Chapter 41: Chapter 40: Out of Jurisdiction
Nobody said much during the trip back to Iron Veil’s underground headquarters.
Kaleb sat across from Mia inside the Iron Veil transport, still wearing his suit. Water dripped from his sleeves and gathered beneath his boots every time the vehicle turned. He had pulled the moisture out of the fabric twice. Mia sat beside him with her hands closed tightly in her lap. Every few minutes, a weak piece of golden light appeared between her fingers before flickering into pink energy and disappearing.
Neiry stood near the transport doors instead of sitting. The burn across his right arm had already started healing, but several glowing blue lines remained beneath his skin where the artificial energy had entered him. In one hand, he held the white medical band taken from the boy’s wrist. The words SUBJECT 07 were printed across its surface, directly above the strange symbol of a circle divided by three vertical lines.
The boy had been transported separately under heavy medical supervision. Neiry had only agreed to that after Vance personally promised that no restraints would be used unless his powers became active again. Even then, Neiry had placed a shadow mark beneath the stretcher before the medical team carried him away. If they took the boy anywhere else, he would know.
Kaleb looked up from his phone. “The footage is already online.”
Neiry didn’t turn around. “Don’t post anything.”
“I wasn’t going to post anything.”
“You’re smiling.”
“I can smile without posting something.”
“You’ve proved that to be wrong before.”
Kaleb lowered his phone, but the smile remained. “Somebody got the whole combination attack. Like, from the second floor of the building. It actually looked incredible.”
Mia’s hands tightened in her lap. A thin current of pink magic slipped between her fingers before she quickly closed them again.
“We almost lost control of it,” she said.
“But we didn’t,” Kaleb replied. “We saved him.”
Mia looked toward the window and watched the city move past them. “Yeah.”
Neiry glanced at her reflection in the glass. He could still feel that something inside her had changed. Her mana no longer settled into the familiar warmth of solid light. Each time Mia forced it toward that shape, it pulled away and became something else.
The transport slowed as it entered the abandoned shipyard hiding the iron veil. Reinforced gates opened beneath the main warehouse, allowing the vehicle to descend into the underground facility. Iron Veil agents were already waiting when the doors opened.
Agent Vance stood at the center of them.
“Conference room,” he said. “Now.”
Vance’s office had always felt too clean to Neiry.
The black glass table reflected everyone sitting around it, while the walls displayed live information from the medical wing. Subject 07’s heartbeat moved across one monitor alongside several readings Neiry didn’t fully understand. The boy’s body temperature remained dangerously high, but at least his condition had stopped getting worse.
Neiry, Mia, and Kaleb sat on one side of the table. Vance sat across from them, his jacket removed and the sleeves of his charcoal shirt rolled slightly above his wrists. Two Iron Veil medical officers stood near the back wall, waiting for the evidence.
Vance placed one hand on the table. “Start from the moment you arrived.”
Neiry explained the artificial energy first. He described how it had been connected to the boy’s nervous system, how it reacted to fear, and how the energy fought against extraction as if it had been physically rooted inside him. He did not mention Infinity directly. Vance’s eyes narrowed, as if he were wondering how Dark could know something so unusual.
Kaleb transferred their suit recordings onto the main screen. He paused the footage whenever the blue lines became visible beneath the boy’s skin and showed Vance how the energy changed direction before every major burst. Mia explained what she had seen inside the collapsing building and how the final blast had behaved when Neiry pulled the artificial power free.
Vance listened without interrupting. When they finished, he looked toward the band in Neiry’s hand.
“I need the medical tag.”
Neiry didn’t move. “Why?”
“Because it is physical evidence connected to an organized attack that destroyed two city blocks.”
“It’s connected to whoever experimented on him.”
“That would generally qualify as evidence.”
Neiry placed the band on the table but kept two fingers over it. “Kaleb scanned the serial information before we left the plaza.”
Vance looked at Kaleb.
“My gauntlet records medical identification automatically during rescues,” Kaleb explained. “It didn’t pull much. Most of the chip was wiped.”
“Transfer the scan with the rest of your recordings.”
Kaleb turned to look at Neiry then faced back to Vance nodding, although Neiry saw him hesitate for half a second. Before entering the conference room, Kaleb had already copied everything onto the base’s private server.
Vance reached for the band, but Neiry still didn’t release it.
