The silence after the blast was deafening.
SH-0 was still on her knees, fingers twitching against the scorched metal floor. Her body was smoking lightly, skin pale and flickering with faint pulses of light beneath the surface—data veins, Liam had called them once.
She wasn't bleeding.
But she was changing.
Miri crouched in front of her, small hands trembling as she reached out.
"Can you hear me?" she whispered.
SH-0 looked up slowly.
Her eyes weren't blank anymore.
They were alive. Focused. Frightened.
"I'm here," she said, voice breaking. "But I'm… coming apart."
"No," Miri said. "You're waking up."
Elena knelt beside them both, one arm still protectively wrapped around Miri.
But she didn't stop her from touching SH-0.
Something passed between them.
A pulse—barely visible—but there.
Miri flinched.
And then—
The chamber around them faded.
Just for a moment.
And Miri was somewhere else.
A corridor.
White walls. A cold table.
The sound of screaming—not her own.
Someone dragging her by the wrist.
A light too bright to look into.
She wasn't Miri.
She was in SH-0's memories.
A girl strapped down.
Wires.
Needles.
Voices repeating the same phrase:
"Asset. Not individual. Memory resets confirmed. Proceed."
Miri gasped and stumbled backward.
The memory snapped.
The room returned.
Elena grabbed her shoulders. "Miri!"
"I'm okay," she said. "I think…"
SH-0 was still kneeling. But now, she was staring at Miri with awe.
"You saw it," she said. "You saw me."
"I didn't mean to."
"You didn't force it. You received it."
Liam stepped closer, careful. "That's what they meant by tethering. You're not linked through tech. You're connected through something older."
"Neural imprinting," Reign said from behind them. "Miri was born into the same frequency SH-0 was tuned to. They're bonded through residual transfer. Probably since birth."
SH-0's gaze softened. "I thought I was the last."
"You're not," Miri whispered. "And you don't have to be alone."
They sat there—just looking at each other.
Not child and weapon.
Not survivor and savior.
Just… two pieces of something broken trying to fit again.
SH-0 reached out, and this time, Miri took her hand.
There was no surge. No blast of light.
Just a stillness.
A deep, quiet hum in the air.
And then SH-0 closed her eyes.
And smiled.
Reign turned to Liam and Elena. "If she can stabilize, she can help us find the others."
"Elena," SH-0 whispered. "Thank you for trusting her."
Elena crouched beside them. "You're not a thing. You're not property. No one else gets to decide what you are now."
SH-0 blinked. "Then I want a name."
Liam nodded slowly. "You get to choose."
She looked at Miri.
Then said softly: "Call me Solace."
The door creaked.
Cassian groaned behind them, tied to a steel beam, blood dripping from his nose. His voice slithered through the air like oil on water.
"Beautiful. The ghost gets a name, the girl gets validation, and you all forget what I actually came here to do."
Liam turned to face him, voice cold.
"You're out of moves, Cassian."
But Cassian just smiled through the blood.
"I'm not the one you should be afraid of anymore."
Cassian leaned against the steel beam where Liam had zip-tied him, blood crusting at the corner of his mouth, his shoulder already bruising. But his eyes… his eyes were sharp.
Alive.
Too calm.
"Go ahead," he said, looking at Reign. "Run your little black-site protocol. Strip my comms. Drain the feeds. It won't change what's coming."
Liam folded his arms across his chest. "You're not in control anymore."
Cassian tilted his head, mock sympathy in his voice. "Still pretending this is about control? Come on, Liam. You of all people should know. This was never about control. It was about containment."
Elena stood behind Liam, silent but alert.
She didn't trust Cassian to speak without poisoning the room.
Liam stepped closer. "You wanted Solace back online so you could finish what Ridgepoint started."
"I wanted her activated," Cassian corrected. "Which I did. I triggered the evolution. You can thank me later."
Reign snapped her pistol's safety off. "Try again."
Cassian grinned at her. "There's the twitch I remember."
She didn't blink.
He shifted his gaze to Elena. "You should've walked away with her. With Miri. That was the clean ending. Fade out. Burn the files. Live in denial. But you stayed. And now you've made her useful."
"She's not a weapon," Elena said.
Cassian's voice lowered, almost a whisper. "She was born a weapon. You just put a name on her holster."
Before anyone could stop him, he added:
"You think Ridgepoint only had one prototype? One link?"
Reign stiffened.
Liam's hand dropped toward his sidearm.
Cassian smiled wider.
"There are five deep-layer hosts. Solace was the first—but not the only one. Miri's not the tether. She's the spark. She woke her. And now the others… will feel it."
"Liar," Liam growled.
"I wish I were," Cassian said. "But the chain's already moving. I didn't build the system to die with me. You've already seen it. The moment Solace woke up, the grid started shifting. Bio-signals activated. Dormant sites pinged."
Reign checked her wrist terminal.
Then went still.
"Shit," she muttered. "He's not bluffing."
Liam spun toward her. "What?"
"Satellite uplinks just lit up two dormant Ridgepoint facilities. Ones we thought were collapsed."
Miri whispered, "More girls like her?"
Cassian's smile faded, just slightly.
"No. Not like her. Not anymore. Solace is—" he looked at her, as if seeing something new "—free."
He turned back to Liam.
"But the others? They're still in the dark. Still tied to commands. And now? They're waking up angry."
Elena stepped forward, ice in her voice. "Then we find them first."
Cassian's voice dropped into something more intimate. "You can't save them all. That's the truth none of you want to say out loud."
"We'll try anyway," Liam said.
Cassian's eyes locked with his. "And that's why you'll lose."
Liam held the stare a second longer.
Then turned to Reign. "Put him in containment."
"What about interrogation?"
"We've heard enough. We need to act."
As Reign dragged Cassian to his feet, the man didn't struggle. But he turned once, eyes resting on Miri.
His voice was soft now. A warning in silk.
"You opened the door, girl. Just make sure you're strong enough to hold it shut."
Solace stepped between them.
"No," she said. "She opened it for me. And I'm not letting you back in."
Cassian's smirk cracked.
Just a little.
Reign hauled him out of the chamber, her footsteps echoing like closing parentheses.
And then there were four.
Solace.
Miri.
Elena.
Liam.
Staring at each other in a circle of flickering light, the air still humming with the weight of something just beginning.