The Reaper markers are blooming again.
Faster. Stronger.
I prepare the serum, teeth clenched, inject her with trembling precision. She flinches but doesn’t cry. Her eyes—too bright—watch me with that eerie calm that’s always set her apart.
But this time… the markers don’t recede.
They dull. They blur. But they don’t vanish.
She’s outgrowing the masking.
Her DNA is evolving.
Changing.
Claiming what she is.
I stare at the monitor’s flickering readings until my vision blurs, then turn off every console in the room and pace. The walls feel too close. My skin itches with the need to run, to scream, to fight something.
Instead, I activate my emergency relay node—built in secret, housed behind a false panel in the floorboards. It’s encrypted. Traced to no network. A legacy of my mother’s war-spy past.
I key in the Reaper comm frequency.
“Khari,” I whisper, breathless. “Matron Khari, please respond.”
The line crackles for long seconds before a voice answers, deep and grating.
“You’ve hidden well, Ayla.”
I almost sob with relief. “I had to. They would’ve taken her from me.”
“Yes.” A pause. “And they still might.”
My gut turns to stone. “Her body is changing. Bone spurs. Strength. Sensory spikes. I restarted recalibration treatments, but they’re failing.”
“The child’s DNA is asserting itself,” Khari says bluntly. “She’s not fully human anymore.”
I close my eyes. “I knew this day would come.”
“But you thought you had more time.”
“Yes.”
Another pause. Then, softer, “You’ve done well. She’s alive. That alone makes you a warrior.”
Tears fill my eyes. “Is there… has there been any word of him? Of Kallus?”
Khari is silent a long time. “No.”
The word is a blade to the gut.
“The clan believes he fell in glorious battle. There is a statue. There was a ritual. We mourned him. We honored him.”
I sink to the floor, hand over my mouth.
Khari continues, quiet now. “But we have moved on. The stars do not wait.”
I end the call.
