The alarm pulled Valoris from sleep at 04:30. Deployment notification, third one this month, routine now in ways that made routine feel like the wrong word for missions into zones where reality didn’t function correctly.

  She sat up slowly, body protesting movement with the kind of exhaustion that three hours of fragmented sleep couldn’t address. Across the barracks, her squad stirred in various stages of wakefulness. Zee already upright, always first awake, muscles tight with readiness that never quite left her even unconscious. Saren emerged from her bunk with mechanical precision despite obvious fatigue. Quinn was phasing slightly at the edges, involuntary, common now when they were tired or stressed, consciousness struggling to maintain solid form. Milo was groaning but moving, glasses already on his face somehow.

  Fourth year, two months in. Regular monthly deployments plus emergency call-outs. Chimera Squad had completed seven deployments since summer ended: Zone 12-Gamma three more times, Zone 9-Delta twice, Zone 4-Alpha once, and one emergency response to Zone 15-Epsilon for a rift expansion.

  Seven deployments. Seven times watching entities die. Seven times killing things that moved wrong and screamed wrong and made sounds that didn’t leave consciousness even weeks later. Seven missions where they came back changed a little more each time.

  Valoris touched the ports at the base of her skull, ritual now, checking their status before connection. The connection fluid wept constantly these days. It had dwindled from a flood to a slow steady seepage that soaked through her collar within an hour of waking. The fluid felt warm, thick, almost viscous against her fingers.

  She wiped her hand on her uniform pants and tried not to think about how the stains never quite washed out anymore.

  “Deployment briefing in twenty minutes,” Saren announced, already dressed, reviewing the notification on her tablet. “Zone 12-Gamma again. Patrol and observation. Entity activity elevated. Possible swarm behavior reported by monitoring stations. Duration: three to five days depending on conditions.”

  “Again?” Milo asked, voice rough with sleep. “That’s our fourth time this month. Don’t they have other squads?”

  “We’re ranked first.” Zee pulled on her combat fatigues with efficient movements. “Top-performing squad gets priority deployments. Lucky us.”

  “Statistical analysis suggests rotation scheduling is inadequate,” Quinn added, their form solidifying as they focused on the conversation.

  “Medical’s aware,” Valoris said, though she wasn’t entirely sure that was true. Medical tracked exposure metrics, but whether they actually cared about thresholds or simply documented progression was increasingly unclear. “We’re within operational parameters.”

  “Operational parameters were designed for sustainability.” Saren’s voice carried quiet weight. “Not optimal performance. There’s a difference.”

  Silence answered that, uncomfortable and necessary, acknowledging truth they’d all been noticing but hadn’t discussed openly. But complaining meant weakness, inability to perform duties, meant potential removal from active rotation or medical discharge before graduation.

  So they didn’t complain. They dressed, checked equipment, moved through their morning routine with a mechanical efficiency that felt increasingly automatic. Pilots preparing for deployment instead of students learning to conceptualize it.

  The briefing room felt familiar now, like deployment had always been their reality rather than something that started barely eight weeks ago.

  Commander Thrace stood at the tactical display with her dimensional exposure scars more visible than Valoris remembered from summer. She was what they would become, eventually. If they survived long enough.

  “Zone 12-Gamma shows elevated entity activity,” Thrace said, manipulating the display to show three-dimensional mapping that hurt to look at directly. “Monitoring stations report possible coordinated movement. Pattern suggests swarm behavior development. Your mission: patrol sectors Alpha through Epsilon, observe entity distribution, engage threats approaching normal space zones, document behavioral patterns.”

  Standard briefing. Standard mission parameters. Except “standard” now included phrases like “swarm behavior” and “engage threats” that would have been theoretical concepts six months ago.

  “Squad Chimera, you’ll take point on Alpha and Beta sectors, highest activity concentration,” Thrace continued. “Squad Talon will cover Gamma and Delta. Squad Azure handles Epsilon and reserve response. Coordination protocol standard. Medical evac available on fifteen-minute response. Questions?”

  “Entity classification?” Saren asked, always tactical and focused, always asking the right questions even when exhaustion made thinking difficult.

