The elevator ride to Sublevel Three felt longer than it should have.
Aiden watched the floor numbers tick down 12, 11, 10 each one a quiet reminder that he was doing exactly what Mara had told him not to do.
No visits without orders.
No bypassing security.
No turning the prisoner into a personal project.
He wasn't bypassing anything this time.
He had orders.
That didn't make the weight in his chest any lighter.
"Level required?" the system asked.
"Sublevel Three," Aiden said. "Transfer escort. Authorization L‑17."
There was a short pause while the scanner at the ceiling swept him again, confirming the code his father had attached to his ID that morning.
"Access granted," the voice replied.
The doors opened onto the same cold hallway, the same harsh strip lights, the same faint smell of metal and old magic.
Two guards waited by the entrance to Research Holding. One of them Tallis, if Aiden remembered right straightened.
"Agent Lioren," Tallis said. "Here for Subject E‑73?"
"Yes," Aiden answered.
"Lucky you," the other guard muttered. "They usually send whole teams when Research calls for a live transfer."
Aiden signed the log they pushed toward him. As the door seals unlatched, he felt the faint buzz of layered wards brush against his skin.
Inside, the corridor of cells was quieter than usual. Many doors showed EMPTY on their panels. A few blinked OCCUPIED in steady red.
Kael's door was one of them.
Aiden stopped in front of the small window.
Kael sat on the bed, back against the wall, hands loosely clasped in his lap. The collar still circled his throat, the band still hugged his wrist. He looked up as Aiden's shadow crossed the glass.
For a second, something like surprise flickered over his face.
Then his mouth curled.
"Let me guess," Kael said. "You're here to bring me breakfast in bed."
"Transfer evaluation," Aiden said. "They want you in the upper labs."
"Ah," Kael said. "So not breakfast."
Aiden tapped the access panel. The locks disengaged with a heavy click. Wards shimmered, then peeled back just far enough for the door to slide open.
Two containment officers stood ready behind him, suppression weapons cradled in their arms. Their presence was a reminder: whatever strange connection existed between Aiden and Kael, the Department still saw only risk.
"Stand," one of the officers ordered.
Kael rose slowly, hands visible, movements deliberate. The band at his wrist pulsed, as if waiting for an excuse.
"Facing the wall," the officer said.
Kael obeyed without comment.
They checked his restraints, scanned his collar, attached a short, glowing tether from the band to a control unit at Aiden's belt.
"Route control is linked to you," one officer said. "If he tries anything, you hit this—" he tapped a red switch "—and the bands go full lockdown."
Full lockdown. The polite term for *enough pain to drop him where he stood*.
Aiden's fingers tightened around the unit.
"Understood," he said.
The officers stepped back.
"Subject E‑73 is in your custody," Tallis said from the doorway. "Escorted by us to the lab entrance. After that, Research takes over."
Aiden nodded.
"Move," one officer told Kael.
They walked.
The corridor felt narrower with Kael at his side, tether light humming faintly between them. His steps were steady, but Aiden saw the subtle stiffness in his shoulders, the careful way he carried his weight. Suppression did that turned every movement into negotiation.
"So," Kael said after a few meters, voice low. "Did you get demoted for talking to me too much, or is this your promotion?"
"Neither," Aiden replied.
"Shame," Kael said. "I was hoping your punishment would be more interesting than mine."
Aiden glanced at him. "You know where we're going."
Kael shrugged, a sharp little motion. "I know people whisper about Sublevel Two like it's the monster under the bed. I know 'evaluation' usually means 'let's see how much we can poke you before something breaks.' I can put two and two together."
His tone was casual. His eyes weren't.
"The more you cooperate," Aiden said carefully, "the less likely they are to push you past your limits."
Kael huffed. "Is that on a poster somewhere? 'Suffer politely and we'll hurt you slower'?"
One of the guards behind them shot Kael a warning look.
"Quiet," he snapped.
Kael's jaw worked, but he fell silent.
