"When the light returns, it doesn't always mean the dark is gone."
The rain fell clean for the first time in years.
Across the wastelands, the old Helix towers steamed as the last radiation storms bled out into mist. For a single breath in the long history of ruin, the world looked almost human again.
But peace has a half-life.
Less stood on the ridge overlooking the smoldering horizon, the remnants of the Ventus Spire a twisted skeleton behind her. Her scarf fluttered in the calm, the red now faded to rust. The glow under her skin had dimmed, but it was still there—faint lines of light pulsing like an echo of what she'd unleashed.
Khale worked silently beside a broken transport truck, stripping its circuitry for parts. Shelly crouched near the fire pit, tuning her injector rifle and checking the readings on a portable med station. The silence between them was heavy, not unfriendly—just full.
Helix was no longer a myth. It was an army again.
Less ran a finger over the edge of her rifle. "How far do you think they are?"
Khale didn't look up. "If their fleet's moving in from the north, two days before they reach Theta."
Shelly frowned. "You mean what's left of Theta."
Less's eyes drifted to the ruins in the distance. The once-luminous towers were now blackened stumps. Still, even in ruin, something inside them pulsed faintly—like dying stars refusing to fade.
"They'll rebuild," Less murmured. "They always do."
Khale finally glanced up. "Then we destroy the heart before it beats again."
They spent the day scavenging what they could. The land around the Spire was littered with wreckage—metal fragments humming faintly from residual charge, shattered drone parts, and the corpses of Helix soldiers.
Shelly knelt beside one of the fallen exo-suits, prying open its visor. Inside was nothing but ash. "Vira's tech didn't just kill them. It burned them out from the inside."
Khale pulled a data chip from a fallen drone. "Looks like she's rewritten the command AI. Every unit's synced directly to her neural pattern."
Less studied the sky. "She's become the Core."
Shelly glanced at her. "You said you redirected the pulse to heal the mutations."
"I did," Less said quietly. "But Vira must've hijacked the backflow."
"So she's controlling the new evolution."
Less nodded. "And she's not bound by human limits."
Khale gave a low whistle. "So the ghost got herself a body."
They set up camp as night fell, using the wreckage as shelter. The sky burned with orange auroras—residual light from the pulse. It painted the world in ghost colors, flickering between beauty and warning.
Shelly sat beside Less, eyes reflecting the glow. "When you touched the Core… what did you see?"
Less hesitated. "My mother. But not alive. An echo. She told me I could change the code. That mercy and survival were the same thing."
"And you believe her?"
Less's voice softened. "I have to. It's the only thing separating me from them."
Shelly nodded, chewing her lip. "You're different now. You feel it too, don't you?"
Less looked down at her hands. The faint gold veins flickered under her skin, pulsing to her heartbeat. "I'm part of the system now. The Core's code lives in me."
Khale's shadow stretched over them. "Then we use it. You said the network's in her blood—well, maybe it's in yours too."
Less met his gaze. "You want me to fight her through the link."
"I want you to end her through the link."
Shelly looked between them. "That's suicide."
Khale shrugged. "So was everything else we've done."
They moved south the next morning, following the magnetic trail left by Helix aircraft. The land beneath their boots shifted from ash plains to cracked highways swallowed by nature. Grass had begun to grow again—mutated, luminous at the edges, but alive.
Shelly marveled at it, fingers brushing the strange green blades. "It's… beautiful."
"Careful," Khale warned. "Beauty bites."
Less walked ahead, scanning the horizon through her scope. In the distance, a Helix relay station blinked—one of the new ones. It wasn't transmitting outward but inward, feeding all data to a single point.
"The network's converging," she murmured. "She's building something."
They reached the ruins by dusk. The relay tower wasn't just tech—it was alive. Veins of organic wiring climbed its sides like ivy, pulsing with light that shifted between silver and blue. The hum of it vibrated in their bones.
Shelly's eyes widened. "She's merging biotech with infrastructure. Helix always dreamed of this—self-healing machines."
Khale's grip tightened on his blade. "Dreams have bad endings."
Less touched one of the organic cables. The moment her fingers brushed the surface, a vision slammed into her mind—Vira standing on a platform of light, surrounded by soldiers who looked more machine than human.
"I offered them purity," Vira's voice whispered. "They offered me obedience. That's balance."
Less tore her hand away, gasping. "She's building a city."
Shelly blinked. "A city?"
"New Genesis," Less said, eyes distant. "A city where Helix can start again—where humans are edited into perfection."
Khale spat into the dirt. "And we're the last bugs she needs to squash."
That night they camped in the shadow of the relay tower. The hum never stopped—it was like sleeping beside a living thing.
Less dreamed of fire.
She stood in the Genesis Core again, but it was no longer broken. Vira stood before her, her golden eyes burning with cold purpose.
"You tried to heal them," Vira said. "You only delayed their suffering."
Less raised her weapon, but it melted into light. "You're killing what's left of humanity."
"No. I'm perfecting it."
Vira reached out, touching Less's cheek. Her hand was warm—real. "You and I were born from the same mercy. The difference is, I don't pretend it's love."
Less jerked awake. The tower's hum had changed pitch.
Khale was already up, scanning the horizon. "Contact. Northeast."
A line of lights approached—Helix transports, silent and disciplined.
Shelly scrambled to her gear. "They found us."
Less stood, loading her rifle. "Then we make sure they regret it."
The first volley came fast. Drones screamed from the sky, their plasma rounds carving molten scars into the ground. Less dropped behind a boulder, returning fire with surgical precision. Each shot found its mark, splitting armor and tearing circuits.
Khale moved through the chaos like a phantom, blades flashing silver arcs. He was everywhere—one moment beside her, the next behind the enemy lines, silent death in motion.
Shelly crouched low, firing bursts of chemical rounds that released clouds of blinding vapor. "I can't hold them back forever!"
Less reloaded, eyes narrowing. "We don't need forever."
She activated the pulse in her veins. For an instant, her body glowed—every nerve alive with gold fire. The world slowed. The air thickened. She could see every trajectory, every angle.
She fired.
The bullet hit the relay's organic core. The entire structure screamed—an awful, living sound. Light exploded outward, and the battlefield froze.
When the glare faded, the Helix troops were gone—ashes scattered by the wind. The relay tower lay split open, oozing light like blood.
Shelly stared, trembling. "Less… what did you do?"
Less looked down at her glowing hands, breathing hard. "I cut the link."
Khale stepped forward, expression wary. "You just killed a hundred soldiers without touching them."
"I felt their minds," Less whispered. "They weren't people anymore. They were code."
Silence stretched between them, heavy as iron.
Shelly swallowed. "If you can destroy them through the network…"
Less finished for her. "…then I can reach Vira."
They left the ruins before dawn. The horizon burned faintly gold again, but it wasn't sunlight—it was the glow of something building itself.
Vira's voice echoed faintly through the comm static.
"You can't kill evolution, sister. You are evolution."
Less didn't answer. She walked faster, eyes fixed on the distant horizon where a new city of light was rising from the wasteland.
New Genesis.
Khale fell in step beside her. "What's the plan?"
Less tightened her grip on her rifle. "We find the city. We find her. And we end the cycle."
Shelly looked up from her console. "What if you can't?"
Less's smile was a scar. "Then I'll teach the new gods how to bleed."
The three of them walked into the dawn as the hum of the growing city echoed across the plains—a heartbeat too steady to be human, too beautiful to be trusted.
And far above, in the shining core of New Genesis, Vira watched them through a thousand eyes.
"Come, sister," she whispered. "Let's see whose mercy survives."