Ohh, my head. My lips. Why does my mouth taste like—like salty pond water?

  Grogginess clung to her thoughts like wet cloth. She shifted her tongue and scraped against something rough, threaded, and bristling. Whatever it was was jammed between her teeth and cheeks, prickling at the corners of her mouth. Felt like hugging a man who hadn’t shaved in a couple days—nothing but sharp, spiteful stubble.

  “Ahh,” she groaned, trying to pry her eyes open.

  What in Hades’ flaming nuts is—

  An orange ball tearing through the night detonated in her mind. Fire. Sky. Impact. Her eyes snapped fully open.

  Her ship.

  Her crew.

  Disoriented, she blinked hard, forcing the world into focus. Fuck.

  She was bound and gagged. A coarse, salt-stiff rope cut into the corners of her mouth, bit into her wrists, and burned around her ankles. Every breath dragged the taste of brine and mildew deeper down her throat.

  Her options were plain and simple: escape, or die trying.

  She couldn’t afford to let the Triarchy crack her Fotisi and trace the Tetra’s movements. If they got even a sliver of her Diafotisi logs… every safe harbor, every covert route, every sympathizer on Delos and beyond would light up like a beacon on the Olympian Grid.

  Squeezing her eyes shut, she pushed through the pounding in her skull and the ache in her limbs—sensations she now recognized as dehydration, fatigue, and hunger. Her mental interface surfaced automatically, icons blooming in the corner of her vision: a cracked droplet, a dimmed eye, an empty plate.

  Mild, but stacking.

  Diafotisi calculated a 25% reduction to both focus and concentration.

  A neat little debuff reminder that escaping was going to be much, much harder.

  If I have to talk my way out of this, I’m screwed. I don’t do well when I’m hungry.

  Not to mention fatigued and dehydrated. Last time—

  She jerked her head as much as the restraints allowed, as if she could shake the memory loose.

  Damn. It’s worse than I thought. Mind’s already wandering.

  She inhaled slowly through her nose, held the breath, and dropped herself into habit.

  Still pond.

  In her mindscape, the world was glassy and quiet. She imagined a small, smooth stone and let it fall into the center of the water. Concentric rings rippled outward, expanding in all directions. Around her—nothing. No Prax signatures within immediate reach. But beyond the invisible boundary of the room, the ripples collided with sparks—nodes of prax-light flaring where they struck.

  Sources of Prax.

  Just outside.

  She needed out. She needed Prax.

  The chair anchoring her was solid, carved from dense, age-worn timber. Its base was wide and low, built to resist tipping even with a struggling body bound to it. Beneath her, she heard the steady slap of water, felt the subtle sway beneath the metal platform.

  For a heartbeat, hope spiked.

  Ship?

  She blinked, letting her eyes adjust. No. Not a deck.

  The wooden throne sat on a metal grate that stretched over a narrow body of water—a bridge of sorts. On either side of the channel, stone walkways ran parallel to the flow.

  Definitely not a ship. She was suspended over a water channel.

  Directly ahead, a towering metal barrier sealed the passage. Only the portion above the surface was visible, but as she watched the water surge, she realized it wasn’t solid all the way down. Each incoming swell crashed against masonry somewhere behind her, then rebounded forward, rushing beneath her feet and into a metal grate set into the base of the barrier. With every surge, the grate vanished under churning foam, then reappeared as the wave sucked back.

  A sea gate.

  Left and right of it, the stone walkways were interrupted by sheets of corrugated metal that ran the full height of the gate, each fitted with a narrow door.

  If she could get free, she might reach one of those doors. And if worse came to worst, there was always the lunatic option: catch a surge and try to ride the water through the lower grate.

  Diafotisi ran the numbers in a cool flash across her vision.

  Estimated success rate: 21%.

  Not good.

  But not zero.

  Her mental interface pulsed, the left edge of her vision flaring with a faint red light denoting the presence of another being.

  They’re hostile, of course. Cursed Triarchy pigs.

  Her jaw flexed, and she bit down on the rope gag, making salt water leak from its frayed fibers—eliciting a prompt.

  Dehydration increased.

  Focus and concentration reduced by 1%

  Total debuff: –26%

  Skills requiring focus and concentration are locked until the debuff is removed.

  Cannot access mindscape until focus and concentration are –25% or lower.

  Find clean water to alleviate debuff.

  The information washed through her in a fraction of a second, and she felt the debuff tightening around her thoughts like a vice—slowing her, clouding her, flooding her mind with doubts and useless noise.

  The hostile!

  Movement—quick, silent, wrong.

