[POV: Nardia]

  I hate paperwork.

  I hate it with the kind of passion reserved for people who smile while they stab you.

  And yet… without paper, you can’t protect anyone.

  Reality loves that little joke.

  Fanark’s corridor was so white it felt like it rejected the very concept of violence. White floor. White walls. White light. Like me punching a bloodless machine ten minutes ago had been a hallucination the station politely pretended never happened.

  But Miyu was in my arms.

  Cold.

  So cold it scared me—except her fingers had squeezed back earlier. Warmth and lifelessness jammed into the same body. Proof she was still here, and a knife in my ribs all at once.

  “Medical bay,” Ahmad said.

  Flat voice. No drama.

  His feet, though, moved fast.

  That was his tell. He didn’t show feelings on his face; he leaked them through speed.

  Genichiro grunted beside us. “We’ll fix the outer shell later. Right now, it’s what’s inside that matters.”

  “Don’t say ‘inside’!” I snapped. “Miyu isn’t some—”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “…Then fine. I’ll allow it.”

  “Don’t ‘allow’ it. You’re not the one in charge.”

  “That’s what pisses me off!”

  We rounded a corner and—of course—there they were.

  A human with a GDC armband, standing like the hallway had been built for this moment. Like they’d been waiting for us.

  This was a research station. Not seeing a GDC armband would’ve been weirder.

  Still. It made my teeth grind.

  “How is the technical collaborator?” the staffer asked, tone perfectly even.

  I hated that tone.

  Even voices were sometimes just cruelty wearing a lab coat.

  Ahmad answered in the same clipped rhythm he used for gunfire. “She’s still running. Signs of interference. Someone attempted a reset.”

  The staffer’s eyes flashed—just for a heartbeat.

  Interest.

  Or greed.

  “Then we must immediately proceed under containment protocol—”

  “We won’t,” Ahmad cut in, instantaneous.

  Low voice. Sharpened.

  “She is under this team’s protection. Any contact is by joint attendance only. Everything is recorded.”

  Terms from the quiet deal we’d made earlier. Terms were a shield.

  But a shield held wrong turns into a collar.

  The staffer frowned. “This is a major incident within Fanark. As the institute, we—”

  “The institute’s convenience comes after survival,” Ahmad said, still calm.

  Today, that calm was the most comforting thing in the world.

  Right outside the medical sector, another person stepped out to intercept us.

  White lab coat.

  No GDC armband.

  A senior researcher—one of those men who look like they’ve never heard the word “no” without turning it into an experiment.

  “Chief Researcher, these are them,” the GDC staffer said.

  “…So you’re the team,” the Chief Researcher murmured, voice soft and inviting—exactly the kind of softness designed to make you lower your guard.

  “I want to see the technical collaborator… no, the ‘machine monster doll’ specimen. Preservation and analysis are required.”

  “Don’t call her a specimen.” My bite came out before I could stop it.

  He looked mildly surprised.

  Such type guy was good at looking mildly surprised.

  Which meant I didn’t trust him for a second.

  “This isn’t about words. It’s about safety. She is derived from Grabhul—”

  “And that gives you the right to take her?” Heat rose in my throat. Hot words made sloppy fights, and sloppy fights got people stolen.

  I knew that.

  Didn’t stop me.

  Genichiro shoved his way between us. “While you two argue vocabulary, someone’s gonna snatch her again. …Show the paperwork. Not your mouth.”

  “Paperwork?” The Chief Researcher narrowed his eyes.

  “Authority,” Genichiro said. “If you claim you ‘need’ her, show the grounds for it. This is a lab, right? Doesn’t have to be a paper. Give me regulations. Contracts. Something in writing.”

  Blunt, rude… and annoyingly correct.

  The Chief Researcher smiled like he’d just found a new toy. “Interesting. A mechanic talking like legal.”

  “Maintenance reads contracts and compliance standards,” Genichiro said.

  “That definition is wrong!”

  Genichiro shrugged like I’d accused gravity of being unfair. “The field rewrites definitions.”

  “Stop worshipping the field!”

  Ahmad lifted a slim, transparent tablet and brought up a clause list.

  “She is registered as a ‘technical collaborator,’” he said. “Not transferred. Not leased. Collaborating. Which means custody remains with the team.”

  The Chief Researcher scanned it, brow tightening.

  The face said I didn’t know.

  Whether he truly didn’t… I couldn’t tell. People like him were professional liars even when they weren’t lying.

  “…Who approved these terms?” he asked.

  The GDC staffer answered, still emotionless. “This was agreed internally. It also includes an emergency joint-response clause.”

