I pause only a fraction of a second.
“You will receive formal notice of further questioning,” I say.
“I will be here,” he replies.
I step into the corridor.
The door seals shut between us with a final, echoing click.
Only then do my knees threaten to give.
My hands tremble visibly now. My pulse refuses to slow. The forensic data unsettles me—but not nearly as much as the violent recognition that struck when his eyes met mine.
That reaction was not political.
It was not rational.
And if it continues, it will compromise everything.
I straighten my jacket, inhale once more, and begin walking.
I will review the raw data personally.
I will dissect every waveform anomaly.
I will not allow biology to dictate judgment.
But as I move down the corridor beneath the cold white lights of Virex Station, I cannot shake the sensation that something far more dangerous than a bombing just ignited.
And it is not contained by cuffs.
CHAPTER 4
KAEL
The door seals behind her with a hydraulic compression that lingers in the air long after the metal finishes sliding into place. The sound echoes faintly against reinforced walls, then dissolves into the steady hum of containment emitters overhead. The chamber feels smaller now—not physically altered, but charged, as though some unseen current still vibrates where she stood.
I remain motionless for several breaths, listening to the rhythm of my own pulse beneath the suppression field pressing against my skin. The cuffs at my wrists emit a low harmonic tone, calibrated to counteract regenerative surge, a faint electric pressure that seeps into muscle and bone without quite hurting. It is not pain. It is insistence.
Across the room, Varek shifts his weight. The scrape of spur against reinforced flooring is soft but deliberate.
“Well,” he says at last.
The air smells sterile—filtered so aggressively that even the metallic tang of dried blood has thinned into something distant and abstract. I can still taste it, though, at the back of my throat. Ionized debris. Burned circuitry. Memory.
“She doubts,” I reply.
Varek exhales slowly through his teeth. “You are certain.”
“Yes.”
He studies me, head angled slightly, eyes narrowing as though measuring not only my conclusion but the source of it. “Because she questioned the waveform.”
“Because she hesitated before accusing.”
“That is thin evidence.”
“It is sufficient.”