  Diafotisi still tracked the presence to her left, but the figure was suddenly in front of her.

  How did they bypass tracking?

  Side effect of the debuff? Or something worse?

  Before she could untangle the thought, a pointy-heeled boot slammed into her chest, tipping her seat back. The heel’s unforgiving point dug into her sternum, pinning her there—her head forced toward the rafters, body suspended in that nauseating space between equilibrium and collapse. Her disorientation deepened.

  “Triarchy pig,” snarled the figure, shifting so that only the dagger-thin heel supported her full weight.

  Wait—what?

  Pain spiked behind her eyes as last night’s memories collided with the present.

  I’m not Tri—oh. The mission. Ahhhhhhhh—

  More pressure. Her balance slipped. She began falling backward when a fist seized her collar and yanked her upright, snapping her head forward and forcing her to bite down hard on the gag.

  Another prompt blinked.

  Dehydration increased.

  Focus and concentration reduced by 2%

  Total debuff: –28%

  Skills requiring focus and concentration are locked until debuff is removed.

  Cannot access mindscape until focus and concentration are –25% or lower.

  Find clean water to alleviate debuff.

  Head throbbing, she tried to focus. She needed to tell this heeled harpy she wasn’t Triarchy—but how? She was still wearing the Tri uniform from the infiltration op. And the gag. Gods, the gag. Salty rope strands scraped her tongue, making her stomach clench with the need to retch.

  She lifted her head—slow, deliberate—to see her captor.

  A mask stared back at her.

  Not a helmet. Not Tri military issue.

  A bird.

  Black feathers. Black lacquered beak. Matte-black lenses over the eyes—blank, reflective, unreadable.

  Not ceremonial like the Hypogeion Sopheia masks at the Lyceum.

  Those had been ornamental—gold filigree, carved wood, handcrafted myths.

  This one was built for utility. Reinforced leather. Breath filters. Seamless stitching. A predator’s silhouette carved into something meant to stalk shadows.

  Whoever this was—this wasn’t a Triarch soldier.

  This wasn’t even a merc.

  This was a faction.

  Her pulse kicked harder.

  And the environment around her—she noticed it now that fear was sharpening her vision instead of blurring it.

  The faint hum beneath the metal platform wasn’t a ship’s engine; it was static pressure, the same vibration she felt once during a training op inside a desalination plant on Naxos.

  Salt-brine aerosol clung to the air, too clean and too engineered to be ocean spray alone.

  Where in Hades am I?

  The perp drew a sword and slashed straight down—fast enough that Tinga only saw a blur of steel until it kissed her cheek.

  She froze.

  Externally, unbothered.

  Internally, one breath away from pissing herself.

  A hot trickle slid along her jawline.

  Sweat. Sweat. Sweat—please be sweat.

  She still had both ears, right? She couldn’t feel one of them.

  But something worse pressed in:

  If my Fotisi gets hacked… gods.

  They’d get mission logs. Encrypted Tetra cipher keys. My crew’s biometrics. Entry paths into Coalition networks.

  One breach and the entire Tetra arm could fall.

  She couldn’t let that happen.

  Escape or die trying wasn’t hyperbole. It was mathematical.

  Then the pressure at the sides of her mouth eased, and with a soft thwup, the rope gag dropped to her shoulders.

  Tinga stared up at the raven-masked figure: tight black-leather jumpsuit, hooded cloak, midnight boots sharp enough to puncture morale. The single imperfection was the zipper—worn, tarnished, running from her navel to just below her collarbones. The only hint this creature was human and not some avenging spirit of the underworld.

  “Speak,” the raven commanded, voice firm and feminine. “Explain why you washed up amidst a squad of dead Tetra troops.”

  “They’re dead?”

  Her voice cracked.

  “Answer.” The blade pressed closer—not enough to cut, enough to promise.

  “I am Tinga.”

  A bad start.

  She inhaled.

  “I am Tinga of the Tetra Coalition, and those dead men are mine— I mean, they served under me—well, died under me—not because of my command, technically—okay maybe partially because—”

  She winced.

  Olympus take her, she was digging her own grave.

  “Water,” she rasped. “I can’t think. I’ll tell you whatever you want, but I NEED water.”

  “You’ll tell me what I ask,” the raven said. Her authority wasn’t postured — it was carved into every syllable. Someone born to command or raised by someone merciless enough to teach it.

  Tinga nodded. She wasn’t in any position to negotiate.

  The blade remained at her throat as the raven let out a two-tone whistle. A door opened behind her, quiet as a sigh. Another masked figure approached—this one feathered like a falcon. They held a dented canteen.