“The boy said the people who took him wore armor like Iron Veil agents.”
The room became quiet.
Vance’s expression didn’t change, but one of the medical officers looked toward the other.
“What exactly did he say?” Vance asked.
“He said they looked like the agents who approached him,” Neiry answered. “He panicked when he saw your medical unit.”
“Iron Veil does not conduct unauthorized experiments on children.”
“I didn’t say Iron Veil did.”
“You were suggesting."
“I was going to say someone either copied your equipment or got it from inside your organization.”
Vance leaned back slightly. “Both possibilities are being investigated.”
“By who?”
“Not you.”
Neiry finally released the band. Vance picked it up and placed it inside a sealed evidence container before handing it to one of the medical officers.
Kaleb leaned forward. “What does that mean?”
“It means this case is being upgraded to First-Class jurisdiction,” Vance said. “Anyone capable of abducting children, artificially creating powers, and imitating Iron Veil equipment represents a threat above your team’s current authorization.”
What the hell? We saved him!” Neiry replied.
“You contained one victim because we needed you.”
“We saved one victim.”
“And you performed well,” Vance said. “That does not qualify the three of you to dismantle an organization whose size and resources remain unknown. We don't need you guys dying.”
Mia looked toward the monitor displaying Subject 07’s condition. “What happens to him?”
“He remains in isolated medical care until we determine what was done to his body. His identity will be kept outside the public registry, and no one will move him without my authorization.”
Neiry watched Vance carefully. “And the other children?”
“A First-Class unit will search for them.”
The conference room doors opened.
Three heroes stepped inside.
The first was a tall woman wearing dark blue armor with silver plates covering her shoulders and chest. A narrow visor concealed her eyes, and the symbol of a closed shield was stamped across the center of her uniform. Neiry recognized her immediately. Sentinel was one of Iron Veil’s highest-ranked regional heroes, known for creating defensive fields capable of surrounding entire buildings.
❖ HERO CARD: SENTINEL ❖
Registered Hero Name: Sentinel
Identity: Unknown / Restricted Access
Organization: Iron Veil (Sector 7 First-Class Unit)
Threat Class: A-Rank Tier
Status Rank (Title Grade): First Class
Power Rank: Registered A-Rank Output
Superpowers: Spatial Boundary Fields (force field)
Behind her walked Cipher, a thinner hero wearing a completely black suit covered in narrow lines of moving data. A mechanical visor stretched across the upper half of his face, continuously scanning everything in the room.
❖ HERO CARD: CIPHER ❖
Registered Hero Name: Cipher
Identity: Unknown / Restricted Access
Organization: Iron Veil (Sector 7 First-Class Unit)
Threat Class: B-Rank Tier
Status Rank (Title Grade): First Class
Power Rank: Registered B-Rank Output
Superpowers: Technopathy / Energy Signature Analysis
The final hero, Bastion, was built like a reinforced wall. Thick gray armor covered his body, and every step he took sounded heavier than it should have.
❖ HERO CARD: BASTION ❖
Registered Hero Name: Bastion
Identity: Unknown / Restricted Access
Organization: Iron Veil (Sector 7 First-Class Unit)
Threat Class: A-Rank Tier
Status Rank (Title Grade): First Class
Power Rank: Registered A-Rank Output
Superpowers: Body Density Manipulation
Sentinel stopped beside Vance. “This is the team?”
Vance nodded. “Dark, Beacon, and Tempest made first contact with the subject.”
Cipher’s visor moved over each of them before focusing on Neiry’s injured arm. “Residual artificial output remains inside Dark’s tissue.”
“It’ll be gone soon,” Neiry said.
“That wasn’t a question.”
Neiry’s eyes narrowed.
Sentinel looked toward the medical monitor. “You kept the subject alive?”
“All three of us did,” Neiry replied.
Her gaze moved toward Mia and Kaleb. “Good work.”
Bastion crossed his arms. “Good work doesn’t make them qualified for what comes next.”
Kaleb looked at him. “Okay well macho man you don’t even know what comes next.”
“That is exactly the point.”
Vance stood. “Sentinel’s unit will take control of the investigation. Your team is ordered to return to normal patrol operations and remain available for additional questioning.”
Neiry remained seated. “You’re telling us to ignore six missing children.”
