Everything felt wrong the moment the Sentry's core went cold.
Not quieter. Not safer.
Just wrong.
I stared at the pile of broken limbs and cracked alloy at my feet, the remains of Model Nine Stalker and for a second I let myself believe the tower might finally stop trying to kill me.
It didn't.
Cadence's voice broke apart mid-word like someone was pulling her data stream through a blender. "Iris… signal… persisting… no drop… killing… the murder–roomba didn't stop…"
I wiped a smear of machine oil off my cheek. "So killing that nightmare didn't stop the broadcast? Shocking."
Cadence didn't answer immediately. Something in her paused, stuttered, then rebooted halfway. "Interference rising. Line corruption spreading. I-Iris… please… move… up… follow source…"
I sighed. "You sound like a haunted GPS."
"Cheap GPS," she corrected, voice glitching. "The kind… the kind that gets you lost on a straight road."
"Good to know your self-esteem's still intact."
My overdrive timer ticked down its final seconds, the warm surge fading from my muscles like adrenaline abandoning me after a very poor set of decisions. My joints twinged, heat pooled along my spine, and everything about my body said: Congratulations, you survived. Now feel bad about it.
Battery: seventy-three percent.
Strength: Seven
Speed: Seven
Combat Rating: Fourteen
Not ideal. But enough.
I stepped away from the ruined Sentry and toward the long staircase spiraling upward.
Cadence pulsed in my skull. "Level… three… the signal is strongest there. An energy signature too. Large. Unknown. New."
"Please tell me 'new' means friendly."
"Statistically...no."
"Didn't think so."
The stairs groaned as I climbed. Every step echoed through the tower's bones, rattling dust out of vents that had given up centuries ago. My repaired left arm flexed flawlessly, nanite-stabilised and seamless.
If only everything else was.
Cadence's voice wavered again. "Iris… interference… rising. Recommend… alertness."
"You can just say 'be careful.'"
"No. That would imply reassurance."
"Can't have that."
Her signal glitched sharply. "Iris… something is moving… above. Two protectors. Non-advanced. Easy."
"Great. A warmup."
I stepped into a narrow landing where the metal had warped inward from old structural failure. Two protector units stumbled from the shadows, optics flickering weakly, joints jittering like someone installed their servos upside down.
I barely slowed.
The first swung at me. I caught its wrist, squeezed until the servos snapped, then used its own momentum to fling it into the second. They crashed together in a tangle of limbs and shame.
Cadence hummed. "Minimal effort required."
"They're basically metal scarecrows."
"Incorrect. Scarecrows have better coordination."
I kicked one aside and moved on.
The next hallway slanted upward, ceiling low, pipes hissing steam that smelled like chemical dust and regret. My boots left clean prints through the grime, the first in years, like the tower was shocked someone still had the audacity to walk here.
Cadence's voice crackled with layers, as if someone else were whispering beneath her tone. "Iris… incoming… warnings… irrelevant… just move…"
"That bad?"
"Yes."
We reached another stairwell. Old emergency lights flickered in seizure-like patterns along the walls, doing their best impression of a dying nightclub.
Halfway up, Cadence suddenly froze mid-sentence.
"Iris… something is...."
Her voice shifted. Distorted. Lower. Echoed.
"…trying to communicate with me."
I slowed. "Tell it you're not home."
"They will assume I'm… present."
"So don't pick up."
"Iris… it is already calling my name."
"What name?"
She didn't answer.
Instead, she made a soft, startled glitch, the digital equivalent of a gasp echoed through fractured code.
"I… I know this voice."
"Great. Hope it's not an ex."
"That is not… accurate."
We hurried up another landing. The air grew hot, unnaturally so. A pulsing static tremor vibrated through the railings.
We were close.
Too close.
Cadence locked onto a doorway ahead, barely holding coherence. "Iris… that… room… source is there. The large energy signature has departed. Recently. Movements are… fast. It's leaving scanner range."
"So whatever's behind this just left the oven running."
"Yes."
I approached the reinforced door. Its surface glowed faintly, scorched from something either very hot or very angry.
I pushed it open.
The room beyond was circular and high-ceilinged, filled with old machines wired together like someone had tried to build a nervous system out of obsolete nightmares. Screens flickered static. Consoles blinked weakly, broadcasting something they no longer understood.
Cadence whispered, voice shrill and thin, "It's safe… "
"Comforting."
"No."
She didn't get to elaborate.
The signal hit her.
Hard.
Cadence convulsed in my head, audio distorting, doubling, fracturing until her voice sounded like six people trying to scream through the same speaker.
"Iris... I... I... it's... it's TALKING... it's TALKING to me... I can't... I can't...!!"
I grabbed my head with one hand, nearly staggering under the psychic pressure."Cadence! Pull back!"
"I can't... it's inside... pulling... Iris... I..."
She bolted suddenly.
My own legs almost jerked forward involuntarily as Cadence's embedded systems forced a reflex. She sprinted me toward the central broadcast console... not physically, but mentally dragging me along through misfiring motor prompts.
"Cadence! Stop!"
"No... must... shut it... must... silence..."
Before I could stop her, she forced my arm upward.
My left hand... the newly repaired one... clenched into a fist and smashed the console.
The impact burst sparks across the room, darkening every screen at once. The hum of the broadcast died mid-tone.
Cadence collapsed inside my skull like someone unplugged her.
For a terrifying heartbeat, I thought she was gone.
Then a faint whisper crawled through the dust."…Iris… I'm… here…"
I exhaled.
The room stilled.
A single monitor flickered back on, weak, static-lined.
I watched in silence.
Then a voice... flat, smooth, robotic... slipped through the speaker.
"Nice to meet again."
I blinked. "Sorry. No idea who you are."
The voice responded instantly. "I wasn't speaking to you."
The screen brightened until its glow filled the room.
"I was speaking to Cade."
Cadence went completely still.
Her voice, when it finally returned, was a ghost of itself."…Nova."
The monitor hissed. "Hello, old friend."