  At a nod from the raven, the falcon tilted it to Tinga’s lips.

  Cold water hit her tongue, ran down her chin, streaked along her collarbone. Her pulse slowed. The pounding inside her skull softened. Her thoughts, once brittle and cracking like a dry riverbed, soaked with clarity.

  A prompt blinked into her vision:

  Congratulations, you have been hydrated!

  Focus & concentration: +21%

  Total debuff: –7%

  Mindscape access: RESTORED

  Time dilation: –70% efficiency due to remaining debuff

  (Current ratio: 6 internal seconds per real-time second)

  Find food and rest to alleviate remaining debuff.

  Clarity snapped into place.

  Her eyes sharpened; her posture straightened.

  She was herself again.

  “Thank you,” she murmured, nothing more — no overexplanation, no sudden bravado. Then she dove inward, tapping into her mindscape.

  Even throttled, six seconds per one was enough.

  Okay. Priorities.

  First: Whoever captured her wasn’t actually hostile. They just thought she was Triarch.

  Second: They clearly hated the Triarchy. And she’d heard them use the same insults her own officers used. A promising sign.

  Third: They were wearing Prax shards in plain sight.

  Amateurs.

  Useful amateurs.

  If diplomacy failed, she could siphon a shard and bolt. But diplomacy meant allies, and allies meant survival.

  Who the hell are these people? And where exactly did I wash up?

  She inhaled, earning herself another mindscape second—a full six internal beats.

  Start simple. Start with your story.

  Tinga opened her eyes.

  “Thank you.”

  The word slipped out too soft, and Tinga winced internally. Damn. Forgot it’s only been two seconds for them.

  She straightened, trying to regain ground. “Are you sure all the Tetra troops are dead?”

  The masked figures didn’t move, didn’t even exchange glances. Just…stared.

  “My name is Tinga,” she continued, forcing her voice steady. “And I—gods—failed my crew last night. I was tasked with infiltrating a Triarchy ship called Kali Tyche.”

  The falcon stiffened. A tiny, involuntary whistle escaped its mask.

  Interesting.

  Tinga pretended not to notice.

  “There was something aboard that mattered to the Tetra Coalition. But our intel was wrong. Whatever we were after was moved before we got there. I had to go in disguised—hence the Triarch uniform.”

  The raven tilted her head, voice crisp and cutting.

  “More. How do I know the Triarchy and Tetra didn’t both lose ships, and you simply drifted here with theirs? How do I know you aren’t a prisoner of war? Or a deserter? Or—”

  She exhaled sharply. “Do I need to continue? Do you have proof you’re Tetra?”

  Tinga grimaced. Good questions. Infuriatingly good.

  Proof. Right.

  Her mark.

  Before she could answer, the raven whistled, and both masked figures left abruptly, shutting the door behind them.

  Alone, Tinga’s mind reeled through possibilities. When they returned, she could show them her forearm—the embedded silver sigil of the Tetra Coalition. A perfect square with lines radiating from each edge, a compass rose etched into her flesh.

  That’ll do it. Except—

  Her stomach dropped.

  Her other arm.

  The fake Triarch tattoo from her six-year espionage assignment.

  Still there. Still fresh. Still damning.

  Her throat tightened as memories of her lost squad surged—

  Dante. Jax. Sophs. Mel.

  Her eyes stung; the saltwater made her lip bleed when she bit down to steady herself.

  Later. Mourn later.

  Right now demanded focus.

  How else could she prove her allegiance?

  She could absorb Prax—that would make her true sigil react, but the fake Triarch one wouldn’t.

  But revealing she could absorb Prax? Not smart. Not to strangers. Not here.

  And why did the falcon react to the name Kali Tyche? What do they know?

  Fotisi’s warning flared red.

  A presence behind her.

  Again?

  Impossible. Her tracking systems flagged the figure, but the moment they moved, the arrow switched from hostile red to neutral white.

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  A blade flashed.

  Tinga tensed—prepared for pain—but instead, her wrists suddenly came free. She lurched forward as the tension of the ropes vanished.

  She spun, and there stood the raven.

  Again, she had bypassed Tinga’s tracking.

  This time, Tinga couldn’t blame dehydration or debuffs.

  Something was off.

  Her eyes darted to her Prax stability meter—neutral. No disruption.

  So it’s not me. It’s her.

  “What changed?” Tinga asked.

  “A friend of yours put in a good word.” The raven stepped to the front of the chair, resting a hand on its arm as if this were a casual conversation and she hadn’t threatened to cut Tinga’s throat minutes ago.