  “Mixed. Class A and B confirmed. Possible Class C but unverified. Standard engagement protocols apply. Eliminate Class A and B on sight unless you require backup. Class C requires immediate command notification and tactical retreat pending reinforcement.”

  Class C. Entities large enough to threaten infrastructure. Powerful enough to damage mechs. Dangerous enough that standard squad deployment wasn’t adequate.

  They’d encountered one during their Zone 4-Alpha mission, a massive thing with geometry that shouldn’t exist, a surface that shifted between states, and an awareness that felt almost intelligent. They’d retreated per protocol and called for reinforcement. They watched from a safe distance as a specialized hunter-killer squad engaged it in combat that lasted three hours and left the zone’s corruption twenty percent worse.

  “Dimensional interference is expected to be moderate to severe,” Thrace continued. “Comms may be unreliable. Sensor systems will glitch. Trust your instruments anyway. Trust your squad absolutely. Standard survival protocols.” She paused, and her voice went quiet and hard simultaneously. “Come back alive.”

  That last part was becoming a ritual. Come back alive. Not “complete your mission successfully” or “maintain operational excellence.” Just survive. Just don’t die in the corruption zones where reality bent wrong and entities killed pilots with disturbing regularity.

  “Equipment check in thirty minutes. Transport departs in ninety. Dismissed.”

  Chimera Squad filed out of the briefing room maintaining their instinctive formation: Valoris leading, Zee to her right, Saren at her left, Quinn slightly behind with their tablet, Milo bringing up the rear with fidgeting energy that never quite settled.

  “I hate Zone 12-Gamma,” Milo said quietly as they walked. “The way time feels there. Like hours compress into minutes and minutes stretch into hours simultaneously. Can’t track duration properly. Messes with my sense of sequential causation.”

  “The gravity fluctuations are worse,” Zee countered. “One step you’re normal weight, next step you’re three times heavier, step after that you’re practically floating. Combat becomes guesswork instead of technique.”

  “The whispers,” Quinn added, their flat voice somehow conveying unease beneath the monotone. “Constant audio hallucinations at the edge of perception. You can’t identify the source. You can’t filter them out. They say things that sound almost like language but never quite resolve into meaning.”

  “All of that is standard corruption zone characteristics,” Saren said, but her voice carried less certainty than the words suggested. “We’ve trained for dimensional interference. We know how to operate under those conditions.”

  “Training is different than experiencing it repeatedly.” Valoris kept walking. “We all know that now.”

  Silence answered her, heavy and confirming what they’d all been thinking but hadn’t discussed openly.

  Deployment was harder than training. Corruption zones were worse than simulations suggested. Killing entities in real combat left marks that didn’t fade between missions. And they were being sent back again and again with barely enough recovery time between deployments.

  They reached the equipment bay and began their preparation ritual: checking survival packs, testing dimensional exposure monitors, verifying medical supplies, inspecting communications arrays, loading live ammunition into weapons that felt heavier each time.

  Valoris’s hands shook slightly as she loaded the magazine into Paragon’s rifle. Not nervousness. Not fear. Just exhaustion expressing itself physically, her body refusing to maintain perfect control when consciousness was stretched too thin across too many deployments.

  “You okay?” Zee asked quietly, moving closer with the kind of protective proximity that had become a habit between them.

  “Fine,” Valoris lied. Then, more honestly: “Tired. Really tired. But functional.”

  “We’re all tired. Been pushing hard all month. Multiple deployments, regular classes, combat training, academic coursework. Not much time for recovery between missions.”

  “It’s a sustainable pace.” Valoris said it without conviction. “We’re pilots now. This is the job.”

  “Is it though?” Zee’s voice dropped lower. “Feels like they’re burning us out. Using us hard because we’re top-ranked. Deploying us more frequently than other squads. Pushing our limits to see how much we can handle.”

  Valoris wanted to disagree. Wanted to say that was paranoid thinking, that the academy’s deployment scheduling was based on tactical necessity rather than some kind of endurance testing.

  But she couldn’t. Because Zee was right. Chimera Squad was being deployed more frequently than comparable squads, sent to higher-difficulty zones, pushed harder despite being students still, despite not having graduated yet.

  “We can handle it,” Valoris said instead. “We’re Chimera Squad. We’ve proven ourselves capable.”