  Joint response.

  The words clinked like a leash being tested.

  Miyu shifted in my arms.

  Her eyelids fluttered open, unfocused, and she looked at me like she was searching through fog.

  “…Nar…dia…”

  “I’m here. I’m here.” I kept my voice low so it didn’t shake. “You’re still with us.”

  The Chief Researcher leaned in. “Then duties also apply. Explanation, testing, log provision. Your right to refuse should be limited.”

  Miyu’s voice, small as a breath, cut through the hallway. “…Let me set conditions.”

  Every head turned.

  She drew in air—she didn’t need to breathe, but she still mimicked the act. A human habit that made my chest ache.

  “Mu Alcium’s… stabilization procedure. Handling shadow matter… I know it, from memories that were already there.”

  The Chief Researcher’s eyes lit up.

  Yep.

  Greed.

  And greed was a weakness you could hook a chain into.

  “…Practical psychic application through shadow matter?” he asked.

  Miyu nodded. “I can teach it. …But no transfer of rights. Supervised. Time-limited. Record the questions.” She hesitated, then forced the words out. “And… no mental interference testing. …Because I don’t want it.”

  Because I don’t want it.

  So human. So blunt.

  And because it was human, it was powerful.

  The Chief Researcher opened his mouth—

  Ahmad spoke first. “Not without her consent.”

  The GDC staffer followed. “The clause requires consent as well. Violation triggers internal audit.”

  Internal audit.

  One of the few weapons that actually bit GDC.

  Hate that I needed it.

  Love that it worked.

  The Chief Researcher closed his eyes once, the motion of swallowing a loss.

  When he opened them, he still wasn’t done fighting. Researchers could lose today and start planning tomorrow’s win in the same second.

  That was what scared me.

  “…Fine. We accept the conditions,” he said. “But we still require joint response in emergencies. If she becomes unstable—”

  “Don’t label her.” I stepped closer, tightening my hold around Miyu without meaning to. “She’s a person.”

  “It’s a real concern,” he said calmly.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  A word I hated.

  A word that still existed.

  Ahmad’s gaze stayed steady. “We won’t use that term. In emergencies: joint response. But the authority to shut her down is not shared. The team holds judgment.”

  The GDC staffer added, “We’ll define ‘emergency’ explicitly in the clause. Exercise is recorded.” A pause. “…We won’t let it become an excuse.”

  Excuse.

  That one word earned a sliver of trust.

  GDC wasn’t all enemy.

  But it wasn’t all ally either.

  A nasty reality, again.

  Genichiro cracked his knuckles. “I’ll write the conditions. …If you sneak in weird wording, I’ll tighten it later.”

  “Tighten it—what does that even mean?!”

  “Same as wiring.”

  “Stop with the wiring religion!”

  The Chief Researcher gestured toward the sealed doors of medical. “Then move. If you want her stabilized, you’ll cooperate with triage.”

  He said cooperate like it was a favor he was granting us.

  The doors irised open with a soft sigh.

  The smell hit first—clean sterilizer and something metallic under it, like the room remembered blood even if the hallway pretended it didn’t exist.

  Inside, the medical sector was not white.

  It was glass, screens, and pale blue light that made everyone look half-dead.

  Two med-techs in flexible suits approached at a trot. One’s eyes flicked over Miyu and froze for half a second.

  Not fear.

  Calculation.

  They had seen a lot of bodies. They were deciding what category to put hers in.

  “Patient?” the nearer tech asked. Their gaze slid toward the Chief Researcher as if waiting for permission to call Miyu that.

  Miyu’s lashes trembled. Her fingers twitched against my sleeve.

  I didn’t like that she could hear everything and still had to pretend she wasn’t there.

  “She is our collaborator,” Ahmad said. “She consented to medical stabilization only. No invasive cognition tests.”

  The tech blinked once. “Understood.”

  The second tech lifted a handheld scanner and stopped short—like the device didn’t know what to do with her.

  “Interface mismatch,” the tech muttered.

  Genichiro leaned in, scowling. “Because she’s not your standardized doll. Give me the port access and I’ll route you a safe readout.”

  The tech hesitated.

  The GDC staffer stepped in, voice unchanged but heavier. “Joint attendance clause is active. Allow it.”

  Paper as a weapon.

  A weapon that made grown professionals obey.

  The tech handed over the connector.

  Genichiro’s fingers moved fast, unreasonably gentle for someone who usually treated machines like stubborn animals. He snapped in an adapter, tapped twice on his own pad, and the scanner chimed.

  A clean waveform appeared.

  Heartbeat analog. Thermal gradient. Power stability.

