The interior of the North Sector base was a labyrinth of white corridors and humming machinery. Kaelen moved like a shadow, his back pressed against the cold metal walls. He had exactly seven minutes before the next automated security sweep.
He needed more than just a way in. He needed a persona. A disguise that no high-tech sensor could penetrate: a human story.
He found what he was looking for in a secondary storage bay—a discarded civilian jumpsuit and a med-kit. But that wasn't enough. Anya Petrova's scanners would see through a clean uniform. To survive here, he had to look like he had crawled out of hell.
Kaelen took a jagged piece of scrap metal and, without blinking, sliced a shallow gash across his own shoulder. Then, he rubbed charcoal and dust from the Dark World into the wound. He made himself look battered, broken, and terrified.
"Pain is just another tool," he whispered, his breath hitching as he forced his body into a state of shock.
Aegis Command – Central Hub.
"Commander! Movement in the secondary maintenance hall!"
Anya spun around, her eyes locking onto the thermal feed. A lone figure was stumbling through the hallway, collapsing against the walls.
"Is it a shadow?" Jax asked, stepping up behind her, his hand already on his weapon.
"No," Anya whispered, zooming in. "It's... it's a person. A young man."
"In the North Sector? That's impossible," Jax grunted. "The only thing out there is rocks and death."
"Get a medical team to Hallway 9. Now! And Jax—keep your weapon hot. If he shows even a hint of Miasma corruption, you know what to do."
Hallway 9.
Kaelen heard the heavy thud of tactical boots. He collapsed onto the floor just as the heavy blast doors hissed open. Through his blurred vision, he saw the glowing blue barrels of Hard-Light rifles.
"Don't... please..." Kaelen gasped, his voice raspy and thin. He reached out a trembling hand toward the soldiers. "The others... they didn't make it... the gate..."
Jax stepped forward, his massive shadow looming over Kaelen. He aimed his cannon, but Anya pushed the barrel down.
"He's clean," she said, looking at her handheld scanner. "No Miasma saturation. He's just... human."
She knelt down beside Kaelen, her sharp eyes searching his face. Kaelen looked back at her, his expression a perfect masterpiece of trauma and relief. Inside, his mind was cold, calculating her heart rate, her pupil dilation, and the distance to the knife hidden in her boot.
She's empathetic but cautious, Kaelen noted. A dangerous combination.
"You're safe now," Anya said, her voice softening slightly. "What's your name?"
"K-Kael," he stuttered, shortening his name to sound less 'Dark World.' "I was a worker... in the outer mines... the shadows took everyone..."
"Get him to the infirmary," Anya commanded. "I want a full interrogation the moment he can speak."
As they lifted him onto a hover-stretcher, Kaelen let his eyes close. He was inside. He was at the heart of the Aegis Guard. The wolf was now sleeping in the middle of the sheepfold, and the sheep were the ones who had invited him in.