  “Capable and sustainable are different things. We can handle it now. The question is whether we’ll still be handling it by graduation. Or whether they’re breaking us slowly.”

  That possibility hung between them, uncomfortable and terrifying and increasingly plausible the more Valoris thought about deployment frequency and cumulative exposure and the way exhaustion never quite faded between missions anymore.

  The transport ride to Zone 12-Gamma felt routine. Valoris sat strapped into her crash seat, surrounded by her squad, watching reality change gradually through the reinforced viewports as they approached the zone.

  Sky shifting from normal blue to purple-green gradient. Clouds moving in wrong patterns. Horizon curving strangely. Distance becoming deceptive. Light bending through air that wasn’t quite air anymore.

  Beautiful and horrifying and wrong.

  Through the nascent bond with Paragon, consciousness distributed between flesh and dimensional substrate, awareness that existed partially elsewhere even without active connection, Valoris felt the mech’s presence growing stronger as they approached corrupted space. Like Paragon belonged there more than in baseline reality. Like dimensional damage called to dimensional entities in ways that felt almost natural.

  We are adequate for this, Paragon offered through their bond. Same assessment as always, fact delivered with characteristic emotional neutrality.

  Adequate. Maybe that was all that mattered. Maybe adequacy was enough when the alternative was catastrophic failure.

  The transport descended toward Zone 12-Gamma’s base camp: prefabricated structures that suggested semi-permanent human presence in space where humans weren’t meant to exist long-term, defensive perimeter, medical facilities, command center, barracks for rotating deployment teams.

  Home for the next three to five days. Living in corruption, breathing air that tasted wrong, existing in a reality that bent around dimensional damage.

  The cargo bay opened, and Chimera Squad disembarked into the wrongness that felt familiar now. Too familiar. Like their bodies were learning to exist in corrupted space more naturally than they existed in baseline reality.

  Their mechs emerged from cargo, five forty-foot war machines moving with practiced efficiency, piloted remotely by bonded humans who’d learned to split consciousness between flesh and metal without thinking about how impossible that should be.

  Paragon moved with elegant precision despite the remote interface. Reaver prowled with aggressive confidence. Meridian glided with perfect efficiency. Specter flickered at the edges of visibility. Jinx shifted and reconfigured constantly, components moving in ways that defied standard architecture.

  “Set up in observation post seven,” Commander Varak ordered. He was supervising deployment again, third time this month, expression suggesting he was noticing patterns too. “First patrol begins in four hours. Rest until then. You’ll need it.”

  That last part sounded almost sympathetic. Almost like Varak understood they were being pushed too hard and disagreed with the deployment frequency but couldn’t do anything about it because orders were orders and students didn’t get to question scheduling.

  Chimera Squad moved together toward observation post seven, route familiar from previous deployments, a path that wound through corruption zones where shadows fell wrong and gravity fluctuated randomly.

  Inside the observation post, tactical displays showed sensor readings that bounced wildly. The dimensional interference was constant, reality refusing to stay consistently mapped. Normal for Zone 12-Gamma. Normal for anywhere within a kilometer of dimensional rift scars.

  “Four hours until patrol,” Saren announced, checking the mission parameters. “Recommend we use that time for actual rest rather than preparation. We’re adequately equipped. Additional planning won’t improve performance. Sleep deficit will compromise combat effectiveness.”

  “Agreed,” Valoris said, surprised to hear Saren suggesting rest over preparation. Progress. Or exhaustion overriding perfectionism. Hard to tell which.

  They settled into the observation post’s minimal sleeping accommodations, military bunks designed for function rather than comfort, barely adequate for human occupation. Valoris lay down and felt exhaustion pull at her consciousness immediately. Her body demanded sleep, her mind too tired to resist.

  But sleep brought dreams.

  She woke gasping at some point, couldn’t track time properly in the zone, hands clawing at her throat despite adequate oxygen. Panic attack. It was common now, a regular feature of deployment experience. Medical said it was normal stress response. Normal for pilots. Normal for people whose job involved existing in spaces where reality didn’t work right and killing entities that screamed wrong when they died.

  Normal.

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  Across the observation post, she saw Quinn awake too, phasing involuntarily at the edges, consciousness struggling to maintain solid form, exhaustion making dissociation harder to control. Their eyes met briefly in a shared moment of mutual understanding. Neither of them was sleeping well. Neither of them was okay.