  Miyu’s numbers were… wrong in human ways, but consistent in her ways.

  That’s what I needed to see. Consistency. A pattern that meant she wasn’t slipping away.

  “See?” Genichiro said, smug. “She’s running.”

  The tech didn’t smile. “Running isn’t stable.”

  Miyu’s lips parted. “I… can hold. Just… keep the noise out.”

  Noise.

  That word made my stomach tighten, because it wasn’t metaphor. Barlock’s reset attempt had left something behind. A scratch in her head.

  And you don’t scrub scratches out with disinfectant.

  They led us to a bay with a transparent wall, as if the room wanted to reassure itself that nothing dirty could ever hide here. A medical couch extended like a slab.

  Miyu’s body went rigid the moment she saw it.

  Not from pain.

  From memory.

  Someone had put her on a table before.

  Not a medical table.

  A disassembly table.

  I felt the tension in her frame like a current running through my arms.

  “I’m not leaving you,” I told her, and this time I meant it literally. “Not for a second.”

  Her eyes found mine. Fogged. But present. “Okay.”

  We set her down together—me, Ahmad, Genichiro. As gently as you could lay down something you’d been fighting the universe to keep.

  The med-techs raised the couch’s sides, not restraints—guards. That distinction mattered, and I watched them like a hawk anyway.

  A wall panel lit up. Contract prompts. Consent fields.

  Even here, even in a place that pretended to be about healing, the first thing they wanted was signatures.

  The Chief Researcher hovered at the edge of the bay, hands clasped behind his back, posture polite. Predator polite.

  “The conditions,” he said. “We can finalize them now. Efficient.”

  Efficient. Like we were negotiating the price of a tool.

  Genichiro snorted. “Efficient is when you don’t try to sneak a knife in the fine print.”

  The Chief Researcher’s smile didn’t move. “Fine print is merely precision.”

  “Fine print is where you bury theft,” I said.

  Ahmad opened the tablet again. The clause list expanded into full contract language, clean fonts, official stamps.

  My eyes blurred at the density.

  I hated paper. I hated screens that were paper in disguise.

  But I read anyway, because if you didn’t read, you deserved what they did to you.

  “Emergency joint response,” the Chief Researcher said, tapping a line. “If the collaborator presents a hazard to station personnel, containment must be enacted.”

  “Define ‘hazard,’” Ahmad said.

  The Chief Researcher’s gaze flicked to Miyu—quick, casual, cruel. “Operational instability. Uncontrolled shadow output. Psychic bleed. Equipment corruption.”

  He was listing fears like he was composing a menu.

  Miyu swallowed. Again, she didn’t need to, but she did. Human habits as armor.

  Genichiro leaned over Ahmad’s shoulder. “Your ‘hazard’ includes ‘equipment corruption.’ That’s a catch-all. You can call anything corruption. A flicker. A cough. A glare.”

  “That’s the point,” I muttered.

  The GDC staffer stepped closer, the armband catching the bay’s light. “Strike ‘equipment corruption’ from the hazard definition. Replace with measurable thresholds only.”

  The Chief Researcher’s eyes narrowed for the first time.

  Good.

  Let him feel what it was like when someone else had the pen.

  He tried again. “Then at minimum: the institute must have authority to initiate a hard reset if—”

  “No,” Ahmad said, instantly.

  Two letters. A wall.

  Miyu’s gaze tightened. Like she’d been holding her breath all over again.

  The Chief Researcher’s voice stayed soft. “You’re protecting her from necessary safeguards.”

  “I’m protecting her from you,” I snapped.

  A beat of silence.

  For a moment, even the med-techs paused their hands.

  Then the Chief Researcher sighed like I was a child refusing medicine. “You misunderstand. This is not personal.”

  That was the worst line.

  The line people used when they wanted to do something monstrous without feeling like a monster.

  Ahmad’s calm didn’t crack. “We understand perfectly. The team holds judgment for shutdown. The institute may recommend actions. Recommendations are logged. No unilateral control.”

  The GDC staffer added, “Violation triggers audit and suspension of access privileges.”

  Access privileges.

  Paper-cuffs.

  The Chief Researcher’s jaw ticked. A tiny movement. The first honest emotion I’d seen from him.

  He didn’t like being told no.

  “Fine,” he said, and if you believed that “fine” meant surrender, you’d never survive a lab.

  A new window opened: Addendum — Condition Set A.

  Genichiro started typing, fingers loud on the screen.

  I watched the lines appear in real time.

  No transfer of rights.

  Time-limited teaching sessions.

  All questions recorded.

  No mental interference testing.