  Tinga frowned. “I…I thought you said everyone was dead?”

  “I lied,” the raven replied simply. “One of your men—Dante—woke a few minutes ago.”

  A sharp exhale escaped Tinga before she could hide it. “What did he tell you?”

  “Nothing. I said your name, and his reaction was enough. He nearly threw himself off the cot trying to reach you.” The raven shrugged lightly. “I teased him, suggested he might be a Triarch wolf dressed in Tetra colors, just to see what shook loose. He spat—eloquently—and showed me his mark.”

  Tinga snorted under her breath. “That’s Dante. Anyone else awake?”

  “Not yet. Three more breathe steadily but sleep on. After you begged for water, I gave Dante a sip.”

  She paused.

  “He woke almost instantly. Seems Fate favors you. A moment longer, and I might have ended you.”

  The matter-of-fact tone chilled Tinga more than the blade at her throat had.

  No remorse.

  Not a threat—just a fact.

  She still knew nothing about her captors.

  Time to begin the digging.

  “You know where we stand,” Tinga said carefully. “How do you fit into all this?”

  The raven stood perfectly still—a statue carved of tension and thought. Ten seconds passed. Not a twitch. Not a breath Tinga could register. It gave her the eerie sense that this girl—masked, young, feathered—was thinking on several channels at once, none of which she was allowed to hear.

  But one thing gnawed at Tinga:

  Whoever this was… they moved like someone without an awakened Diafotisi.

  And yet they slipped past her tracking twice.

  How?

  Enough silence. Tinga pushed forward.

  “If you’re not ready to say where you stand in this war, fine. Truly. But not choosing a side is worse than choosing the wrong one.” Her voice steadied with purpose. “I don’t have the luxury of time. I play a role in something far bigger than last night’s disaster, and—”

  The raven cut her off with an abrupt, fervent reply.

  “We stand for freedom. The Triarchy must fall.”

  Tinga nodded slowly, skeptical. “Good to hear. But how do I know you’re not Triarchs? How do I know you haven’t been fishing for intel this entire time? You could sell the information I’ve already given you for a pretty shard of Prax. Or haul me straight to a Triarchy officer as a bargaining chip.”

  The raven stepped forward so suddenly Tinga’s pulse spiked. The girl planted her boots wide in front of Tinga’s chair; from this angle, Tinga was eye-level with her sternum.

  Without hesitation, the raven unzipped her leather suit—fully.

  White chest bindings glowed faintly against her dark uniform. She hooked two fingers beneath the lowest part of the opening and pulled the fabric aside.

  A barcode.

  Branded into her flesh just below her navel.

  Tinga’s hands balled into fists.

  She knew those numbers.

  Everyone in the Tetra did.

  The first two digits—her birth year.

  Nineteen. A child.

  The third—classification.

  A 1: state-owned property.

  The next—intended use.

  Labor (1), military (2), or pleasure (3).

  This girl had been marked 3.

  Tinga swallowed hard. Rage and pity twisted together.

  The final digits—

  Zero.

  Zero.

  Not “no family.”

  Not “never had kin.”

  But something far crueler:

  A bureaucratic erasure.

  A deliberate rewrite.

  The Triarchy’s way of declaring that whoever she used to belong to was gone—

  wiped out—

  and that she was theirs now.

  A state-made orphan pressed into their system the moment her village fell.

  The raven zipped her suit closed with a harsh Z-Z-Z-Z-ZT.

  “They stole my freedom,” she said, her voice steady as forged iron, “and with it, the freedom of everyone on this island. I took back what was mine—and I’ll do the same for anyone willing to fight. One day, I’ll find my family again and give them liberty.”

  Tinga’s expression softened—unbidden.

  Her lips curled into a small, genuine smile… only to falter again.

  Because the girl didn’t understand.

  She truly, heartbreakingly didn’t understand.

  That the numbers weren’t a mystery of her origin—

  but a gravestone encoded in ink.

  A beat of silence stretched—too long, too heavy.

  The raven shifted, misreading the pause.

  Her stance tensed; her chin lifted defensively behind the mask.

  “What?” she snapped lightly. “You see a Forgotten or something?”

  Her tone wasn’t threat—it was embarrassment.

  A wounded reflex.

  Like she thought Tinga was judging her… or recoiling from her.

  Tinga blinked, pulled back into the present.

  “No,” she said gently. “You just… reminded me of someone.”

  Yeah—herself.

  An old, worn piece of herself, frayed by years of chasing impossible dreams.