“I am telling you to follow your jurisdiction and what we know you’re capable of.”
“And if your team doesn’t find them?”
Sentinel stepped closer to the table. “We will.”
Neiry looked at her for several seconds. Her heartbeat remained steady. She believed what she was saying, but that didn’t mean she was right.
Mia placed one hand against Neiry’s arm. “Come on.”
He looked at her.
“Not here,” she said quietly.
Neiry stood.
As Iron Veil agents escorted them from the room, Cipher opened the evidence container and began scanning the medical band. The doors closed before Neiry could see the results.
The hallway outside Vance’s office was busier than usual. Ranked heroes, analysts, and armored agents moved between different sections of the facility while news coverage from Queens Plaza played across several wall-mounted screens while other screens displayed other heroes. The footage had already been edited into slow-motion replays.
One screen showed Neiry catching the bus.
Another showed Kaleb’s water wrapping around Mia’s shield.
A third replayed the moment Mia’s golden light disappeared and pink magic exploded from her hands.
Mia looked away from that one.
A group of younger Iron Veil heroes stood near the elevator. One of them recognized the three and immediately stepped aside.
“That bus catch was insane,” he told Neiry. “One hand?”
Neiry pressed the elevator button. “The other one was injured.”
The hero stared at him, unsure whether he was joking.
Kaleb grinned. “He’s joking. I think.”
Another hero looked toward Kaleb. “That water barrier was yours?”
“Most of it.”
“First real mission?”
“My first mission, not so much for the other guys and this time it’s where people actually remembered I was there.”
The elevator doors opened. Before they could enter, Cipher’s voice came from behind them.
“Beacon.”
Mia stopped.
Cipher stood at the far end of the hallway with his visor fixed on the light surrounding her hands. The glow flickered again, breaking into loose golden fragments. Pink energy formed underneath it before Mia forced both powers to disappear.
“That energy was not included in your registration,” Cipher said.
“It’s new,” Mia answered.
“Uncontrolled?”
She hesitated. “For now.”
“Then remain off active missions until medical evaluates it.”
Neiry stepped slightly between them. “It was just a coincidence her power changed after exposure to the subject’s energy.”
Cipher’s visor shifted toward him. “That gives her more reason to be examined, not less.”
“I’m fine,” Mia said.
““You nearly lost that shield over a civilian evacuation zone. Someone could’ve been killed.”
The words struck harder than Mia expected.
Cipher turned back toward Vance’s office. “Schedule an evaluation before your next deployment.”
The elevator doors began closing. Neiry held one hand between them, stopping the metal panels before they could meet.
Mia stepped inside. “Let it go.”
Neiry followed her, with Kaleb entering behind him. The doors finally closed, separating them from the rest of Iron Veil.
For several floors, nobody spoke.
Then Neiry pressed the emergency stop.
“Let’s talk from what I can tell there’s no cameras.”
The elevator jerked to a halt.
Kaleb grabbed the wall. “A warning would’ve been nice.”
Neiry turned toward both of them. “How do you feel about walking away from this?”
Kaleb’s expression became serious. “I don’t like the idea.”
Mia leaned against the elevator wall. “Listen guys Vance might be right.”
Neiry waited.
“We don’t know how large this is,” she continued. “We don’t know who made those powers, where the other children are, or whether someone inside Iron Veil is involved. Going behind their backs could destroy everything we’ve built.”
“I know.”
“And you’re going to investigate anyway.”
“I’m investigating either way,” Neiry admitted. “I’m asking whether I do it alone.”
Mia looked up.
Neiry rarely asked before deciding something. He listened to them during missions, but once he believed something needed to be done, he usually started moving and expected everyone else to catch up. This time, he remained still.
Kaleb folded his arms. “That kid begged us not to let them take him back. I can’t just go to school tomorrow and pretend somebody else will handle it.”
Mia looked toward the floor numbers frozen above the elevator doors. “If we do this, we do it carefully. We don’t attack Iron Veil. We don’t break into one of their facilities, and we don’t rush into wherever that band leads without knowing what’s inside.”
Kaleb glanced toward Neiry. “She means you.”
“I can’t make any promises. All my plans include doing everything you just said.”
Mia stepped closer. “This has to be something we all agree on. Not another situation where you disappear and decide you’re protecting us by lying. So if you’re gonna do this tell us.”
