For a few seconds after the soldier stepped away, Jagger did not move.
The training court was wide, bright, and quiet in all the wrong ways. The smell of sweat, rubber, steel, and old violence still lingered, but in this section of the room, everything had gone still.
Jagger stood at the edge of the court in the issued navy sweatsuit, stripped of his weapons and dressed in the insignia of a place that had not earned the right to claim him. After everything he had been through, the clean fabric felt wrong on his skin.
Across from him, the people waited.
Jagger let his gaze move over them one by one, the same way he had learned to study every new threat before it moved.
Lieutenant-General Adriana Tan stood at the center, straight-backed and unreadable. She did not need to say anything to make it clear who held authority here. It was already there in her posture, her scars, and the cold steadiness in her eyes.