  Yet still there.

  A spark forever fighting to burn through every wall blocking her path.

  She couldn’t let her mind drift there—not now.

  She reeled herself back in and picked up the question she’d meant to ask before the raven had bared her soul.

  “Okay-okay. So we’re on the same team. If that’s the case, why did your friend Falcon-face react to the mention of Kali Tyche?”

  “Kali Tyche and another ship were in port two days ago.”

  The raven’s voice hardened. “They caused trouble—again. For us and for the village. The Triarchy always comes in like they own the place. No regard for the people who actually live here.”

  “It’s like that everywhere,” Tinga muttered. “Even in their home ports.”

  The raven’s masked head tilted. “How would you know?”

  Damn. She’d relaxed too much.

  They couldn’t know she’d been deep-cover for six years—knowing that would blow a hole through any trust she’d built.

  She recovered fast.

  “Sailors talk,” she said with an easy shrug. “It’s all they’ve got on long crossings. Time, bad jokes, and booze. That stuff’s like truth serum.”

  The raven’s shoulders shook, and a chortle escaped from behind the mask.

  “That it is. That it is.”

  The moment of levity vanished as quickly as it came—like a coal sizzling out in water.

  The raven straightened, the air shifting, those bead-black eyes sharpening into command once more.

  “We have business to discuss.”

  She whistled—three mid-range chirps, ending on a long, high-pitched note.

  Then she extended an arm.

  Tinga accepted the hand and rose, now eye-to-eye with the masked girl. Without the exaggerated height of her boots, the shadowed hood, or the theatrical presence of the mask, the raven would have seemed almost small. Young. Too young to be carrying the weight she clearly bore.

  The raven gestured for Tinga to lead, and she obeyed, stepping onto the metal grate bridge. Water churned beneath them, echoing like distant thunder in a cavern.

  At the end of the bridge, Tinga hesitated. Two doors—left and right.

  Before she could ask which one, the left swung open on its own.

  The falcon stood framed in the doorway.

  Her cloak had seen better days—frayed edges, patches of salt-stain, sun-bleach, and old travel. Her boots told the rest of the story: fresh dirt caked into the seams, grass blades clinging stubbornly.

  A girl who’d been running errands that took her places she shouldn’t have had to go at her age.

  Curiosity pricked at Tinga. The falcon carried herself with the posture of someone trained beyond her years, but her youth still clung to her like an aura. Why had someone entrusted a girl barely out of adolescence with negotiations and security protocols this sensitive?

  She glanced at the raven again, trying to map their hierarchy.

  Was this some kind of trial? A rite of passage?

  Another unanswered question dangling in a growing web of them.

  The tension hummed between all three of them—palpable, alive—an invisible thread binding their fates whether they liked it or not.

  The torrent of questions buzzing in Tinga’s mind snapped silent the instant Dante stepped into view from the doorway.

  There he was—towering over her by a full two heads, lean-built but forged like tempered steel. His features were sharp enough to belong on a drachma coin: high cheekbones, a commanding jaw, a prominent chin dusted with brown stubble. Sun-bleached waves of hair were bound into disciplined braids—three thin plaits tucked behind each ear, with a thicker braid flowing from his crown and merging neatly into a ponytail.

  He looked like he’d crawled out of a shipwreck and straight into a parade.

  His shirt—black silk, patterned with gray florals that shimmered like mist over dark water—was missing its top buttons from the scuffle, giving a glimpse of sun-kissed skin and a dark trail of chest hair. His sleeves were rolled, exposing muscular forearms marked by the intricate silver insignia of the Tetra. Leather straps crossed his torso, securing gear to trousers faded to an ash-black from years at sea. And those boots—broken, mended, broken again—fifteen years old if they were a day.

  Dante and his damned sentimental boots, she mused.

  Tinga strode to him and clapped his shoulder. He mirrored it—then drew back into a crisp salute. She returned it just as sharply, watching her first mate stand ramrod straight, awaiting orders.

  Only then did she take in the room.

  Understanding crashed over her.

  The metal grate beneath their feet vibrated with the steady churn of water. Beneath it, a quiet, controlled whirlpool hummed—nothing like the violent channel she’d nearly been dumped into. Gas struts controlled a heavy panel recessed into the wall, regulating water flow between this chamber and the death-trap she had just escaped.

  And then she saw it.

  Submerged just below the surface…

  an impeller the size of the entire room.

  Her eyes widened.

  If the Raven had pushed her earlier—

  if she’d triggered the grate—

  if she’d opened the flow—

  Gods.

