Kyle lowered himself into a chair with a trembling sigh, his fingers twitching as if they remembered restraints still biting into his wrists. His voice came out raw, low.

  “Malcolm doesn’t shatter you all at once. He wears you down, bit by bit. First, the questions. Then the visions. He straps you into the rig until your worst memories feel like someone else’s, and his feel like they’re yours. Paige… she held on longer than I did. And then—her voice was just gone.”

  Aiko’s throat closed. Her hands dug crescents into her arms. Chester gave a low, uneasy chirr, padding closer to her chair. Dynamo said nothing, though her eyes darkened like storm glass.

  Kyle dragged a hand through his hair, tugging at the matted strands. “I should’ve died with her. But something snapped—like static in my head. I pulled free long enough to crawl out of there.” He looked at Aiko, shame mingling with defiance. “I don’t want to be just another ghost he made. Tell me how I can help.”

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  The silence stretched. Aiko’s pulse thrummed in her ears, memories of Liam and her mother twisting through her chest. Kyle’s face was gaunt, scarred, but behind his eyes she felt the trace of something—like a current she could sense without touching.

  Her words came measured, almost cold. “Stay nearby. I don’t need you in front of me. Just close enough that I can feel you when I call.”

  Kyle frowned, confused. “You… can sense me?”

  Aiko gave the slightest nod. “You’re tied into it now. The interface marked you. As long as you’re breathing, I’ll know where you are.”

  That seemed to rattle him more than Dynamo’s threats. His gaze flicked to Hiroto, then back to her. He nodded slowly, as if binding himself to invisible chains.

  “Then I’ll stay in the shadows until you need me.”

  Aiko leaned back, folding deeper into herself, but she didn’t look away. For the first time since he entered, she let herself believe he might be more than just Malcolm’s cast-off pawn.

  Dynamo muttered under her breath, cracking her knuckles, “Let’s hope that doesn’t bite us.”

  And in the charged quiet of the room, Aiko could feel it: Kyle’s presence, faint as a heartbeat in the dark—waiting.