  But they were all functional. Still adequate for deployment.

  Still pilots.

  The patrol began at the four-hour mark with mechanical precision that felt absurdly normal given the surrounding wrongness.

  Chimera Squad deployed into sectors Alpha and Beta, the areas with highest reported entity activity. These were the zones where monitoring stations had detected possible coordinated movement patterns. Their mechs moved through corruption with practiced efficiency, sensor arrays scanning constantly despite dimensional interference making readings unreliable.

  Through Paragon’s connection, Valoris experienced reality as her mech perceived it. The fever-bright clarity was routine now. Still disconcerting, still wrong in fundamental ways, but familiar enough that she could function despite the wrongness. Enhanced perception. Tactical awareness. Combat capability that exceeded human baseline by orders of magnitude.

  And the constant sense that she was losing herself a little more each time she connected.

  “Chimera Lead, movement detected,” Quinn announced through squad comms, their flat voice carrying across dimensional interference with characteristic precision. “Three hundred meters northwest. Multiple signatures. Classification uncertain due to interference.”

  “Visual confirmation,” Zee added. Reaver moved toward the detected signatures with aggressive readiness, weapons systems armed. “I count four entities. Class A. Standard threat profile.”

  Through Paragon’s enhanced perception, Valoris saw them: four entities manifesting from dimensional corruption, geometry wrong, surfaces that shifted between states, movement that hurt to track with eyes that wanted to process physics normally.

  The entities moved toward the squad in a direct approach, hostile intent clear in the way their forms shifted, reorganizing into configurations that promised violence.

  “Engage per protocol,” Valoris said, and combat began with the familiar rhythm they’d learned across seven deployments.

  The four entities fought back. Not all entities did, Valoris had noticed. Some fled. Some seemed confused. Some attacked with coordinated ferocity. There was no pattern she could reliably predict. These four wanted violence, and Chimera Squad gave it to them with brutal efficiency.

  Paragon’s weapons discharged, energy beams designed to disrupt dimensional substrate tearing through the first entity’s geometry. It screamed as it dissolved, a disconcertingly human sound that resembled pain mixed with rage. Reaver’s blades carved through the second. Meridian’s precision fire eliminated the third. The fourth tried to flank, caught Specter’s phased counterstrike, and collapsed into sparkles of dimensional energy that scattered like dying embers.

  Four kills. Four threats eliminated. Standard engagement.

  Except Valoris couldn’t stop thinking about the ones that didn’t fight. The previous deployments where entities had fled rather than attacked, had moved toward rifts rather than toward human positions, had died confused and terrified rather than aggressive.

  This was the pretty lie she told herself: that the ones that fought proved they were threats. That combat-ready entities justified the protocols. That killing was necessary because sometimes entities were hostile.

  But sometimes wasn’t always. And protocols didn’t distinguish.

  “Sector Alpha cleared,” Saren reported. “Continuing patrol route.”

  They continued.

  The second contact was different.

  “Movement detected,” Quinn announced, voice carrying something beneath the precision that Valoris couldn’t quite identify. “Two hundred meters east. Single signature. Classification uncertain due to interference patterns.”

  “Visual confirmation,” Zee added, and Reaver moved toward the detected signature with readiness that had become automatic. “Single entity. Class B. Alone.”

  Alone.

  That registered wrong immediately. Entities weren’t solitary. They moved in groups, clustered together, coordinated movements suggesting social structure or survival instinct or both. Finding one alone was unusual.

  Through Paragon’s sensors, Valoris saw it.

  The entity moved slowly through the corruption zone, geometry wrong in ways that made it difficult to track, surface shifting between states like it couldn’t quite hold itself together. Damaged, she realized. Its dimensional coherence was flickering with visible instability, struggling to maintain its form in a space that didn’t welcome its existence.

  It moved erratically, without purpose or determination but a desperate struggle, like an injured animal trying to find shelter. Valoris knew that she was projecting human emotions onto something that wasn’t human, but each movement seemed to cost it, dimensional substrate fragmenting slightly more with every effort.

  And it wasn’t approaching them.