  It would’ve been Tinga sashimi à la carte.

  The door shut behind her with a deep metallic THUD, and she snapped back to attention beside Dante.

  “You and Dante wait here,” the raven said—no hesitation, no softness, no suggestion. It was an order. Tinga had heard more leniency from full-command officers. Who was this girl?

  “My team and I,” the raven continued, “have things to discuss before you and I come to terms.”

  “Sorry—terms?” Tinga asked, frowning as the raven reached for another door.

  “Yes. We rescued you, and we set you free. Now you need a ship—a fast one. And”—a pause, a deliberate glance—“you need it now. You’ve got a battery to catch.”

  Before Tinga could reply, the raven turned and strode out. The falcon followed, shutting the door until only a narrow slit remained. Through it, she glared at them—the beaked mask framed in shadow like something straight out of a low-budget horror reel.

  Tinga blinked once.

  Falcon’s Feather: The Silent Scream.

  Coming soon to a theater near nobody.

  “Don’t try anything funny,” the falcon said. “We have others of yours in custody.”

  The door clicked shut—

  but notably, not locked.

  Tinga’s stomach dropped.

  Great.

  She was absolutely in a horror flick.

  “They’re showing us trust,” Tinga whispered, her voice barely above breath.

  “But still playing it safe,” Dante murmured back, as quietly as his deep baritone allowed. “Door’s not locked, but they’ve got collateral.”

  “Clever,” Tinga said. The falcon was female too.

  Does she have a barcode as well?

  “Captain? Last night was brutal, we…” Dante hesitated, concern flickering in his eyes. “You holding up?”

  Tinga nodded and turned fully toward him, then shut her eyes.

  “I’ve got a Prax shard stowed in my boot,” he added.

  Before he could say more, she cut in, keeping her voice soft and even. “Save it. I’m pretty sure they’re watching—or at least listening. They’re not hostile, and the Raven proved she’s not Tri… but she is smart. Smart gets dangerous fast.”

  “They’re with the Tetra?!” Dante’s face lit, hope flaring.

  “Not exactly.” Tinga shook her head. “Their enemy is the Triarchy. That much is real. And it’s not just dislike—it’s hate, and earned hate at that. But I don’t know where they sit on the wider board. Right now, best guess? Rogue organization. Too organized to be just a village gang, too quiet to be on any Tri registry. I still need confirmation.”

  “Can we leverage them?” he asked.

  “We’re in no position to make offers,” she said. “And we’re not pinging the Dreadnought until we know the Tri aren’t sweeping this whole coast. Last thing we need is Oracle Net traffic drawing attention. Like I said—now’s not the time to talk.”

  Dante swallowed that and moved off to the side, crossing to a wall threaded with thick pipes. They rose from the floor, bent at a hard right angle, and vanished into the ceiling. He tapped them with the back of his hand, checking temperature by instinct before choosing a spot between both doors, planting himself in a seat that gave him a clear line of sight to each exit.

  Good. Watching the doors. I’ll watch the board, Tinga thought.

  She let her gaze roam again, trying to figure out where, exactly, they were—and how these bird-masked kids had access to a facility like this.

  Still nothing concrete.

  Metal grate. Controlled flow. Industrial paneling. Civil infrastructure. It screamed pre-Triarchy. One of the old desalination plants, if she had to bet—a relic from before Prax-reactors made half the old waterworks “obsolete” on paper and “too expensive to fix” in Tri-led council votes. The kind of place that simply vanished off official city schematics and quietly became someone else’s problem.

  Or someone else’s hideout.

  A few minutes later, she had to admit it: all she could confirm was that the facility produced hydro-power and was anchored to land, not a ship. Everything else was conjecture.

  Reluctantly, her attention slid to the notification pulsing at the edge of her vision—the blinking prompt she’d been ignoring since she woke. The ignored harbinger, now demanding she look it in the eye. And with it… everything she’d lost last night.

  With a thought, she opened it.

  “Project Energizer” bloomed across her vision, enlarged and anchored to the world in front of her. Even though the interface was fixed in place, she still found herself tilting her head.

  The quest title no longer glowed in its usual muted purple. It was emboldened, shimmering gold, framed in ornate scrollwork that hadn’t appeared in any of the thousands of quests she’d taken before. The UI itself felt… ceremonial. Heavy.

  Unsettling.

  Intriguing.

  She read.

  Quest Update: Project Energizer

  Grid: Olympian

  Overview:

  The battery you were tasked to recover for the Tetra was not aboard Kali Tyche as reported by Antaeus. As this was an error from the quest source, you have not failed the quest. A notification has been sent to the Oracle Net for analysis. Hark and rejoice; an alternate route to completion has been presented.

