The sky is a low iron lid, threatening rain that never commits.

Cold drops speckle their jackets as they cross the meadow, boots sinking in wet grass half-thawed from overnight frost. The zerks keep their core warm, but the damp creeps through the rags and settles in their bones.

They walk for hours under that bruised sky, breath fogging, silent where words aren’t needed.

Eysin keeps glancing at the space between them. An arm’s length. Easy to close. Impossible to cross.

She’s cold enough that a hug sounds like salvation, but they don’t do that. Not while moving.

Better to keep the pace fast, reach the Factory before the damp turns dangerous.

Then Arkion, almost reluctant:

“I ran into Erika in Reval.”

Eysin’s shoulders tighten. She keeps walking. “All hail the queen,” she sings, flat and cold.

Arkion exhales. “Gisnepo is finally coming for what they paid for.”

Eysin’s mouth curves—small, sharp. Satisfaction flickers. She lets it live one heartbeat, tasting the bitter sweetness of watching your own life’s work burn someone else.

Ten years. The Red Flag was hers—blood, risk, sleepless nights exposing traffickers, cartels, the rot beneath the corporate shine. Then Erika took Gisnepo’s money, ran a dirt campaign, turned Eysin into a scapegoat, and transformed their movement into the fascist-antifascist mess bombing the richer parts of Reval into rubble.

And now Gisnepo was coming to collect.

“Good,” she whispers to the rain. The word leaves on a thin plume of breath that hangs longer than the others.

Beneath her boot the half-thawed grass crackles.

Then softer: “How was upper district?”

“Shambles. They blew up a lot of stuff.”

Arkion’s next breath fogs heavier, as if smoke and rubble have settled in his lungs.

Eysin’s boots crunch on the grass, a small, deliberate sound.

“I ran into Valen in the washroom.”

The words come flat, but orange blossom still clings to her hair, carried on the damp air.

“Scared me a little… About you.”

He thinks about it a little.

“Not cool.”

Eysin chuckles, “will I have to challenge her to a duel or something?”

Arkion exhales through a small smile, he turns back to look in her eyes as he says it:

“No.”

He turns back to the road, cheeks warming despite the cold.

A private smile flickers.

“She’s the first girl you referred to, yeah?”

“Yeah—yeah.”

He exhales, softer. “And I’m sorry she came on to you like that.”

A rustle overhead. Two pale squares glide between the pines—graceful and silent.

Arkion’s grin breaks the gloom.

“Flying squirrels. Thought the neighborhood got the last of them.”

Eysin pulls her Specs.

“Logging off the dream world,” he teases.

She sticks her tongue out and scrolls—

The lens flattens the forest into a bright 2D platformer. Trees become green pipes, raindrops perfect white circles, every living thing hops in 8-bit glory.

Arkion is a blocky figure with a pixel beard.

Center screen, a gigantic red exclamation block pulses above their heads.

⚠

A pixel-perfect dragonfly drone locks onto a tiny third walker that wasn’t there a second ago.

Eysin flicks the screenshot into Arkion’s visor.

He blinks. The pixel beard twitches.

Whoosh!

Both bolt.

Eysin sprints, Blindside pole extending—eight black rods blooming into an electromagnetic net that hums.

The drone dives, rotors screaming.

Arkion’s zerk flares—magnetic field rippling. He pulls himself forward in a dash that breaks physics, feet barely touching ground.

Mid-leap he somersaults, cape billowing, hands clamping onto both dragonfly wings.

RIP.

The dragonfly splits with a glorious 8-bit explosion:

♪ BWOOM-ch-ch-ch! ♪

Momentum carries. Arkion spins, each half whirling in his grip like twin saw blades.

He releases.

The left half shears through a pine trunk with a CRACK. The tree groans, tips, crashes.

The right half cartwheels, decapitating saplings before embedding in an oak with a meaty THUNK.

Arkion lands in a crouch, pixel cape settling.

The follower is Clarissa. She stares at the falling trees, then at him.

“You could have murdered me!”

“I’m keeping my murder-count low before breakfast,” Arkion deadpans, brushing pixel confetti off his jacket.

Eysin pockets the Specs, cheeks pink from laughing.

“Still following me?” Arkion’s tone is fond, resigned.

“I wanted to get out too. Tired of babysitting…” Clarissa stops. “I saw Gen leave earlier with a small company. How are you all doing that? The drones are no longer a threat?”

Arkion pats her shoulder, shares the Umbrella technique—frequencies, coverage radius, what to do if she falls out of range.

“Babysitting?”

“Uh… Valen’s been moody.”

Arkion thinks: Considering the rubble that used to be her Revalian holdings—and whatever else she’s smuggling under that velvet calm—Valen’s keeping it together remarkably well. Moody is an understatement.

“We go to the quarry?” Arkion asks Eysin, smirking.

Eysin blinks. “Uh—”

Arkion gives her a wink, then turns back to Clarissa, “we would have had to pass it anyway.”

Clarissa catches the electricity between them. She winces.

“Oh god, I’m intruding, aren’t I?” She laughs, awkward. “I can turn back. Tell Valen I got lost. Or eaten by squirrels. Very tragic.”

