CHAPTER THREE

...Sereia's POV...

...----------------...

The desert felt too still.

I adjusted the scanner on my wrist, heart steady but alert, eyes locked on the ridgeline ahead. We had taken our positions fifteen minutes ago, cloaked by terrain and silence. Somewhere between the stillness and the stars above, something was about to give.

Liri was nestled in the dip beside Thalen, already grumbling about sand in her gloves. Elira and Nael were on overwatch, higher up with the drones, running silent scans through the canyons. Keira was just off my right, rifle poised with terrifying calm, and Caius—Caius was behind me.

Like always.

"All clear on the east line," Elira reported through comms.

“No movement yet,” Keira murmured. “Almost boring.”

Tov’s voice clicked in after hers. “Could’ve stayed back and eaten protein bars.”

“You did,” Keira deadpanned. “Three. I counted.”

Tov made a strangled sound. “You stalk me?”

“I count resources, dumbass.”

I smiled faintly, gaze still on the ravine.

Then it happened.

A pulse of violet-blue energy cracked across the rock face—too sharp, too sudden. My HUD glitched for a beat as the shockwave hit, and everything turned to static. Smoke. Light. Heat. The scream of plasma tearing through air.

“Contact!” Nael shouted. “We’ve got incoming—south ridge!”

I ducked low, my gauntlets already flaring to life with a soft white glow. Caius stepped beside me, shielding the flank as debris rained down. I felt the pulse of energy under my palms—medical tech syncing to combat mode.

“Zayen’s team,” Caius muttered, eyes narrowed.

My stomach tightened. I didn’t need to ask how he knew. Their entrance was too precise, too calculated. And when Zayen stepped through the dust, it confirmed everything.

He moved like he was born in fire and raised in shadows. Commanding. Terrifying. Familiar in a way I refused to unpack.

“Sereia,” Caius said quietly.

I glanced up.

He was looking at me—not at the battlefield, not at the team, just at me. “Stay close.”

“You always say that,” I replied, forcing lightness into my voice.

“You never listen,” he said, just as quietly, but I caught the edge of concern in his tone before he turned away, already moving to intercept a hostile.

Behind me, Keira groaned. “Tov, your plasma pack is backwards.”

“What? No—it’s tactical! It's—wait, it’s really on backwards?”

“You absolute menace.”

“I’m still alive, aren’t I?”

“Barely.”

They kept up the chatter as the fight erupted around us. And maybe that was the point—our rhythm, even in chaos, even in fear. It held us together.

Held me together.

I activated my gauntlets, pulse syncing to Liri’s vitals, just in case. Because this fight wasn’t going to be clean. Zayen never played fair.

Blasts echoed off the canyon walls, plasma bolts slicing through the smoke like lightning born of war.

Zayen’s team moved like specters—flawless, brutal, synchronized.

Nyra Veyne was the first to strike. Her illusions fractured the battlefield, making it seem like three of her were sprinting through the dust. Thalen cursed, switching to thermal. “She’s messing with my visuals!”

“She always does,” Liri shot back, breathless, returning fire. “Try using instincts for once!”

I scanned quickly—Elen’s interference was already pulsing through our comms, turning half the feed into a storm of static and laughter. Her signature.

Nael grunted through the line. “She hacked my drone again.”

“You named that drone,” Elira muttered, tone deadpan even while she fired controlled bursts toward a shadow moving along the upper ridge.

“I bonded with it, yeah!”

“You need therapy.”

“I have therapy. It’s called victory.”

Meanwhile, Rhaz Vorn Kael, their bruiser, charged through debris with terrifying force. Tov actually yelped—yelped—when the ground near him exploded.

“HE’S CHASING ME—WHY IS HE CHASING ME?!”

“Because you smell like fear,” Keira called out, firing clean shots over his head to cover him. “Also, you’re loud. It’s his type.”

Tov veered behind a boulder, panting. “Tell my fans I died bravely!”

“No one’s your fan,” Elira muttered, and Nael added, “Maybe that one lizard back on Theta-4.”

But laughter couldn’t hide the tension tightening in my chest.

Zayen hadn’t made a move yet. He watched from the edge of the chaos, calm, cruel, calculating—eyes locked on our squad like we were just pieces on a board. His dark coat whipped in the wind, the faint glow of his blade humming quietly by his side.

He didn’t need to fight to control the battlefield. His presence was the battlefield.

I clenched my fists, feeling the tech within my gauntlets pulse to life.

Then—

A sharp sound behind me.