  Although your ship, crew, and target have all been lost, the Fates smile upon you, oh Awoken one. The tendrils of destiny have woven themselves such that a synchronicity has taken root. Negotiate with your current captors to determine the cost and scope of your blessed tidings.

  A word from the Tetra Oracles:

  Synchronistic occurrences are rare and far-reaching. They delve into the realm of creation itself. Their primordial nature extends beyond the physical, and they can permanently alter not only your fate but the fates of kingdoms and worlds.

  Careful, Awoken one. Your decisions today can send tremors that will shake not just tomorrow, but the bedrock of millennia to come.

  Synchronicities are chaotic by nature and exist outside the usual confines of time. Due to this, your quest can no longer be supported by the Olympian Grid and has been transferred to the Titan Grid.

  New Support: Titan Grid

  Rewards now provided by Titan Grid. Rewards no longer limited to the physical realm—Pnevma and Gnosis realms are now open to Quest: Project Energizer.

  Be forewarned: A global message has been transmitted to all Awoken beings, notifying them of the occurrence of this synchronicity. Your blessing, Daughter of Prax, shields your identity and the precise location of this event upon the Grid.

  Due to the nature of your quest, the initial Grid provider has been transferred:

  Original Grid: Olympian

  New Grid: Titan

  Reward(s): Unknown…

  Tinga reread the prompt. Once. Twice. Ten times. Twenty.

  What in Poseidon’s damp nuts is a synchronicity?

  Did she trip over it? Trigger it? Was it something the gods dropped on her head just because they were bored?

  Those weren’t even the worst parts.

  Her quest was no longer running through the Olympian Grid. It had been kicked—no, elevated—to the Titan Grid. That meant the stakes weren’t just high; they were mythic.

  Normally, Titan Grid access was for Demis and gods. People whose names shaped continents. Not captains who woke up gagged over industrial blenders.

  I’m neither, she thought, brows knitting hard.

  Who were these people in bird masks? How could their terms—whatever they ended up being—determine the fate… no, the destiny… of worlds?

  Her hand rose almost on its own. She buried her face in her palm and pressed her fingers into the space between her brows, making slow circles.

  The Raven was nineteen. Nineteen.

  And somewhere, some cosmic accountant had decided:

  Yes. Let’s tether the fate of millennia to this shipwrecked captain and a bird-masked teenager hiding in an abandoned desal plant.

  Tinga snorted once under her breath. It came out closer to a groan.

  Fates had a fucked-up sense of humor.

  “You okay, Captain? You’re doing that thing.”

  “I know,” Tinga hissed through clenched teeth.

  Her pulse throbbed at her temples—stress she thought she’d already maxed out now multiplied by a factor of a bazillion and ten. Waking up bound, gagged, and half-dead was bad enough.

  But a Titan-Grid quest? A synchronicity?

  The more she thought about it, the heavier the entire world pressed on her shoulders.

  The door swung open.

  Her stomach plummeted.

  The Raven stood there.

  “We’re ready for you. Both of you.”

  Tinga’s mind stuttered. Of course she would follow—but the quest whispered at the edges of her thoughts:

  Your decisions today can send tremors that will shake not just tomorrow, but the bedrock of millennia to come…

  She almost wished she hadn’t read it.

  She wasn’t the anxious type—never had been—but now?

  Now the fate of kingdoms was apparently stapled to her forehead.

  A red prompt flashed.

  Caution!

  Cortisol levels rising at a hazardous rate.

  Possibility: loss of consciousness.

  Issue identified.

  Would you like to temporarily suppress the source?

  Yes / No

  Tinga imagined Yes.

  The prompt expanded.

  Duration of Cortisol Spike Suppression?

  10 min

  30 min

  1 hour

  2 hours

  Tomorrow

  Custom

  She selected 1 hour.

  The quest’s weight dulled but didn’t vanish—more like someone had turned its volume down to a low murmur. The mental fog lifted. Her breath steadied.

  Clear-headed once more, she bowed to the Raven and stepped forward—Dante falling into place behind her.

  “The time is five till twenty-three hundred,” the Raven began as they walked down a narrow corridor loaded with pipes, old conduit, and shadows that hummed with the building’s heartbeat. “I have a favor to cash in—but it must happen between four and five in the morning.”

  Dante’s voice cut through the mechanical hum. “What day?”

  As they rounded a sharp corner, the Raven glanced back, eyes narrowing behind the mask. She didn’t slow.

