**Chapter 4: The Unlikely Guides
The antechamber they were given was spacious, with walls that pulsed with a soft, internal light. The moment the citadel guards withdrew, the formal posture of the Earth Militant trio dissolved like a pricked balloon.
Leo-7 let out a long, controlled breath, rolling his shoulders as if shedding an invisible armor. He walked to a crystalline table and poured himself a glass of water that shimmered with tiny lights. "Right. Civilians," he said, the hard-edged commander's tone replaced by a weary, almost normal teenage grumble. "No prior conditioning. This complicates the operational parameters."
Tobin-4 immediately slouched into a floating chair, his boots propped up on another. His holographic display shifted from tactical readouts to what looked like a complex, fast-paced video game. "Complicates? It nukes them from orbit. Their synaptic responses are unpredictable. It's like trying to calculate the trajectory of a leaf in a hurricane." He glanced at Juno. "No offense."
Juno, who had been about to take offense, was momentarily disarmed. "Uh. Some taken?"
Calyx-12, meanwhile, had produced a small, polished whetstone and was quietly, meticulously sharpening his black energy dagger. The sound was a soft, rhythmic shhh-click in the quiet room. "The female, Talia. Her cognitive processing speed is 12.8% above the Earth-Prime baseline. She is an asset. The other two are statistical anomalies."
Kael stared, the shift in their demeanor throwing him more than the alien city had. "So all that... 'Designation this, efficiency that'... that's just for show?"
Leo took a sip of his glowing water. "It's protocol. When in a command structure, you follow the script. It maintains order. Here?" He gestured around the room. "The script is useless. We're off-book." He finally looked at Kael, a real, assessing look. "You held your ground back in the field. Your power output is reckless, but the instinct is there. You're not a complete lost cause."
It was the closest thing to a compliment Kael was likely to get.
Their "tour" of the city was a surreal affair. Lyrian, the golden-armored soldier, was their official guide, but the real commentary came from the Militant trio, their formalities completely abandoned.
As they walked across a bridge of solidified sound that chimed with every step, Tobin pointed at a floating market. "See those fruit that look like pulsating brains? Don't eat them. They'll make you hallucinate your own memories for six hours. Useful for intel extraction, bad for morale."
Juno's eyes went wide. "How do you know that?"
"Field test," Calyx said flatly from behind her, not elaborating.
When Lyrian proudly showed them the "River of Collective Unconscious," a flowing stream of liquid thought and memory, Leo grunted. "A massive security risk. A single corrupted thought could poison the entire tributary. Their defenses are elegant but naive."
Talia listened to every word, her cold eyes taking in both the wonders of the city and the pragmatic, often cynical, analysis of their guides. She said little, but Kael could see her mind working, cataloging the information.
The plan began to form not in a war room, but right there, in the middle of the bustling, impossible city.
"It's simple," Leo said, stopping near a plaza where dreamers were creating ephemeral art with beams of light. "The Corruption attacks from the fringes. It targets places of high emotional or structural significance—ley line convergences, memory reservoirs. It weakens the fabric of this place so it can tear through to your world, and ours."
"We need to be proactive," Talia stated, her first real contribution to the strategy. "Not reactive. We can't just wait for it to attack."
"Correct," Tobin said, swiping his game away and pulling up a map of the Dream Continent. It was scarred with pulsing red dots along its edges. "We run patrols. We mix our teams. One of us, one of you. We cover more ground, and you learn."
"The Beyond's power can heal the scars the Corruption leaves," Calyx added, sheathing his dagger. "Our power can only cauterize the wound. We need your ability to... fix things."
The simplicity of it was brilliant. It wasn't about grand speeches or cosmic unity. It was about plugging holes in a leaking dam.
"First patrol is at next cycle," Leo declared. "Tobin, you're with Juno. Your chaos might actually synergize with his data-crunching. Calyx, with Talia. See if her precision can temper your... lethality. Kael," he turned, his gaze firm. "You're with me."
Kael felt a jolt of anxiety and something else—anticipation. "Why?"
"Because your power is the most volatile. It's the closest to what we use, but it's fused with something else. Something that creates. I need to see what you can do up close." He almost smiled, a faint, hard curve of his lips. "And if you blow up, I'm probably the only one who can contain it."
It was a plan. A real, tangible plan. As they stood there, two trios from different worlds, surrounded by the proof of a reality they'd never imagined, the gulf between them didn't seem so vast. It was still there, a chasm of different lives and training. But now, they had a blueprint for a bridge.
The formalities were gone. The mission was everything. And for the first time since he'd been pulled onto that silver field, Kael felt not like a victim of chaos, but like a soldier in a war he could actually fight. Beside him, Talia gave a single, sharp nod of approval. The ice hadn't melted, but it had found a purpose.