Liri’s scream.

I turned so fast my vision blurred.

She was on the ground, gripping her shoulder, blood staining the edges of her gear where a plasma shard had pierced through. Thalen was already there, crouched beside her, hands fumbling as he tried to apply pressure.

“Sereia!” he barked. “I need you—now!”

I was already moving.

I dropped beside Liri, her face pale but trying to stay brave. “Still got one shot left,” she whispered with a grin, even as her blood seeped between her fingers.

“Save it,” I murmured, activating the sterile field from my gauntlet. Blue-white light bloomed over the wound, sizzling softly as it closed surface tissue. She hissed. Thalen didn’t let go of her hand.

“We need cover!” I yelled over comms. “I can’t finish this out in the open!”

“On it!” Nael’s voice crackled back.

Within seconds, plasma flared overhead—Nael and Elira had set up suppressing fire from the ridge, their sync seamless. Like a pair of mismatched gears that somehow kept turning the same direction.

“I thought you were watching the flank!” Elira shouted.

“I was! Then I blinked!”

“You blink for three seconds like a catnap, Nael—”

Keira’s ice-calm voice cut through, “Focus. We’ve got movement on the east wall.”

“I’ll stall,” Tov said, vaulting off cover like an idiot with too much charm and not enough survival instinct.

He landed with a slide, drawing the attention of two of Zayen’s soldiers.

“You’re gonna die,” Keira muttered, picking one off mid-charge with a sniper shot so clean it looked like art.

“I’m gonna die fashionably!” Tov shouted, diving sideways. “This armor’s limited edition!”

Above them, Rhaz charged Thalen’s position. Thalen pulled Liri behind him and fired three clean shots—only one landed. Rhaz didn’t even flinch.

“I hate that guy,” Thalen grunted.

“Join the club,” Nael muttered.

“WE HAVE JACKETS?” Tov shouted gleefully from below.

Then the battlefield bent—just a little.

A shimmer, like the air was folding in on itself.

“Nyra’s doing it again,” Elira hissed. “Illusion field incoming!”

Too late.

The landscape fractured into mirror shards, copies of Zayen’s team moving on all sides.

I clenched my hands. “Let me clear it.”

Caius landed beside me, finally joining the ground unit.

“No,” he said lowly. “We clear it.”

He pressed his palm to the side of my gauntlet, syncing our energy cores. Light rippled between us, steady and synchronized.

I exhaled, letting the link flow into the med-tech. The gauntlet pulsed wide, shattering the illusion field with a static shockwave. The mirrors broke. Just one real Nyra left—and she was mid-leap.

Caius stepped in front of me, caught her wrist mid-air, and flipped her into the dirt.

“No illusions today.”

Zayen moved then.

Just a single step—and suddenly the entire battlefield felt like it held its breath.

I met his eyes. Silver cut with storm-gray. Cold.

“Vexen,” he said softly.

My blood ran colder than his voice.

Caius shifted beside me, blade humming to life.

“Let’s finish this,” he said.

And we charged.

Before I could reach him, the wind shifted.

No—not wind.

The air thickened. Folded. Distorted like a breathing thing.

Zayen raised one gloved hand. His fingers curled—slowly, deliberately—and the pressure slammed down like gravity gone mad.

A crushing force swept across the field.

My knees hit the ground.

Around me, the others collapsed one by one. Elira’s drone spiraled out. Tov swore as his arms buckled mid-dash. Liri let out a strangled breath before Thalen caught her.

Only Caius remained upright for a breath longer than the rest. He pushed forward—gritted his teeth—and then staggered, falling to one knee.

Zayen stood above us. Calm. Composed. His dark cloak fluttered unnaturally behind him, unaffected by the chaos around him.

His team closed in—Nyra to his right, Rhaz and Elen on his left. All unscathed. All watching us like wolves at rest.

“This was sweet,” Zayen said, his voice smooth and slow. “Almost touching.”

I fought to lift my head. The pressure twisted against my skull like a scream without sound.

“You fight well together,” he went on, walking between our scattered bodies like we were merely debris. “Loyalty. Timing. Attachment.”

He stopped near Caius, gaze flicking down with mild amusement. “But you’re sloppy. Distracted. Emotion clouds the blade.”

Caius met his stare without flinching. “Try me again when I’m standing.”

“Oh, you’ll stand,” Zayen said. “Eventually.”

He turned to me. “And you, little Vexen. Still don’t remember, do you?”

My heart stuttered.

Zayen smiled, slow and knowing.