Arkion snorts. “You’re not intruding. You’re networking.” He smiles. “Very professional.”

“Plus,” Eysin adds, crooked smile, “if you turn back now, you’ll miss the worm.”

“The worm,” Clarissa repeats, deadpan. “Right. The worm.”

Arkion’s breath turns cold, and he says with a voice so low it’s uncharacteristic of him, “the cathedral that eats light and dignity.”

“Sold,” Clarissa walks past him and socks his shoulder to keep moving.

They walk.

The moment settles into something easier.

A few hours later, five zerkers crouch in a ditch beside the cracked road, rain falling in earnest.

Jarre-Pierre and Raynar wait, watching the road.

Jarre’s Gauloise glows in the gloom, smoke curling into the rain.

Headlights cut through the downpour.

Jarre mutters, amused:

“Four zerked bandits. Young. Stupid. À nous.”

“Liths?” Arkion asks.

Jarre shrugs, taps ash.

“Mm. Heard about the worm, I’d bet.”

Raynar’s tubes sprout—Terror pipes like cathedral gargoyles.

He bellows, testing resonance: gravel gargling in a cathedral organ.

Jarre elbows him.

“You sound like my hangover with opinions, mon frère.”

Arkion snorts.

Clarissa looks delighted and horrified. “Does that work?”

“On anyone stupid enough to run,” Raynar says.

The trucks barrel closer.

Eysin pulls her specs—tactical overlay, heat signatures blooming.

Arkion steps into the road—bomber turned silver, hood up hiding his masked face, crouched low.

The first truck screams toward him.

Thirty meters.

Twenty.

Ten—

ZAP.

Arkion’s zerk pulls—magnetic pulse. The front axle screams. Wheels lock, twist.

The truck flips—Goomba-stomped.

It rolls once—glass exploding.

Twice—doors ripping off.

Crashes with a sound that’s 90% accordion, 10% regret.

The second truck swerves, hydroplanes, spins, piles into the wreckage with a shriek of tearing metal.

Four pixel boys spill out and bolt.

Jarre-Pierre walks, Gauloise dangling, picks up a fist-sized rock.

Throws.

Whisper through the downpour.

THUNK.

Target drops face-first into a puddle,

“œil-de-bœuf,” Jarre reports, brushing his hands. “Someone remind me to join a baseball league… or perhaps le cricket.”

Raynar chases his runner, Terror pipes roaring. The kid’s zerk vibrates. Knees buckle. He stumbles, rips at the suit, trips into a thornbush.

Raynar scoops him by the scruff. “Gotcha.”

Clarissa pursues the third…

Eysin tracks the fourth—veering left, panicked.

She morphs Blindside into antennae—eight rods humming, generating a distortion field.

The runner crashes into nothing.

“SUKA!” He stumbles back, hands out, feeling invisible wall.

Footsteps splash behind him.

A screeching hum builds in his head—zerk activity, unauthorized access.

Eysin’s voice gloats:

“I didn’t even have to yell Sesame, open! to catch you off guard.”

She taps his shoulder. “Rookie mistake.”

He spins. Specs glow electric blue. She grins.

Her Kaestus touches his temple.

His zerk goes limp. He drops.

She drags him back.

Crows explode upward in V-formation—caw caw caw—like they rehearsed and are now applauding.

The third runner heads toward a farm. Clarissa howls she won’t make it.

Arkion flares—magnetic push off the ground, launches forward, boot-prints smoking.

He intercepts, plants a boot, shoves with a pulse like a freight train of SIT. DOWN.

The kid flies backward, lands in the deepest puddle.

SPLORTCH.

Arkion lands beside him, knee between shoulder blades.

Arkion leans close, voice winter.

“Don’t. Bother. These. People.”

The boy whimpers, “Kurwa blyat!”

Arkion drains the zerk, tosses him to Clarissa.

She lets him land in another puddle.

Arkion could light a cigarette if he had one.

“Mice catch.”

They trudge the last kilometer—boots heavy, jackets dripping—until soup and woodsmoke drift through the trees.

Behind the forest dubbed Moistest of Woods (Now With Gift Shop!), Imogen’s camp appears at the edge of No Ma’s Quarry: canvas tents, quiet competence.

Inside the big tent, Imogen is mid-briefing.

“—worm showed up just on time. We have a potential extraction mission at Sampo once the lockdown lifts. More details tomorrow. Check Clarity after you wake.”

Arkion drops the last bandit at Imogen’s feet.

She doesn’t blink. “Thanks for the help. Stay until light?”

“We had some other place to be, actually.” Arkion glances at Eysin.

Imogen follows the look. A smile tugs.

“Lighthouse?” Imogen asks, pretend innocent.

“No?” Arkion says.

“Very well.” Imogen grins. “I’ll let you two take the next slot just because you’ve missed like seven of these. And she’s had none.”

Eysin lights up like someone handed her a continue coin.

Imogen almost laughs. “Fair warning: it gets kinda funky in there. One out of five. Would not repeat my first turn.”

Clarissa raises an eyebrow. “Should I be concerned?”

“Seulement si tu tiens à garder un pied dans la réalité consensuelle,” Jarre murmurs. *

Raynar nods. “Worm’s weird, man.”