didn't exist.
Each breath was a reflex, useless and cruel, her chest rising only to collapse again.
The planet around her was silent—no wind, no sound, no sky she recognized.
Just a dull, dim horizon stretching endlessly, cracked ground floating in fragments like the planet itself had given up staying whole.
She tried to stand but dropped to her knees almost instantly.
Her hands clawed at her throat, not because something was there, but because something wasn't.
No oxygen mask. No suit. No warning. Drayke hadn't sent her here to fight.
He had sent her here to wait.
Tema forced herself to stay conscious.
She pressed one hand to the ground, grounding herself, slowing her breathing despite the panic screaming inside her body.
Panic wastes oxygen. Fear kills faster than enemies.
Think.
Her vision blurred at the edges. Dark spots bloomed like ink in water.
She looked at the sky—if it could be called that.
A thin, colorless void, broken by distant debris drifting slowly, lazily, as if even gravity was tired.
This place wasn't meant for life.
It was barely existing.
Tema laughed softly, the sound dry and broken.
"So this is how you do it," she thought, her inner voice barely carrying.
"Removing me from the pack and winning?"
Her body shook as another breath failed to give her anything.
Her heart began to pound harder, faster, trying to compensate, trying to force something out of nothing.
Faces crossed her mind uninvited.
Peppy's ridiculous grin.
Bear's sarcasm hiding worry.
Chitki's sharp eyes that always noticed too much.
Chiki's noise, chaos, heart.
Tuka standing even when his body begged him not to.
Bandy—still a child, still learning what survival costs.
She clenched her fist.
No.
She hadn't built Headquarters to end like this.
She hadn't raised them to fight while she disappeared quietly.
Her knees hit the ground fully now.
Her palms scraped against the stone, skin tearing, but she didn't feel it.
Sensation was fading. The edges of the world dimmed further, sound thinning until even her own heartbeat felt far away.
Her thoughts slowed.
She clenched her fists.
Her power stirred—not explosively, not violently—but heavy, dense, pulling inward like everything she was had decided to move at once.
The ground beneath her feet cracked slightly as she focused, drawing every remaining ounce of strength she had.
"One jump," she whispered. "That's all I need."
Her lungs screamed in protest as she bent her knees.
Then she launched.
The force tore her off the surface, the planet dropping away beneath her as she shot upward, faster than her body could handle.
Pain detonated through her spine, her muscles ripping under strain, but she didn't let go.
Higher.
Higher still.
The sky peeled back, and space opened around her.
Stars flooded her vision.
Other planets came into view—distant, scattered, hanging like witnesses.
And then she saw it.
One planet, torn and scarred, shaking under impact.
Energy flashes.
Explosions.
Movement.
Figures.
Her heart slammed against her ribs.
Even from this distance, she recognized the chaos—the brutal speed, the distorted air, the violence that bent the environment itself.
Drayke.
Standing against them all.
And then—
A flash of light.
A bomb detonating mid-air.
Chiki.
Her breath caught, not from lack of oxygen this time, but from shock.
On the battlefield far below, Chiki twisted mid-motion, eyes snapping upward as if instinct had screamed before logic could catch up.
He froze.
His eyes widened.
"…What?"
For a split second—just one—his focus broke.
Tema hovered at the peak of her jump, body shaking, blood floating off her in thin droplets, her vision blurring rapidly now.
She couldn't stay here. She couldn't breathe.
But she smiled anyway.
She raised one hand.
Not a wave.
Not a signal.
Just proof.
I'm alive.
Gravity reclaimed her violently.
Her body dropped, crashing back toward the dead planet below as the stars spun and the darkness surged in full force.
Her strength was gone. Her power was spent.
But she fell knowing one thing.
They had seen her.
And on the battlefield, Drayke felt it.
That brief disruption.
That impossible presence.
His smile faded just a fraction.