The blood drains from my body.
Heavy footsteps thunder around a bend, and two recruits appear, dragging a woman between them. Her wrists are bound with thick restraints, her long, bright hair tangled around their gloved fists as they force her forward. Dirt streaks her face, mixing with tears that create clean tracks down her cheeks.
But her eyes—her eyes blaze with a fury that makes my heart stutter.
She appears nothing like the broken, submissive women I’ve glimpsed in the propaganda images the Syndicate displays. This woman is rage incarnate, fighting every step despite the futility.
“No!” The youngest man lunges forward, only to be slammed back to the floor by an Enforcer’s boot.
“Quiet,” Arayik commands, his attention on the woman. “Your identification number.” She only glares, and his neck cracks from the tension. “Your identification number. And the names of any others who escaped with you.”
Still, she says nothing. One of the Enforcers holding her yanks her hair, forcing her head back at a painful angle. She huffs, yet doesn’t make a sound.
“We can do this the easy way,” Arayik continues, his voice almost conversational now, “or we can do this while these men bleed out on the floor. Your choice.”
The woman’s eyes flick to her kneeling companions, and her resolve wavers. Fear for them bleeds through her anger.
“Don’t tell them anything, Mira!” the older man shouts. “They’ll kill us anyway—” An Enforcer’s fist connects with his jaw, silencing him mid-sentence. Blood sprays across the wooden floor.
Mira flinches, but her jaw remains set. Her emotions churn—fear, rage, and beneath it all, a core of iron determination.
It’s all I can do to dampen the trembling of my limbs.
Pax steps forward and raises a hand to her forehead. “Commander, permission to extract information?”
Oh, fuck. His power would allow him to manipulate things in her body; he’ll make her talk, but he’ll break something in her first.
“No.” The word escapes my lips before I can stop it.
The room goes utterly silent. Every mask snaps in my direction,and the weight of their stares is like sludge dripping onto my uniform.
“What did you say?” Arayik’s voice is stone.
I’m so stupid. My mind races—I’ve just made a terrible mistake, but I can’t backtrack now. I need to make this sound tactical, not like I’ve lost my fucking mind in a fit of compassion.
“She’s terrified,” I remark, shrugging. “She won’t give us accurate information like this. Give her space.” I pause, then add, “Let me try.”
He stares at me, blinking once. “You presume to give orders now, Ashford?”
“No, Commander. I’m offering a more efficient approach. My abilities can help us get what we need without resistance or harm, as you insisted yesterday.”
Elias leans in, murmuring something to Arayik I cannot hear. The Commander’s shoulders tense, but after a moment, he steps back with a muttered curse.
“Try, then. But if you fail, I’ll let Pax have his turn.”His turn.
Heart hammering, I approach the woman. The Enforcers holding her tighten their grip, but I motion for them to give her a little slack. Surprisingly, they comply.
I kneel before her, bringing myself to her eye level. Up close, exhaustion blankets her face, and her body trembles with the effort of remaining upright. But those eyes—they burn with a fire that agrees with the ache in my soul.
“I’m not here to hurt you,” I murmur, keeping my voice low enough that only she can hear. “Just tell us what we need to know, and this can end.”
Her emotions swirl around me—and beneath them all, a tiny flicker of hope. That hope startles me. It’s so fragile, so easily crushed, yet it persists despite everything.
Without another thought, I reach for the hope with my power, amplifying it just enough to keep her calm. I want her to believe there’s a way out of this, that cooperation might spare her some pain. It’s a lie, of course. I’ve realized nothing I do here will save her from what’s coming. But if I can make this moment easier…
“What’s your number?” I ask, gentler than the foreboding presence behind me.
She searches my eyes through the slit in my mask, looking for something—humanity, perhaps. After a long moment, she whispers, “W-7249.”
