JEREMY POV
The rain in Sector 4 didn't wash things clean; it just turned the grit into a slick, grey sludge that clung to the soles of my boots.
I stood in the shadow of a rusted fire escape, tucked away in an alleyway that smelled of salt air and rotting trash. Beside me, Sarah was a ghost in a damp hoodie, her breath coming in shallow, ragged hitches. Without our Blue Impulse to regulate our body temperatures, the damp cold was biting into our bones. It was a pathetic, human sensation.
"There," I hissed, nodding toward the brightly lit window of The Neon Skillet.
Through the glass, I could see her. The "mouse."
June Miller was laughing. She was leaning over a counter, wiping it down with a rag, talking a mile a minute to some guy behind the grill. She looked radiant. Not the refined, artificial radiance of a High Sentinel, but something worse. She looked... happy.
Every time she smiled, it felt like a hot needle driving into my skull.
"Look at her," I muttered, my fingers digging into the brickwork of the alley. "She's back to her life. Like nothing happened. Like she didn't watch the Elite Seven get dismantled like children's toys. She's carrying the secret of our cowardice around like it's a funny story to tell over burgers."
"Jeremy, she's just working," Sarah whispered, her voice trembling. "Maybe she hasn't told anyone. Maybe she's too scared."
"She's not scared. That's the problem." I pulled a crumpled piece of paper from my pocket—a crude map I'd drawn from memory. "In the church, when the Nun was unmaking us, I saw her eyes. She wasn't looking at us with awe. She was looking at us with pity. A zero-tier civilian, pitying a noble."
The rage was the only thing keeping me warm. I remembered the way I had screamed when the vines touched me. I remembered the way I had begged for the darkness to take me just so the pain would stop. And then I remembered her—running through the violet mist, her hair a chaotic mess, reaching for her friend while I waited to die.
She had more courage in her pinky finger than I had in my entire bloodline. And I couldn't let that exist in the same world as me.
"If she lives, we are a joke," I said, my voice dropping to a flat, dangerous monotone. "Every time Valerius looks at us, she'll see that girl standing over our broken bodies. We'll be the prodigies who were saved by a waitress. I won't be that. I'd rather be a murderer than a joke."
The diner's bell chimed. June stepped out into the night, pulling a worn-out denim jacket over her yellow t-shirt. She hummed a tune—something bouncy and infuriating—as she started walking toward the pier.
She walked with a bounce in her step, the kind of walk someone has when they've just spent the afternoon with a boy who makes them feel like the center of the universe. She had no idea the "background noise" was following her.
"Jeremy, we don't have our blades," Sarah said, grabbing my arm. "If we do this, it's... it's just us. With our hands. It's messy."
"Good," I said, peeling her hand off my sleeve. "I want it to be messy. I want to feel the moment her 'courage' runs out. I want to see if she stays brave when it's not an angel saving her, but a man who has nothing left to lose."
We trailed her through the winding streets of Sector 4, staying in the long shadows of the warehouses. The further we got from the lights of the diner, the darker the city became. The "wool" of the fog was rolling in from the Gray Sea, swallowing the sound of her footsteps.
She reached the entrance to the Gravity Well park—the same place she'd met the golden boy earlier. She stopped at the railing, looking out at the water, a small, secret smile on her face. She pulled her phone out—the new, expensive-looking one—and tapped the screen.
I saw the glow of the phone light up her face. She was looking at a contact. Adam.
"She really thinks she's one of them now," I spat, stepping out from the shadows of a shipping container. My boots crunched on the gravel.
June spun around. Her smile didn't vanish immediately; it just froze, confused. She squinted through the fog, trying to make us out.
"Hello?" she called out, her voice still carrying that annoying, hopeful ring. "Phil? Is that you? I told you I'm off the clock!"
I stepped into the dim orange glow of a flickering streetlamp. Sarah followed, her face pale and drawn.
June's expression shifted. The confusion turned into recognition, and then into a sharp, sudden dread. She remembered us. She remembered the two "nobles" she'd seen hanging from the rafters.
"You," she breathed, her hand tightening on her phone. "You're... from the church. Jeremy, right? And Sarah?"
"You have a good memory for a mouse," I said, my voice echoing in the empty park. I didn't have my Blue Impulse, but I had the weight of my desperation. I started walking toward her, slow and deliberate. "Too good. That's the problem."
"What are you doing here?" June asked, her back hitting the cold iron railing of the pier. She looked between us, her eyes darting for an exit. "Are you okay? You looked... really bad at the hospital."
"We're decommissioned, June," I said, stopping five feet away. "Because of you. Because you decided to play hero while we were being 'overwhelmed.' Because you made the Elite Seven look like a bunch of panicked children."
"I didn't mean... I was just trying to save Becky!" June's voice rose, a hint of the panic I wanted to see finally surfacing. "I didn't even know who you guys were! I just wanted to help!"