  “Entity trajectory analysis,” Saren said, Meridian’s targeting systems tracking the being with perfect precision. “It’s avoiding us. Changing direction when we move closer. Giving us a wide berth.”

  Valoris watched the entity alter course as Chimera Squad adjusted positions. It wasn’t an aggressive reaction or a combat maneuver but a consistent pattern of maintaining distance. It was avoiding contact. Trying to get past them rather than engage them.

  Moving toward the rift scar.

  Just trying to reach dimensional damage that would let it leave. Trying to go home. Or flee. Or escape. Whatever home meant for things that existed between realities and got pulled through corruption into spaces where they couldn’t survive.

  “Protocol says eliminate on sight,” Saren announced, and through the squad channel Valoris heard what that cost her. The way protocol had become chain rather than guidance, orders that demanded compliance regardless of what they witnessed.

  Valoris watched Saren’s Meridian line up the shot. Railgun charged, tracking locked. She had a perfect angle for a clean kill. Efficient elimination of an entity that wasn’t threatening anyone, wasn’t attacking anything, just struggling to survive long enough to reach an escape route.

  “Hold fire,” Valoris said.

  Silence on the comms, sudden and sharp and weighted with surprise.

  “Chimera Lead? Please repeat?” Saren’s voice carried confusion mixed with something that might have been relief.

  “I said hold fire.” Valoris kept her voice steady despite the weight of disobeying protocol, of making a command decision that directly contradicted standing orders. “We’re observing.”

  “Valoris,” Zee’s voice came through careful, concerned. “Protocol says–”

  “I know what protocol says.” Valoris cut her off, awareness focused on the struggling entity that was trying desperately to reach dimensional damage two hundred meters away. “Hold. I want to see what happens.”

  They held.

  The entity continued its journey with agonizing slowness.

  Through Paragon’s sensors Valoris tracked its deterioration: dimensional coherence failing progressively, structure coming apart in ways that looked painful despite having no reference for what pain meant to beings made of folded space and impossible geometry.

  It was dying.

  Not from combat. Just from existing in space that couldn’t support its survival, reality refusing to accommodate a consciousness that belonged elsewhere.

  And it was fighting to stay cohesive long enough to reach the rift scar, struggling against dimensional current that seemed to flow wrong, from the rift side toward the human side, pulling at the entity in opposition to its desperate movement.

  Swimming upstream. Fighting the current. Trying to reach the breach that would let it leave.

  “The entity’s fleeing,” Milo said quietly, his voice stripped of its usual enthusiasm. “It’s not a threat. It’s just trying to get past us. Trying to leave.”

  “Confirmed,” Quinn added, and through their connection to Specter, Valoris watched them extending awareness toward the entity, their dimensional perception letting them understand things baseline humans couldn’t. “Dimensional resonance patterns suggest–”

  The entity’s coherence failed catastrophically.

  Valoris saw it happen through Paragon’s sensors: structure collapsing, geometry fragmenting, dimensional substrate unable to maintain form against corrupted space that rejected its existence. The entity didn’t explode or combust, it just came apart. Dissolved. Reality letting go of a consciousness that had been struggling to maintain presence.

  Dying.

  “Chimera Four,” Valoris said urgently, recognizing what was happening. “Can you–”

  “Already moving,” Quinn cut her off, and Specter phased through dimensional boundaries with speed that should have been impossible, closing distance to the failing entity in seconds rather than minutes. “Getting closer. Have to see. Have to understand–”

  Through the squad channel Valoris heard Quinn gasp, sharp intake of breath that carried shock mixed with horror mixed with recognition.

  “It’s scared,” Quinn said, voice shaken in ways she’d never heard from them before. Wrong in a way that suggested whatever they were sensing had cracked through their emotional flatness and forced feeling through barriers they’d maintained for years. “I can feel it. Dimensional resonance. It’s terrified. It’s dying and it’s trying to go home. It’s–”

  The entity dissolved completely.

  One moment it was a struggling being made of folded dimensions and impossible angles, fighting desperately for survival.

  In the next moment it was nothing. Residual dimensional distortion fading into corruption, awareness terminating without ceremony or significance.

  Gone.