  No invasive core access without explicit consent.

  Emergency defined by thresholds, not adjectives.

  Team retains shutdown authority.

  Joint response is assistance, not custody.

  He wrote like he wired—tight, blunt, and with zero patience for fancy. Somehow, that made me trust the words more.

  Miyu’s hand lifted a centimeter off the couch, shaky. I caught it and held on.

  “Add one thing,” she whispered.

  Genichiro glanced at her. “Yeah?”

  Miyu swallowed again. “If… if they ask about Mu Alcium’s method, I can answer. But… I choose the order. And I can stop.”

  Ahmad nodded once. “Add it.”

  Genichiro typed.

  The Chief Researcher leaned in. “That reduces efficiency.”

  “It increases consent,” Ahmad said. “Which increases cooperation. Efficient enough.”

  The Chief Researcher stared at him, then at Miyu.

  For a second, his expression softened.

  Or he pretended it did.

  I didn’t care which.

  “We’ll accept,” he said.

  The contract required a signature.

  Miyu’s eyes flicked to the prompt and she tensed like the screen was a trap.

  It was a trap. Paper always was. Just… sometimes you built your own trap first, then forced the other side to step in it.

  Ahmad angled the tablet toward her. “Only if you want.”

  Miyu’s fingers—cold, still cold—touched the glass. Her signature wasn’t a name. It was a pattern. A line of symbols that looked half like handwriting, half like a circuit trace.

  When it completed, the panel chimed.

  The bay lights shifted from pale blue to a calmer tone. Consent registered.

  The med-techs resumed their work, attaching noninvasive sensors, setting up a noise-damping field. A soft hum rose, low enough you felt it in your teeth.

  Miyu’s shoulders loosened a fraction.

  “Better,” she murmured.

  Then her eyes unfocused again, and my heart slammed because I’d seen that look before—right before she went blank.

  “Miyu?” I leaned closer.

  “I’m okay,” she said quickly, too quickly. “Just… there’s a… ping.”

  “A ping,” Genichiro repeated.

  Miyu’s pupils slid, tracking something none of us could see. “A log request. Someone is… calling a door.”

  The Chief Researcher’s head snapped up. “A door?”

  The GDC staffer’s tone sharpened for the first time. “Clarify.”

  Miyu’s voice went thin. “In the memory set. There’s a label. Key. It’s trying to… authenticate.”

  My skin crawled.

  Keys meant locks.

  Locks meant someone built cages.

  And cages meant they planned to use them.

  Ahmad’s voice stayed level, but his speed shifted again—his hands moved like he was reaching for a weapon he didn’t want to use in a hospital. “Can you trace the source?”

  Miyu blinked slowly. “Not without opening the core. And… we just said no.”

  The Chief Researcher’s lips pressed into a line.

  There it was.

  Opportunity. A crack in our shield he wanted to pry open with a crowbar.

  “You see?” he said softly. “This is exactly why we need deeper access. For safety.”

  “For control,” I hissed.

  Ahmad didn’t look away from Miyu. “We hold to the contract. We can take other measures. GDC—can you isolate network calls from this wing?”

  The staffer’s eyes flicked to their wrist console. “Yes. Medical is already segmented. We can harden it further.” A pause. “But if there is a key-call embedded in her memories, it may not be network. It may be station protocol.”

  Station protocol.

  That meant Fanark itself might be part of the cage.

  The med-techs exchanged a glance and pretended they didn’t. Professionals pretending not to panic.

  Genichiro swore under his breath. “Barlock.”

  My fist clenched so hard my nails bit skin. “He’s not here.”

  “No,” Genichiro said. “But he left hooks. Same as always. You don’t steal a machine and not leave a backdoor.”

  Miyu’s voice came out smaller. “I… think it’s timed. Not… far. Something about… twelve.”

  Twelve.

  My throat went dry.

  Because twelve wasn’t just a number. It was a countdown. A threat wearing a clock.

  Ahmad’s gaze flicked to the GDC staffer. “How long until the institute’s containment team arrives?”

  The staffer answered after a quick check. “A rapid-response unit is already being assembled. ETA: ninety minutes.”

  Ninety minutes.

  And Miyu had said twelve.

  Not ninety.

  Not even close.

  The Chief Researcher noticed the same mismatch. His eyes glittered. “If there is a timed activation, you cannot afford to delay proper containment.”

  “Containment,” I repeated, tasting the word like poison.

  Ahmad spoke, and his voice was the kind of calm that meant he’d already decided what he’d kill for. “We’re not giving her up. We’ll prepare for a trigger. We’ll isolate. We’ll record. And we will keep her conscious of what’s happening.”

