The room was still crackling with fading electricity when Kairo finally found the strength to stand. His legs shook, his palms burned, and his heartbeat still pulsed with a faint electric rhythm. The scorched floor beneath him looked like the remains of something alive.
He felt everyone's eyes on him—the guards gripping their rifles, Eryn staring wide-eyed, Hensley breathing fast from fear she couldn't hide, and Director Voss… calm as ever.
"Another one?" Kairo whispered. "Someone else like me?"
Voss clasped her hands behind her back.
"Yes. And their energy signature is escalating. If left unchecked, it could destabilize the city."
Kairo felt a cold weight settle in his chest.
"I'm not a weapon."
"No," Voss said softly. "But you may be the only one who can stop one."
Those words hit him harder than any surge of electricity.
The Monitoring Chamber,
Hensley escorted Kairo down another hallway—this one darker, humming with deeper energy. The lights here flickered slightly, like the power was being redirected somewhere else.
"Are you okay?" she asked in a low voice.
Kairo didn't answer immediately. He stared at his hands—still trembling, still tingling. "I don't know what I am," he finally said. "Or what I'm supposed to be."
Hensley slowed her pace and touched his arm gently.
"Kairo… you're still a person. Don't let them make you forget that."
He held onto that sentence like it was a lifeline.
They stopped at a pair of large black doors. Hensley keyed in a long sequence on a holographic panel.
ACCESS GRANTED - PRIORITY LEVEL GREEN.
The doors slid open to reveal a massive observation chamber filled with screens, glowing diagrams, and floating holograms of the entire city.
Dr. Vanton turned as they entered. His coat was half-wrinkled, and his hair was sticking up from hours spent analyzing data. "Kairo," he said briskly. "Come closer. You'll want to see this."
A giant central screen showed a pulsing blue orb surrounded by jagged white lines.
"What is that?" Kairo whispered.
"Your counterpart," Vanton said. "The second anomaly."
The orb flickered violently—almost like it had a heartbeat.
Kairo felt a strange pull in his chest.
A vibration.
A whisper.
A connection. He gasped and grabbed the railing. Electricity flickered around his fingertips.
"You feel it?" Vanton asked eagerly.
Kairo nodded. "It feels like… like something is calling to me."
Vanton scribbled notes rapidly.
"Incredible. The coupling effect is stronger than predicted."
Hensley shot him a glare.
"He's not a sensor, he's a child."
Vanton ignored her. The Other One Moves
The blue orb on the screen suddenly twitched and began shooting across the city map toward the outskirts.
"Movement detected!" a technician shouted. "It's heading toward the industrial district!"
Eryn, who had followed them, stepped forward.
"So it's real. Not just some glitch."
"Very real," Voss's voice echoed as she entered the chamber.
Kairo stiffened.
"We will need to intercept the anomaly before it destabilizes the sector," Voss said. "Destabilizes?" Kairo repeated. "What does that mean?"
"It means," Vanton answered, "that whoever they are… they are losing control faster than you did."
Kairo's heart dropped.
Another kid, maybe.
Scared.
Alone.
Overloading.
"Then we have to help them," he said quickly.
A long silence followed.
Voss studied him with unreadable eyes.
"We will. But Kairo—you need to understand something."
She stepped closer.
"If the other lightning-bearer cannot be stabilized… we cannot allow them to endanger millions."
Kairo felt the room tilt.
"You mean… you'd stop them?"
"If necessary," Voss said. "Lethal force is authorized."
"No." His voice cracked. "They didn't choose this. Same as me."
Voss didn't blink.
"Then prove you are different. Prove you can control what they cannot."
The Stabilizer Malfunctions
Kairo's stabilizer cuff beeped sharply—once, twice, and then began flashing bright red.
"What—what's happening?" he gasped.
Vanton lunged toward him.
"His levels are spiking—Kairo, breathe! Slow your heart rate!"
But he couldn't.
Something inside him felt like it was being pulled—dragged—toward the second anomaly like a magnet. His vision blurred with sparks. The lights overhead flickered violently.
Hensley grabbed his shoulders.
"Kairo! Look at me! Stay with me!"
"I—I can't—"
Electricity crawled up his arms, down his spine.
The screens all cracked at once.
Eryn stumbled back.
"Director—this is bad!"
But Kairo wasn't hearing them anymore.
All he heard was the static.
The whisper.
The voice from far away.
Help me…
It wasn't just a feeling.
It was a cry.
A real voice—panicked, desperate, filled with pain.
It echoed in his mind like thunder shaking the earth.
Kairo's eyes widened.
"They're scared," he whispered. "They're like me - they're terrified."
The stabilizer cuff shorted out and shattered in a burst of sparks.
"Kairo!" Hensley shouted.
A wave of blue lightning burst from his body, knocking equipment over and sending technicians flying.
But Kairo was no longer panicking.
He lifted his head slowly, and the lightning around him shifted from chaotic white to deep, steady blue.
A calm he didn't understand settled over him.
A pull.
A purpose.
"I know where they are," he said softly.
Everyone froze.
Director Voss stepped forward slowly.
"Then it seems," she said, her voice low and calculating,
"your first mission begins tonight."
Kairo clenched his fists, sparks dancing between his fingers.
He wasn't running anymore.
Not from Sigma.
Not from his powers.
Not from the truth.
Someone like him was out there. And they were calling his name.