  It hadn’t attacked or threatened. It hadn’t even acknowledged Chimera Squad’s presence beyond avoiding them. It just died trying to leave, trying to escape, trying to reach a home that presumably existed somewhere beyond the rift scar it couldn’t reach.

  Silence filled the squad channel. Heavy. Crushing. Impossible to fill with words because what words addressed watching something die from fear while trying to flee?

  Through Paragon’s sensors Valoris tracked Quinn’s Specter, forty feet of semi-transparent dimensional substrate that had gotten within meters of the entity’s death, close enough to sense whatever Quinn had sensed, witness whatever they’d witnessed.

  Close enough to feel an entity’s terror as it died alone trying to escape.

  “Sterling,” Valoris said carefully. “Status report.”

  More silence. Then Quinn’s voice came through flat again, forced flatness, emotional control reimposed through visible effort.

  “The entity expired from dimensional coherence failure. Natural causes. Not combat-related. It wasn’t attacking us. It was running away. Trying to escape. Trying to…” Their voice cracked slightly. “It just wanted to go home.”

  They completed their patrol in heavy silence.

  They swept sectors Alpha and Beta. Found two more entity clusters. One group attacked immediately with coordinated aggression, and Chimera Squad eliminated them with efficient precision that felt mechanical. The other cluster scattered the moment mechs approached, fled in every direction, tried to reach rift scars, died anyway because protocol demanded elimination regardless of behavior.

  Eight more kills. Some hostile. Some fleeing. All dead.

  By the time they returned to observation post seven, Valoris’s hands were shaking. It wasn’t from exertion or fear. It was something that felt like recognition she couldn’t put back in the box.

  The lone entity. The damaged one that just wanted to leave.

  Quinn had felt its terror. Its fear. Its desperate desire to go home.

  And they’d been positioned to kill it for existing in the wrong place.

  That night, insofar as night had meaning in corruption zones where time felt wrong, Chimera Squad sat together in observation post seven’s cramped common area. None of them slept despite their exhaustion because none of them were able to process what they’d witnessed without discussing it.

  “That wasn’t a monster,” Zee said quietly, her voice lacking its usual aggressive confidence, stripped down to something raw and honest. “That thing we watched die. That wasn’t the enemy. That was something terrified and dying, trying to leave, and we were going to kill it for being in the wrong place.”

  “Protocol says all entities are hostile threats,” Saren said, but she sounded like she was reciting memorized text rather than expressing belief. Clinging to protocol because protocol was safe, orders were clear, questioning meant insubordination and doubt.

  “Did that look hostile to you?” Zee shot back, sharper now, anger bleeding through. Not at Saren. At the situation. At protocol that demanded they kill things that weren’t threatening anyone. “It was fleeing. Running away. We’re what it was afraid of, and we were going to shoot it for trying to escape.”

  “But the cluster before that attacked us,” Milo said, adjusting his glasses with shaking hands. “They came right at us. Hostile intent clear. And the ones in sector Beta scattered, but some of them turned back and engaged when we pursued. Entity behavior isn’t consistent. Isn’t predictable. Some fight. Some run. Some die trying to leave. How are we supposed to know which is which?”

  “Exactly,” Saren said, seizing the point. “We can’t know intent in advance. That’s why protocol exists. That’s why we eliminate on sight. Because we can’t distinguish threat from flight until it’s too late.”

  “So we kill everything,” Valoris said, hollow recognition settling into her awareness like ice in her chest. “Because some of them might be dangerous. We kill the ones that fight and the ones that run and the ones that just want to go home, because we can’t tell the difference and protocol doesn’t try.”

  The words sat among them like accusations.

  Quinn spoke from where they sat apart. “Dimensional resonance signature was distressed,” they reported with clinical precision that didn’t hide the wrongness underneath. “Fear. Pain. Desperation. Not aggression. Not hostility. Flight. The entity was experiencing terror. Overwhelming terror. It knew it was dying and it was trying to reach the rift before coherence failed completely. It just wanted to go home.”

  “But we’ve killed dozens of entities across seven deployments,” Saren said, desperately trying to maintain the structure her worldview required. “Some of them attacked. Some of them were genuinely hostile. That proves the threat is real. That proves protocol is necessary.”