Neiry met her eyes. “Agreed.”
Kaleb lifted one hand. “Then I vote we investigate whatever is going on secretly.”
Mia raised hers. “I vote we find the children.”
Both of them looked at Neiry.
He pressed the elevator button and allowed it to start moving again. “Then we’re going behind Iron Veil’s back.”
Kaleb exhaled. “I think this is our first official team crime.”
“It isn’t a crime,” Neiry said. “It’s an unauthorized investigation.”
“That is not better, just say crime,” Mia replied.
By the time they reached the shipyard surface, Kaleb had his phone out again.
“We’re everywhere.”
The first video had already passed two million views. It showed Dark stepping from a wall of shadows and stopping the city bus with one hand. Dramatic music had been added behind it, along with the caption: DARK MIGHT ACTUALLY BE THE STRONGEST TEEN HERO IN NEW YORK.
Neiry looked at the screen. “I dislike the music.”
“That’s what you got from this?”
“The impact sound is delayed.”
Kaleb swiped to another video. This one showed him pulling water from two broken hydrants and wrapping it around Mia’s shield.
The comments moved faster than he could read them.
TEMPEST SAVED THAT ENTIRE BARRIER.
Dark’s water guy is actually getting strong.
Did anybody see that water and pink energy combination?
Tempest finally did something!
Kaleb’s smile faded slightly at the last comment before returning when he replayed the clip.
“People know my name,” he said. “Like actually know it.”
Mia glanced at him. “You earned that.”
He looked toward her, surprised by how directly she said it.
Neiry nodded. “You did.”
Kaleb stared at both of them. “Okay, you guys have to stop complimenting me. It’s weird.”
Another video played automatically. This one focused on Mia.
The clip slowed down at the exact moment her shield flickered. The missing section was circled in red before the video zoomed in on the pink magic replacing her light.
DID BEACON LOSE HER POWERS?
That wasn’t light.
She almost dropped the entire shield.
New power awakening?
Beacon is still the strongest one there.
Mia took the phone from Kaleb and turned off the video.
“They saw everything.”
“So did whoever created Subject 07,” Neiry said. “They can study our reactions, effective ranges, and how our powers work together.”
Kaleb looked toward the shipyard gates. “We can’t exactly remove videos with two million views.”
“No. We assume they’ve already watched them.”
Mia handed back the phone. “What are people calling us?”
Kaleb scrolled through several posts. “Dark’s team. The Queens Trio. Iron Veil’s kids. One person called us the Shadow-Light-Water Alliance, but I’m choosing to ignore that.”
“We need an actual name,” Mia said.
Neiry walked toward the edge of the shipyard. “That is currently the least important part of this situation.”
Kaleb followed him. “That means we’re discussing it later.”
“It does not.”
“It absolutely does.”
A final video appeared before Kaleb locked his phone. It showed Carol dragging the injured man away from the collapsing building. Her orange jacket stood out clearly through the dust.
The caption read: WHO IS ORANGE JACKET GIRL? SHE RAN IN BEFORE THE HEROES EVEN ARRIVED.
Mia watched over his shoulder. “Carol.”
“You know her?” Kaleb asked.
“She goes to Jefferson. She’s a year above us.”
Neiry looked at the frozen image. “She entered a collapsing building without powers.”
“She saved people,” Mia said.
“I know.”
Neiry studied Carol’s face for another moment before stepping into the shadow beneath the warehouse. Darkness spread around all three of them and carried them back toward the base.
Neiry’s laboratory occupied one of the oldest sections of the bunker.
The room had originally been intended for equipment storage, but Neiry had spent months rebuilding it. Iron Veil computers now shared space with handwritten spell diagrams, glass containers of crystallized mana, and pieces of technology from several different centuries. One wall held modern scanners and holographic displays. Another was covered in ancient symbols carved directly into stone.
Kaleb had added most of the computer equipment. Neiry had added everything that made the room slightly terrifying.
Mia stopped near a glass container holding a small black object that appeared to be breathing.
“What is that?”
Neiry looked over. “Don’t touch it.”
“That didn’t answer my question.”
“It answered the important part.”
Kaleb dropped into the chair behind the main computer and connected his gauntlet. “Medical-band scan is uploading.”
A holographic model of the wristband appeared above the center table. Its serial number had been scratched from the physical surface, but the interior chip still contained several broken sections of identification data.
