I blink. “You had this the whole time?”
“No. I got it off a vault on Auron Prime. Stole it six weeks ago. Took months to get the right access signal.”
“And you’re just giving it to me now?”
“Because I trust you.”
I stare at him. His face is carved from stone, but I see it—the strain behind his eyes, the weight in his shoulders. Trust doesn’t come easy for him. Never has.
But this? This costs him something. And that makes it real.
“Thanks,” I say softly.
He nods, then hesitates. “You’re not a damsel, Rhea.”
“I know.”
“I never said my pain was more important.”
“You didn’t have to.”
And that’s when he finally looks away.
And I know he heard every word.
The hum of the server is the only constant in the room now. It vibrates through the metal floor beneath my feet, like a pulse—artificial, steady, unlike mine. Mine is erratic. Racing. Because the more I dig into the encrypted code with the key Valtron gave me, the more my world bends around me like glass under heat.
The file opens like a wound. What I thought was damning enough—proof of internal corruption, of misappropriated funds and blacklisted operations—is just the tip. The Combine wasn't just laundering money or setting up shell companies to skim Alliance contracts.
They were experimenting.
On soldiers.
On civilians.
I scroll through grim lines of data—sparse but haunting. Neural compliance systems. Behavioral override implants. Something about waveform programming using high-frequency pulses designed to manipulate adrenaline response. I don’t understand it all, but what I do understand makes my stomach flip.
This isn’t just war profiteering. It’s puppeteering.
They weren’t just trying to control enemy forces. They were testing on civilians—Alliance civilians. Disguised as disaster relief drones, food aid modules. The Combine infiltrated entire systems under the guise of humanitarian support. Some of these logs mention a failed experiment on Trenar-4. I remember Trenar-4—it made the news cycle for a few weeks. Spontaneous riots, strange illnesses, unexplained deaths. Then it vanished from public record.
But it didn’t vanish from here.
“Son of a bitch,” I whisper.
My palms are sweating. I wipe them on my pants and push deeper, the decryption algorithms unraveling like torn cloth under my fingers.
Every click is a cut. Every scroll, another slice of truth I wasn’t ready for.
And Valtron’s gone.
Said he had to “verify a source.”
What the hell does that even mean? It's been three hours. I haven’t heard a word. I told myself I wouldn’t worry. That he’s capable. That he’s a walking tank made of scales and fury. But I keep glancing at the door like it’s a portal to bad news.
I’m halfway through cross-referencing coordinates with public station maps when the door slams open.
I leap to my feet, heart thudding?—