"You helped us right out of our lives," I hissed. "And now, you're going to help us one last time. You're going to be the tragedy that proves we fought until the end. A civilian casualty of the 'Nun's lingering resonance.' It's a clean story. It's a noble story."
I lunged.
Without the Blue Impulse, I wasn't a blur of light. I was just a boy with a bruised ego and a desperate heart. I tackled her, my weight sending us both crashing onto the wooden planks of the pier.
"RUN, SARAH!" June screamed, struggling against me.
But Sarah didn't run. She stood over us, her face a mask of grief, her hands shaking as she reached down to help me pin the girl who had dared to be brave when we were not.
The air left my lungs in a wet, choked wheeze.
One second, I had her pinned, my fingers digging into her denim jacket, the high-octane rush of my own malice making me feel like a Noble again. The next, a blinding, white-hot explosion of agony bloomed between my legs. It wasn't just a kick; it was a desperate, piston-like strike fueled by the kind of adrenaline only a cornered animal possesses.
I collapsed onto the wooden planks, my vision swimming in a sea of red and black. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't even scream. I just curled into a ball, clutching myself as the world tilted on its axis.
"Jeremy!"
I heard Sarah's voice, distant and panicked. I felt her hands on my shoulders, trying to pull me up, but my body refused to cooperate.
"She's... she's going..." I managed to rasp, the words feeling like shards of glass in my throat.
I forced my head up, squinting through the stinging salt spray and the haze of pain. June wasn't just running. She was moving.
I had called her a mouse, but I'd forgotten that mice are fast. She had lived her whole life in Sector 4—navigating the crowded streets, sprinting between tables at the Skillet, dodging the heavy machinery of the docks. She hit the pavement of the park with a rhythmic, frantic speed that shouldn't have been possible for a civilian. She was a blur of yellow fabric and teal hair, her sneakers slapping against the asphalt with terrifying efficiency.
"Sarah! Get her!" I wheezed, shoving Sarah away with a trembling hand. "Go! Don't let her reach the street!"
Sarah hesitated for a heartbeat—the old, soft Sarah still fighting the coward she was becoming—before she turned and gave chase.
I dragged myself up, using the iron railing to pull my dead weight into a standing position. Every nerve in my groin was screaming, a sickening throb that made my stomach churn. I looked down the long stretch of the pier. Sarah was already falling behind.
Without the Blue Impulse, our bodies were just... bodies. We were trained for combat, yes, but we were trained to use our energy to bridge the gap. We were used to our muscles being reinforced by resonance. Now, Sarah looked sluggish, her movements heavy as she tried to match June's frantic pace.
"Run, you idiot!" I roared, my voice breaking.
I started to limp after them, my breath coming in ragged, shallow gulps. The rain was coming down harder now, turning the pier into a deathtrap of slick wood and shadows.
June didn't look back. She knew the layout of this park better than we ever could. She didn't take the main path; she banked hard to the left, vaulting over a low concrete retaining wall that Sarah had to awkwardly scramble over. June was using the environment—the shipping containers, the rusted playground equipment, the gaps between the warehouses—to break our line of sight.
She wasn't just faster; she was smarter.
"Sarah! Cut her off at the gate!" I yelled, even though my lungs felt like they were collapsing.
I watched as June reached the edge of the park. She didn't head for the main road where the streetlamps were. She dived into the "Narrow," a labyrinth of back-alleys and industrial service tunnels that fed into the heart of Sector 4.
She was disappearing. The witness was slipping through our fingers.
"No," I hissed, my teeth gritting so hard I thought they might crack. "No, you don't get to win this too."
I forced myself into a lopsided run, the pain in my lower body flaring with every step. My pride was the only thing fueling my muscles. I couldn't let it end like this. I couldn't be the Elite who was beaten by a kick to the groin and a footrace.
I reached the spot where she had jumped the wall. I saw her phone lying in the grass—it must have fallen when I tackled her. The screen was cracked, but it was still glowing. A notification was pinned to the center:
[ADAM]: Are you home safely? The popcorn was... sufficient.
The sight of it sent a fresh wave of loathing through me. He was checking on his little pet. He was playing human while I was rotting in the rain.
I picked up the phone and smashed it against the concrete wall, watching the screen go dark.
"Sarah!" I shouted, plunging into the dark mouth of the Narrow. "Find her! She can't keep that pace forever!"
But as the fog swallowed June's silhouette and the sound of her footsteps faded into the ambient noise of the city, a cold, sickening realization began to settle in my gut.
She was faster than us. She was braver than us. And if she reached a public terminal or a Sentinel patrol, the story of the "Elite Seven" wouldn't end in Sector 9. It would end in a cell.
"June!" I screamed into the darkness, my voice echoing off the damp brick walls. "You can't hide from us! You're just a mouse!"
But the only answer was the sound of the rain and the distant, mocking toll of a buoy in the harbor.