Neiry stood beside the projection and placed his injured hand underneath it. A thin strand of blue energy remained beneath his skin. He pulled it free slowly, trapping the artificial residue inside a sphere of darkness.
Mia watched the energy strike repeatedly against its container.
“It’s still active?”
“Barely,” Neiry said. “Whatever created it was designed to remain connected to a living body.”
Kaleb enlarged the band’s internal structure. “The chip is medical grade, but there’s no hospital registration. Whoever made this removed the manufacturer code.”
“Can you recover it?”
“Probably.”
“How long?”
Kaleb looked at the damaged data. “Anywhere between twenty minutes and however long it takes to order food.”
Neiry pulled over another chair. “Start.”
Mia sat near the opposite side of the laboratory and summoned a small sphere of light above her palm. It held for three seconds before the gold flickered. Pink magic pushed through the center and tore the sphere apart.
She tried again.
The same thing happened.
Neiry glanced toward her while arranging the artificial energy beneath one of his scanners.
“My light isn’t coming back properly,” Mia said.
“Your mana isn’t disappearing.”
“It feels like it is.”
“It’s changing shape before you release it.”
Mia closed her hand. “Beacon uses light.”
“Beacon is just a name. You just have to change your fighting style maybe.”
She looked at him. “You say that like it’s easy.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
Mia attempted to summon another construct. Instead of a shield, a curved line of pink energy appeared and sent several loose papers flying across the laboratory.
Kaleb caught one against his face. “Can we aim the identity crisis away from the computer?”
“Sorry.”
Neiry walked over and held his hand near the pink magic surrounding her fingers. He didn’t touch it. The energy reacted to his presence, curling toward his mana before Mia pulled it back.
“This isn’t wind,” he said.
“It moved the air.”
“Because you released it as force. It’s closer to raw magic.”
“I don’t know how to use raw magic.”
“I do.”
Mia looked at him.
“When we finish this,” Neiry continued, “I’ll teach you.”
She nodded, but the fear didn’t leave her expression. For most of her life, the light had responded before she even understood what it was. Losing it felt less like switching weapons and more like losing a piece of herself.
Kaleb turned away from the computer. “I found something.”
The holographic wristband enlarged. A damaged line of manufacturing data appeared across its interior.
“Northline Medical Polymer,” Kaleb said. “They manufacture patient identification bands for hospitals, laboratories, and private research programs. This batch was purchased eleven months ago by something called Palisade Youth Health Services.”
Mia moved beside him. “Is that the company?”
“Maybe a shell company. It was registered eighteen months ago, purchased almost two hundred medical tags, and dissolved three weeks later.”
Neiry looked toward the strange symbol on the model. “Where were they delivered?”
“That part was erased.”
“Recover it.”
Kaleb sighed. “I was afraid you’d say that.”
The next several hours passed inside the laboratory.
Neiry compared the artificial energy against records from previous incidents. The wavelength didn’t match any naturally awakened power in Iron Veil’s registry. It had been constructed from several different frequencies, forced together and stabilized with something resembling a magical seal. Whoever created it understood modern power mutations and ancient mana manipulation.
Kaleb built a map of recent unexplained energy events across the city. Three incidents had occurred near abandoned medical properties. Two more happened close to freight routes leading toward the waterfront. None had been large enough to attract Iron Veil’s attention until Subject 07 destroyed Queens Plaza.
Mia helped Kaleb dig through archived shipping records, cached corporate filings, and deleted purchase orders. Every time he found Palisade Youth Health Services, the information led to another dissolved company. Someone had built an entire chain of businesses designed to disappear after a single transaction.
At two in the morning, Kaleb found the delivery route.
“I have an address.”
Neiry and Mia moved behind him.
A shipping receipt appeared on the screen. Most of it was corrupted, but the destination remained readable.
PIER 19 COLD STORAGE FACILITY — QUEENS WATERFRONT
Mia studied the date. “Three months ago.”
“The building was condemned last year,” Kaleb said. “No active business license, no registered employees, and supposedly no electricity.”
Mia replied “If the delivery was three months ago, they could already be gone.”
“Probably,” Neiry said. “But empty facilities still leave evidence.”
Neiry looked at the satellite image. Six warehouse structures surrounded a larger refrigeration building near the water. The property had tunnels connecting it to an older freight system beneath the pier.