They reached the elevator at the end of the corridor. Aiden keyed in the lab level. The tether at his belt buzzed as the system recognized the link.
Inside the lift, the space was small enough that Aiden could feel Kael's breath when he exhaled. The collar light reflected faintly on the metal walls.
"You didn't answer me," Kael said finally, voice low enough the guards might miss it. "Are you here as a reward or a leash?"
Aiden stared at the closed doors.
"I'm here because the Director believes my field experience with you will be helpful to Research," he said.
"In other words," Kael murmured, "you're the one who caught me, so you get to watch what they do with the catch."
Aiden had no good response to that.
The doors slid open onto Sublevel Two.
The air here was colder. The corridors were wider, lined not with cells but with heavy doors bearing numeric codes and hazard symbols. The lights were softer, but the wards woven into the walls felt stronger, tighter, more intricate.
Laboratory assistants in pale uniforms moved between stations. Some glanced up as the group passed; most pretended not to see.
They stopped at a door marked LAB 2‑B – LIVING FIELD RESPONSE.
A woman in a white coat waited outside, tablet in hand. Her hair was twisted into a severe knot, and a pair of thin, rimless lenses hovered just above her eyes, projecting data directly into her vision.
"Agent Lioren," she said. "Subject E‑73. On time. Good."
"Dr. Vell," Aiden replied.
He had seen her name in Research reports before. Specialized in live‑magic stress testing.
Perfect.
"We'll take it from here," she said, gesturing to the door. "You may observe from the control room. Your insight into the subject's previous behavior will be valuable."
The guards handed her the tether control, then stepped back.
Kael's gaze flicked from Vell to Aiden.
"Don't worry," Dr. Vell said to him with a smile that didn't touch her eyes. "We're not here to hurt you unnecessarily."
Kael's lips twitched.
"Always nice to hear that the pain will be…necessary," he said.
"Pain is feedback," Vell replied. "Feedback is information. Information keeps the city safe."
She keyed the panel. The door hissed open.
The room beyond looked almost like a gym: open floor, high ceiling, reinforced walls. Lines were painted on the ground in concentric circles and angular patterns, many of them embedded with faintly glowing sigils.
At the center stood a raised platform with a circular mark etched into it.
"Place him there," Vell told Aiden.
Aiden led Kael forward. As they crossed the outer ring, he felt the difference in the air a dense, layered weave of spells and circuits, ready to snap shut if anything went wrong.
He released the tether hook from his belt and stepped back.
The band on Kael's wrist flared, syncing with the room.
"Remove his suppression cuffs from the arms," Vell said to an assistant. "Neck restraint stays. Wrist band stays in regulated mode."
An assistant approached Kael with a device. The red lines of the heavy cuffs faded and snapped open, falling away from his forearms.
Kael flexed his hands slowly, as if confirming they still belonged to him.
The collar beeped once, warning.
"Let's begin with baseline control," Vell said, moving to the control booth overlooking the room. "Subject, you will generate a minor electrical discharge inside the circle only. No arcs beyond the marked boundary."
"Subject," Kael repeated under his breath. "Nice to meet you too."
He closed his eyes.
Aiden watched from the booth as blue‑white light gathered around Kael's fingers, tentative at first, then steadier. It crackled between his hands, lighting his face from below.
The readouts on Vell's tablet climbed.
"Output is high even at minimal focus," she murmured, half to herself. "Amplitude unstable, but frequency remarkably consistent."
"Subject demonstrates strong reactive use under stress," Aiden heard himself say. "In the field, his power spiked in response to our attacks. He attempted redirection away from civilian structures."
Vell glanced at him, mildly annoyed at the interruption, then typed a note.
"We'll test reactive thresholds next," she said.
She tapped a command.
Small discs embedded in the floor around Kael lit up and began firing short, controlled bursts of energy at the circle nothing lethal, but sharp enough to sting.
