"And you're okay with that?"
"It doesn't matter what I'm okay with.I won't force her."
"Noble."Rick's voice dripped with sarcasm."Also stupid.You need her, Gray.Not just because she's your mate.Because you're about to lose control completely, and when you do, people you care about are going to get hurt."
Gray was quiet for a long moment.Through the window, he could see the lights of the training grounds below, where a night shift of variants was running combat drills.Preparing for a war they might not survive.
"Maybe that's exactly why I can't go after her," he said finally."What if bonding with her makes it worse?What if instead of helping me control it, she just amplifies everything?"He turned to face Rick."I could become exactly what everyone fears.A Pollux variant with unlimited power and no restraint.The monster Larsen accused me of being."
Rick was silent for a moment.When he spoke, his voice had lost its edge."Or she could be exactly what you need to stop pretending you're something you're not."
Before Gray could respond, a figure appeared in the doorway.Vera Seer stood with one hand braced against the frame, her pale eyes unfocused, swimming with the milky film that meant she was seeing beyond the present moment.
"Gray," she said, her voice distant and strange."It's coming.The final confrontation."
He was on his feet before she finished speaking."When?"
"Three days.Maybe four."Vera blinked, and her eyes began to clear, the vision releasing its hold."They're planning something public.Multiple cities.They want the world to watch."Her focus sharpened fully, and she looked at Gray with an expression that made ice settle in his gut."And they have the weapons.The ones that strip powers.They're ready to deploy."
The silence that followed was absolute.
"Three days," Gray said."We need to move the teams into position.Coordinate with Yaz and the Castor Consortium."He looked at Rick."Get the Pollux Legion ready.Full mobilization."
"Already on it."Rick headed for the door, pausing with his hand on the frame."What about you?Are you ready?"
Gray looked at his hands, still and steady now but carrying the memory of lightning."I have to be."
Rick and Vera left.The door closed behind them with a soft click, and Gray was alone with the city lights and the weight of impossible choices.
He pulled up the tracking system one more time.Hannah's location blinked on the map, a single blue dot in a sea of suburbs forty miles from the city center.She wasn't at the apartment building anymore.The mob had driven her out days ago, according to the reports he'd been trying not to read.
She was in a motel now.The kind of place that took cash and didn't ask questions, where the ice machine was always broken and the walls were thin enough to hear your neighbors arguing at three in the morning.She'd lost her job at the bank the same day her name hit the news.Lost her apartment a week later when the building's management decided that harboring a supernatural was bad for property values.
All because the Gemini Initiative had rescued her from Protogenus, and someone had leaked her identity to the press.
Gray closed the tracking display.
Then opened it again.
His finger hovered over the command to send a message.Three words sat on the tip of his tongue, simple and devastating and absolutely impossible to say.
I need you.
He didn't send it.
Instead, he turned on the television, letting the noise fill the empty office.A news anchor stared out from the screen, her expression pitched somewhere between excitement and concern.
"...confirmed tonight that Hannah Charge, a local bank manager, is among those affected by the Aethor Institute serum.Ms.Charge was rescued three weeks ago from a Protogenus facility, but sources say she had been hiding her supernatural abilities for years while living and working among normal humans."
The footage cut to Hannah at her old job, smiling at customers from behind a desk, looking so completely ordinary that it hurt to watch.Then it cut to current footage: Hannah ducking through the protesters, electricity sparking at her fingertips, her face a mask of barely contained fear.
"The revelation has sparked outrage in her community," the anchor continued."Former coworkers and neighbors say they feel betrayed."
A woman appeared on screen, middle-aged and indignant."She sat across from me at lunch every day.We talked about our kids.And the whole time, she was one of them."The woman shook her head."It makes you wonder who else is hiding."
Gray watched it all.He watched them tear apart a woman whose only crime was surviving, whose only sin was wanting a normal life, and he let the familiar rage build in his chest because it was easier than the guilt.
"This comes as the Senate prepares to vote on the Supernatural Registration Act," the anchor said, "which would require all individuals with enhanced abilities to register with the government or face imprisonment.Critics say this is a necessary safety measure.Advocates for supernatural rights call it persecution."