“That’s where we start.”
Mia folded her arms. “We start by watching it.”
“That is what I meant.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
Neiry didn’t answer.
Kaleb saved the address to their private network. “Vance’s team will probably find this eventually.”
“Then we need to get there first,” Neiry said.
By four-thirty, Kaleb was asleep with his head beside the keyboard. Mia had moved to one of the laboratory stools, wrapped in a blanket she found in the living quarters. A small trail of pink magic continued moving between her fingers while she practiced holding it in one place then suddenly she fell asleep.
Neiry remained in front of the artificial energy sample. He had spent hours studying how it attached itself to the boy’s body, but one question continued bothering him. The power had been unstable, yet the process behind it was precise. Subject 07 wasn’t the result of someone failing to create a power.
He was the result of someone testing how much failure a child could survive.
At six-thirty, Kaleb’s phone alarm went off.
He lifted his head from the desk and looked around the laboratory. “Why is it morning?”
“You fell asleep too fast,” Neiry answered.
“That wasn’t a real question.”
Mia checked the time. “School starts in less than two hours.”
Kaleb stared at her. “We’re going?”
Neiry closed the artificial energy inside a sealed container. “Yes.”
“We conducted unauthorized corporate surveillance all night.”
“And?”
“And now you’re worried about attendance?”
“Dude, just go get ready.”
Kaleb looked toward Mia. “Please tell me you see how insane he is.”
“I already missed an assignment last week because of hero work.”
“That isn’t the support I wanted.”
They showered and changed using the spare clothes stored in their living quarters. Mia had kept several complete outfits inside her locker. Neiry owned enough outfits that changing clothes barely altered his appearance. Kaleb discovered that the only clean shirt he had left at the base was an Iron Veil training shirt one size too small.
He pulled at the sleeves. “I look extremely muscular.”
“You look like the shirt doesn’t fit,” Mia said.
“Same thing.”
Forty minutes later, the three left the base and headed directly toward Jefferson High.
By lunch, everyone at school had seen the footage.
Students crowded around phones in the hallways, replaying the bus catch, the failing shield, and the water-and beacons new power combination from every available angle. Someone had already created an edit placing Dark, Beacon, and Tempest beside several famous hero teams. Another student was attempting to calculate the exact weight of the bus Neiry stopped.
Kaleb had to pretend he wasn’t reading every comment about himself.
At their usual lunch table, Destiny held her phone in front of Aaliyah while Mia sat across from them, trying very hard not to react to footage of her own fight.
“The orange-jacket girl is either the bravest person in New York or completely insane,” Destiny said.
“Those aren’t mutually exclusive,” Aaliyah replied.
Kaleb opened his drink. “I think she was brave.”
Destiny looked at him. “You say that like you were there.”
“I have eyes. I watched the video.”
Neiry sat beside him with his head resting against one hand. He hadn’t slept at all, and although his body could function much longer than an ordinary human’s, the exhaustion made him look more like a regular teenager than usual.
Marjory sat at the end of the table with a notebook open beside her tray. Dark ink stained two of her fingers, and faint circles rested beneath her eyes. She had barely spoken since lunch began.
“That pink energy was more interesting,” Marjory said. “Beacon’s powers changed completely. That wasn’t a new light technique.”
Mia looked at her. “How can you tell?”
Marjory paused. “The videos.”
“You could just figure from a video?”
“There were multiple angles.”
Neiry lifted his head slightly.
Before he could say anything, a voice came from the next table.
“You guys know Orange Jacket Girl has an actual name, right?”
Carol stood behind Destiny with a lunch tray balanced on one hand.
Her orange jacket was gone, replaced by a gray Jefferson hoodie. Bandages covered both knees, a bruise stretched across one side of her face, and several small cuts marked her hands. Despite that, she smiled like she had only overheard them discussing a funny video instead of the moment she nearly died.
Destiny’s eyes widened. “That was you?”
Carol sat beside her without waiting for an invitation. “Carol. Orange Jacket Girl when the city is actively collapsing.”
Aaliyah looked at her injuries. “Running into that building was extremely reckless.”
“Yeah.”
“You agree?”
“I didn’t say it wasn’t reckless.”
Mia watched her carefully. “Why did you go inside?”