  “Today.”

  “TODAY?” Dante barked.

  The Raven looked over her shoulder again—this time at Tinga—and jerked a thumb toward him.

  “He hard of hearing? Because that’s not great for what we need done.”

  “No,” Tinga answered dryly. “He just likes having the facts.”

  A low chuckle escaped the Raven. “Just like my Owl. And you know what I tell him?”

  “Huh?” Tinga asked.

  “Nothing—’cause he knows his place.”

  “You little—” Dante started, but Tinga’s elbow hit his ribs with surgical precision.

  “Sorry,” she said quickly. “He meant no offense. His loyalty is absolute—he follows my word, and a very short list of others. He’s never steered me wrong.”

  “In that case,” the Raven said, stopping just long enough to angle her masked face toward him, “tell him he’ll show me the same respect.”

  “It will be done,” Tinga replied.

  “But—” Dante tried.

  He caught himself, slammed his fist to his chest, and straightened.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  The Raven halted so abruptly that Tinga nearly walked into her.

  She turned, nudged Tinga aside, and faced Dante directly.

  Then—mirroring him—she brought her fist to her chest and bowed.

  Before either of them could parse the gesture, she shifted, placing a palm lightly on Tinga’s shoulder.

  A spark snapped through Tinga’s skin.

  Not mystical—physical.

  Static.

  Like the air itself had briefly leaned close to listen.

  “Five minutes,” the Raven said. “Forever lost.”

  She pivoted sharply.

  “It’s 2300 now. That gives us three hours to plan the heist, one hour to position everyone, and one hour to pull it off. Phase One is already underway.”

  “Hu—” Dante grunted before clamping his jaw shut.

  They rounded another corner and came upon a watertight door—a design straight from their own maritime vessels, thick and built to survive both pressure and conflict.

  It confirmed Tinga’s suspicion: this place wasn’t just hydro-powered—it was a hydro facility, repurposed and resurrected.

  One escort spun the wheel.

  The door groaned open.

  Inside was… not a room. Not exactly.

  More like a cavernous chamber reimagined by necessity and rebellion.

  The grated floor formed a lattice over a tapered funnel of steel below, narrowing toward a massive filtration bulkhead—a throat of the desalination plant.

  At the center sat a crate draped in canvas, turned into a makeshift command table.

  Maps. Assorted figurines. Chalk. Plans upon plans.

  But it was the people that stole Tinga’s breath.

  Masked figures lined the chamber, each dressed in dark utilitarian gear.

  Feathered masks—swallow, sparrow, kingfisher.

  Some rare, unfamiliar birds likely native to Delos.

  Formations of five or six, each group anchored by a rarer species.

  An osprey led one cluster—broad-shouldered, vigilant.

  The walls rose in a smooth cylinder, chalkboards affixed everywhere, coated in diagrams and arrows.

  No ceiling—just darkness above, broken only by the twin pipes descending from the shadows like the roots of some metal tree.

  The weld lines gleamed.

  Welded. Not bolted.

  Realization hit.

  “We’re in a tank,” Tinga announced.

  A slap hit her back—friendly, approving.

  “Nice. This one’s got a good head,” the Raven said.

  “It’s an old desalination tank. Or, more recently, our heist mission bunker.”

  Heist mission bunker? Tinga mused.

  What a childish name…

  A childish name backed by an army of masked commandos.

  The Raven crossed to a chalkboard and waved her over.

  “The heist has three phases,” she said, not turning around.

  “We’ve got Phase One handled despite Kali Tyche’s… interference. The rest? You plug yourselves in where useful. We’ll adapt.”

  Tinga scanned the chalkboard.

  PHASE 1: Get crew onboard Herme

  PHASE 2: Make the ship disappear

  PHASE 3: Bring the ship back to

  HEIST MISSION BUNKER!!!!

  Before Tinga even finished blinking at the quadruple exclamation marks, the Raven was already at the next door, unsealing it.

  “I’m handling Phase One,” she called back. “You’ve got three-ish hours to figure out the rest. I’ll try to be back in two. No promises.”

  The door slammed shut.

  Silence swallowed the chamber.

  Tinga scratched her head.

  What in Hermes’ breezy balls just happened?

  A chuckle drifted from her right.

  The Falcon stepped forward, clutching a stack of maps and notes.

  “She likes to be dramatic sometimes,” the falcon said, lowering her voice conspiratorially.

  “I’ll fill in the details.”

  She paused, tilting her head.

  “And trust me… you’re going to want to sit down for this part.”