Kael flinched at the first impact. The second. By the third, electricity flared around him in a defensive halo, snapping against the incoming blasts.
"See?" Vell said. "Stimulus, response. Perfectly predictable."
Aiden watched Kael grit his teeth, watched the way his shoulders tensed, the way his jaw locked as he forced the lightning to stay inside the circle.
"If you keep this up," Kael shouted, voice echoing, "you're going to get a very different kind of response."
"That is the point," Vell said calmly. "Increase intensity by ten percent."
The blasts grew stronger.
The collar around Kael's neck glowed brighter, reacting to his rising output with matching suppression pulses. His body jerked once as two signals collided his own power trying to surge, the collar forcing it back.
"That's enough," Aiden said before he could stop himself. "You're forcing overlapping feedback. You'll fry his channels."
"His channels will adjust or fail," Vell said. "Either way, we learn where the limit is."
She tapped another command. "Twenty percent."
Kael stumbled.
Lightning exploded outward, slamming into the invisible barrier at the edge of the circle. The room filled with the sharp crack of energy against containment fields. The hair on Aiden's arms stood up despite the glass between them.
"Doctor," Aiden said, fighting to keep his voice calm, "if his output collapses here, you lose any chance of controlled cooperation later. You said yourself pain is feedback. You're about to drown the signal in noise."
Vell's fingers hovered over the controls.
"Your father said you had a good tactical mind," she said after a beat. "Fine. We'll hold at current intensity."
The blasts continued, but they didn't climb higher.
Kael dragged in a breath and forced his hands apart, splitting the lightning into two separate arcs that ran along the inside of the circle instead of slamming straight into the barrier.
"Adaptive behavior," Vell murmured, watching the monitors. "He's learning the room faster than expected."
Aiden watched too and saw something Vell missed.
The pattern of the arcs. The precise places where Kael let the lightning touch the barrier, testing it, measuring its give.
He's not just surviving this, Aiden thought. He's mapping it.
Their eyes met through the glass.
For a heartbeat, the room fell away. The blasts, the data, the observers everything blurred into the thin line of recognition between them.
You see this too, that look said.
Aiden's hands curled at his sides.
"End phase one," Vell said briskly. "Let him recover for three minutes. Then we'll force a spike and see how long he can sustain it before suppression overrides."
Aiden spoke before she finished.
"Doctor, may I make an alternative proposal?" he asked.
Vell sighed. "Agents," she said. "Always wanting to adjust the experiment."
"Your current plan pushes him until he breaks or shuts down," Aiden said. "If you want usable data, test what happens when he isn't cornered. When his output isn't pure panic."
"And why," Vell asked, "would a Deviant ever not be cornered?"
"Because sometimes," Aiden said, "we put them in corners they didn't choose. That affects behavior."
She studied him for a long moment.
"Your father warned me you'd be…philosophical," she said. "Very well. You want to see him controlled? Give him a task."
She toggled the intercom.
"Subject," she called. "New parameters. You will generate a directed arc strong enough to power the target on the far wall, without damaging anything around it. Think of it as practice for behaving like a citizen instead of a storm."
A panel slid open at the far side of the room, revealing a dark metal box with a dead screen.
Kael wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand.
"So now I get to prove I'd make a great battery," he said hoarsely. "Fantastic."
"Focus," Vell said. "Precision. Not force."
Kael turned toward the target.
For a moment, nothing happened.
Then a thin line of lightning shot from his hand in a clean, tight bolt. It hit the box dead center. The screen flickered, then came fully to life with a soft hum.
The monitors in front of Vell lit up with new data.
"See?" Aiden said quietly. "He can direct it."
"That doesn't make him safe," Vell replied. "It makes him useful."
The word landed like a stone.
Kael lowered his hand slowly, chest rising and falling.
"Again," Vell said into the mic. "Higher output. Same precision."
Aiden watched Kael obey.
Watched him prove, over and over, that he could be more than a weapon
while the people in the room wrote him down as exactly that.