Carol shrugged. “Nobody else was moving fast enough.”
“You could’ve died.”
“So could the people inside.”
Carol said it like that ended the discussion. A metal lunch tray fell somewhere behind them, striking the floor with a loud crash. Carol flinched hard enough that her drink nearly slipped from her hand.
She caught it and immediately smiled again.
Kaleb noticed. So did Mia.
Destiny leaned closer. “Were the heroes as cool in person as they looked?”
“Beacon was,” Carol said. “Her shield was having problems, but she still went inside. Dark was terrifying. Tempest seemed cool too.”
Kaleb straightened slightly. “Yeah, I heard Tempest was amazing.”
Neiry kicked him under the table.
Kaleb winced. “What?”
Carol looked at him. “You’re a Tempest fan?”
“I respect his work.”
“He almost dropped an entire fire escape.”
“He also caught it.”
“With help.”
“Most heroes work with teams.”
Carol smiled. “You’re defending this guy pretty hard.”
Kaleb took a drink to avoid answering.
Marjory finally looked up from her notebook. “The combination attack only worked because Tempest’s water absorbed and redirected the kinetic force. Without him, Beacon’s replacement energy would’ve overloaded the area.”
Kaleb slowly lowered his drink.
Carol looked toward Marjory. “You got all that from shaky phone videos?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Because I wanted to understand what happened.”
Carol pointed toward the damaged city visible in the video. “Something exploded.”
“Yeah but look how they reacted, especially that mutant,” Marjory replied. “I wanted to understand why.”
Carol stared at her for a second before smiling. “Okay, glasses. I like you.”
Marjory’s expression tightened. “My name is Marjory.”
“Even better.”
While the rest of the table continued talking, Neiry focused on Marjory’s backpack.
He felt it again.
A faint pulse of dormant mana moved from somewhere inside the bag and reacted to the energy surrounding Marjory. It was the same presence he had sensed above Queens Plaza. The same one that had watched Subject 07 from the parking structure.
Marjory had been there.
She touched the side of her backpack, and the energy pulsed again. Her eyes shifted toward Neiry.
For a moment, neither of them looked away.
Marjory’s expression didn’t show guilt. It showed focus. She was trying to understand why Neiry had suddenly become interested in her bag.
Neiry picked up his drink and looked away first.
He wouldn’t confront her yet. He didn’t know what she had discovered, how long she had been tracking the energy, or whether she had connected anyone at the table to the heroes in the footage.
Until he knew, he would watch her.
Marjory quietly closed her notebook.
Deep beneath Sector 7, Iron Veil’s underground headquarters, Subject 07 opened his eyes.
The medical room was dark except for the blue monitors surrounding his bed. His body felt heavy, and every nerve burned where the artificial power had been removed. He tried moving his hands and discovered that no restraints held him down.
Vance stood several feet away beside Sentinel. Both wore ordinary clothes instead of armor, but Bastion remained near the door in his full suit.
The boy saw the gray armor and immediately began pulling himself backward.
“No,” he whispered. “No, no, stay away.”
His heartbeat spiked across every monitor.
Vance raised both hands. “Nobody is going to touch you.”
“You look like them.”
Bastion removed his helmet and placed it on the floor. Sentinel stepped between him and the bed, blocking the armor from view.
“You’re inside an Iron Veil medical facility,” Vance said. “The heroes who found you brought you here.”
The boy looked around the room. “Where’s the band?”
“It’s secured.”
His eyes widened. “It isn’t safe.”
Vance’s expression changed. “Why?”
“It tells them where we are.”
Sentinel immediately touched her communicator. “Place the evidence room under signal isolation. Now.”
Vance moved closer to the bed but kept enough distance that the boy didn’t feel trapped. “I need to know your name.”
The boy stared at him.
“Do you remember it?”
“They stopped using names.”
“What did they call you?”
“Seven.”
Vance glanced toward Sentinel. “Were there six before you?”
The boy nodded.
“What did they call the program?”
His breathing became uneven again. Memories of white rooms, needles, and voices behind dark glass moved through his head. He remembered the other children being taken through numbered doors. Some came back with powers. Some didn’t come back at all.
“They said we could become something better than you heroes,” he whispered.
Vance waited. “What did they call all of you?”
The boy looked down at the empty place around his wrist.
“Prospects.”