  He looked at Miyu. “Do you want to continue?”

  Miyu’s gaze steadied. It took effort. You could see it like a muscle straining.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “I don’t want… things done to me without me.”

  That sentence hit me harder than any punch I’d thrown today.

  Because it was so simple.

  And it was the whole war.

  “Then we proceed under your conditions,” Ahmad said.

  The GDC staffer nodded. “I will file an emergency addendum: Key-call anomaly. That triggers audit oversight. The institute can’t quietly bury this.”

  The Chief Researcher’s expression tightened.

  Audit oversight.

  Paper biting again.

  Good.

  Let it bite.

  Genichiro tilted his screen toward me and Miyu. “I can build a buffer. If something tries to ‘open a door,’ I can make it open into a wall. But I need access to the sensor feed.”

  The med-tech hesitated.

  The GDC staffer didn’t. “Approved. Joint attendance clause.”

  The tech handed it over.

  Genichiro’s hands flew.

  I watched his posture change—the sloppy mechanic turned into a man threading a needle while the room shook.

  He muttered as he worked. “If it’s a station protocol, it’ll call through medical automation. It’ll look like a normal request. Which means we have to make normal requests lie.”

  “That sounds safe,” I said.

  “It’s safer than letting a lab coat decide her fate,” he shot back.

  Fair.

  Miyu’s fingers tightened around mine. Her grip was weak, but it was real.

  I leaned close. “Hey. You’re not alone.”

  She blinked. “I know.”

  The hum of the noise-dampening field deepened.

  On the wall display, a diagnostic graph jumped—just once. A tiny spike, like a needle flinching.

  Then another.

  Rhythmic.

  Like a knock.

  My skin prickled.

  The Chief Researcher was watching the same graph, eyes hungry. “That is not random noise.”

  “Don’t,” I warned him.

  He smiled. “I’m not doing anything. I’m observing.”

  Observing was how they justified everything.

  Ahmad didn’t argue. He simply moved, placing himself between the Chief Researcher and Miyu’s couch like a human door.

  Paper could be a shield.

  So could a person.

  The GDC staffer’s wrist console chimed. They glanced down. “Alert. A station-level process has been flagged. Label: KEY AUTH — MEDICAL SECTOR ROUTE.”

  My blood went cold.

  It wasn’t in Miyu only.

  It was in the station.

  “So it’s real,” Genichiro muttered. “And it’s coming here.”

  “How long?” Ahmad asked.

  The staffer checked. “Twelve minutes.”

  There it was again.

  Twelve minutes.

  The Chief Researcher inhaled like he’d been handed proof he could use. “Then containment must be enacted immediately. The institute—”

  Ahmad cut him off. “Prepare joint response. Under our authority. GDC, lock down the wing. Med-techs, keep her stable. Genichiro, build your wall. Nardia—”

  “What.”

  “Breathe. Then watch every hand in this room.”

  I hated that he said it like he knew I wouldn’t.

  But he was right.

  I forced air in and out once.

  Then I turned my eyes into knives.

  Every person. Every glance. Every finger that drifted toward a console.

  Because the thing about paper?

  It didn’t stop people from trying.

  It only gave you a reason to punish them after.

  And after wasn’t good enough if Miyu got taken in the twelve minutes before.

  Miyu’s voice rasped, fragile but steady. “…Nar…dia.”

  “Yeah.”

  “If it opens… don’t let it decide.”

  I leaned in until my forehead almost touched hers. “We decide.”

  Her lips trembled. Then she managed a tiny smile.

  That tiny curve made my lungs feel lighter.

  Light didn’t mean safe.

  I’d already learned what happens when you relax for a heartbeat.

  Right before they began sealing the bay, Ahmad said quietly, “Nardia.”

  “What.”

  “Don’t forget this. Barlock got away.”

  My fist clenched until my nails hurt. “I won’t. Never.”

  Miyu’s voice, still small, still stubborn, answered from the couch. “…Me neither.”

  That “me neither” made me happy.

  And terrified.

  She wasn’t just someone to be protected anymore.

  She’d stepped into the fight with her own feet.

  That was strength—and it was also danger.

  Under the medical bay’s cold light, I thought about paper again.

  Contracts could be a shield.

  But hold a shield too long and your hand goes numb.

  Try to protect someone with a numb hand, and you’ll drop them.

  So I won’t drop her.

  I won’t let anyone make me.

  The wall display counted down.

  11:58

  11:57

  The station itself was about to knock on our door.

  Next time, we find him first.

  —Barlock.

  Run if you want.

  Just don’t think you can run forever.