Page 27 of Damsel in Disguise

Whoever she is, she’s not here to watch me from the shadows anymore. She’s here to announce her presence at last. In person.

I shift the car into gear, but don’t follow after her immediately. Chasing now would be crude. It’d make this about dominance when it’s clearly about curiosity—for both of us.

So I let the distance stretch. Let her believe she’s slipped the leash. My leash.

A faint smile touches my mouth as I pull back onto the asphalt, easing into motion, headlights steady, speed controlled.

You don’t pass me unless you want to be remembered. And my mind never forgets the ones bold enough to step into my darkness.

The entire situation settles unpleasantly in my chest. Nothing she did was meant to intimidate me. She just wanted me to notice her. Acknowledge her presence.

Which narrows the field considerably.

I resume driving and sharply turn my car in the opposite direction—the one I just followed doesn’t lead to either my place or The Triarch Dominion, the organization that took me at my lowest when I was only twelve, and now I’ve been working on Synthètes for the past five years.

My mind does what it always does when presented with an anomaly—it begins sorting patterns and deviations.

Sentinels would’ve intercepted her already if she were sloppy—the Council’s surveillance net flags amateurs within minutes. Cameras, metadata, traffic modeling—nothing slips through unnoticed unless it knows how to bend the system around itself. Which she did precisely.

That leaves only two possibilities. An external actor with resources comparable to the Dominion.

Or—my knuckles go white on the steering wheel—an internal variable I didn’t account for.

I replay her image in my mind—the hair, deliberately unbound, the controlled speed, the refusal to look at me even when she had the perfect opportunity.

Synthètes exhibit similar behavior in early divergence stages—when awareness sharpens faster than compliance. When curiosity mutates into agency. When they stop waiting for instruction and begin testing the perimeter of their leash.

There was some iteration that had been released into the world, but only if they were auctioned off. So not officially, at least.

A slow, cold realization unfurls at the base of my spine.

If the Council authorized an unsanctioned deployment—if one of the Triarchs decided to run a live-field observation without disclosure—then this isn’t surveillance.

It has to be an experiment. One I’m unaware of.

I don’t like being placed inside anyone else’s trial parameters. Hell, I’m the head of the R&D of The Triarch Dominion, the Nocturis Vincit, for fucks sake.

The Triarch Dominion functions through knowledge. Variables isolated. Outcomes predicted. Deviations corrected. We do not tolerate blind spots, especially not one that moves this confidently through my territory.

I glance at the road ahead, eyes sharp, already mapping contingencies. If she’s a Synthète or something built adjacent to the program, then she’s not here to assassinate me.

She’s here to see what I might do next, and she’ll react accordingly to rewrite her embedded program on her own. That’s the main function of a Synthète.

And now they want to test run a subject on me?

A faint, humorless smile curves my mouth.

If that’s the case… Fine. Observation without interference goes both ways.

She stepped into my darkness on purpose. Which means, sooner or later, she’ll step into my hands. And once she does, she’ll be my puppet. After all, I’m the only one specialized in this project, Synthète.

10. TRIARCH

alistair

The lift descends forty meters beneath the surface. The Dominion breathes—mechanical and alive in the way things become when they are fed blood instead of electricity.

Just saying.