  “Does it?” Valoris asked. “Or does it prove that trapped, desperate beings sometimes fight when cornered? When they can’t escape, when we block their path to the rifts, when we kill their companions in front of them… of course some of them attack. What else would they do?”

  “We don’t know that,” Saren argued. “We don’t know they’re trapped. Briefings say entities emerge from dimensional rifts to invade our reality. Briefings say–”

  “Do briefings explain why some entities always move toward rifts instead of away from them?” Valoris countered. “Why entity behavior looks like an escape attempt when we don’t engage immediately?”

  “I’ve been tracking measurements,” Quinn said flatly. “Seven deployments. Dimensional flow data consistently shows that we’re bleeding through into the other dimension as much as theirs is bleeding into ours.”

  Silence filled the observation post.

  Milo spoke first, voice quiet and uncertain. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying the data doesn’t fully support the official story.” Quinn’s words came measured, careful. “Some entities attack. That’s undeniable. But many of them are trying to leave. The dimensional flow suggests corruption is pulling them through from their side to ours. Some of them might be trapped here. And we kill them all regardless.”

  “That’s… that can’t be right,” Saren said, but her voice carried no conviction. “The academy wouldn’t train us for four years to kill things that aren’t threats. Command wouldn’t deploy us against entities that are just trying to escape. There must be something we’re not understanding.”

  “Or there’s something they’re not telling us,” Zee countered. “Something wrong with the whole system. Something that doesn’t match the hero narrative they’ve been feeding us since first year.”

  “We should ask,” Valoris said. “Formally. Through proper channels. Request clarification on entity behavior patterns and dimensional flow data. Get actual answers instead of following orders blindly.”

  “You tried that after last deployment,” Milo reminded her. “Commander Varak shut you down. Said clarification requests should go through proper channels, which means submit written reports that disappear into bureaucracy and never get answered.”

  “So we try harder. Talk to instructors. Talk to Thrace. Find someone willing to explain why what we’re seeing doesn’t match what we’ve been told.”

  “Or we accept that no one will explain,” Zee said. “Because maybe the truth is worse than confusion. Maybe understanding why we’re killing things that might not be threats would make this job impossible to continue.”

  That possibility hung between them, terrifying and plausible, explaining why veteran pilots gave evasive answers and warned against asking questions.

  But Valoris was a Kade. Five generations of pilots who’d served with distinction and honor. Five perfect summonings. Five legendary careers built on eliminating dimensional threats.

  She couldn’t believe her family legacy was built on lies. Not yet. Not without evidence she couldn’t deny.

  “We document everything,” she said finally. “Personal records. Not official reports. Everything we observe: entity behavior, dimensional flow patterns, corruption zone characteristics, anything that doesn’t match briefings. We keep our own data. And when we have enough evidence, when we can’t deny the patterns anymore, we ask questions that can’t be ignored or dismissed.”

  “That’s dangerous,” Saren warned. “Questioning mission parameters. Suggesting official narrative is incorrect. That’s borderline insubordination. Could get us disciplined or discharged.”

  “So we’re careful. We document quietly. We don’t discuss openly except with each other. We wait until we have undeniable evidence before we ask questions. But we find answers. Because continuing to kill without understanding what we’re actually doing…” Valoris looked at her hands, remembered them shaking. “I can’t do that indefinitely. Can’t live with that uncertainty forever.”

  She looked at her squad. Four people who’d become family through four years of shared transformation, who’d killed alongside her multiple times now, who were changing into something other than human together.

  “Are you with me?”

  “Yes,” Zee said immediately. Always first to commit. Always ready for conflict.

  “Affirmative,” Quinn agreed. “Data collection is logical. Documentation is prudent. Understanding is necessary for informed operational decisions.”

  “I’m in,” Milo said. “Can’t function without understanding underlying systems. Will document everything.”

  Saren hesitated longer, perfectionist at war with loyalty, protocol competing against friendship. Finally: “I’m with you. But we have to be careful. Smart. Can’t afford to get caught questioning officially if we’re wrong.”

  “And if we’re right?” Valoris asked.

  “Then we’ll deal with that when we have proof.” Saren’s voice was steady despite everything. “One step at a time.”

  Quinn’s voice came through the silence one more time, barely above a whisper.

  “It just wanted to go home.”

  No one had an answer for that.