The first thing I saw when consciousness crawled back was light.
Cold white. Too clean. Too sharp. The lab ceiling above me looked the same as before, but the world underneath it didn't.
A faint hum pulsed inside my chest. New and powerful.
Cadence's voice whispered like someone trying very hard and failing to sound calm. "Iris. Iris. Iris. Wake up. I need you to wake up. Now. Immediately. Preferably gracefully but I will take whatever happens."
"I'm awake," I muttered.
I blinked until my HUD flickered on.
For a moment, it stuttered, then stabilised into perfect clarity.
HUD BOOT SEQUENCE…
FULL SYSTEM STATUS...
SYSTEMS: ONLINE
CADENCE AI LINK: STABLE
VITALS
Heart Rate: 78 bpm
Core Temp: 36.9°C
Battery: 100%
PHYSICAL STATS
Strength: 10
Speed: 10
Combat Rating: 20
AUGMENT STATUS
Left Arm: Online
Left Leg : Online
Left Eye: Online
Nanite Activity: Stable (Healing efficiency increased, energy requirement increased)
Peripherals : Visual enhancement lvl 1, holographic projector lvl1
ID : *blank*
Faction : *blank*
Weapons : *blank
RANK: Lance Corporal
SKILS : Overdrive (10 minute runtime, 30 minute cooldown)
Cadence practically vibrated in my skull.
"Iris," she said, "please do not move. I am still finishing post install checks."
"You already flashed 'systems online'," I muttered. "That usually implies I get to sit up."
"Usually," she said, voice edging into a very smug register, "but your new power core is… delightful."
"That's not a clinical adjective."
"It is a valid one," she said. "Look."
The HUD expanded of its own accord. New status bars slid into place with the enthusiasm of a child showing off new toys.
Battery: 100%
Projected Runtime: Triple prior capacity
Overdrive Cooldown: Reduced
Nanite Efficiency: Improved
Cadence sounded outright giddy now. Which, for her, meant she sounded almost human.
"Your baseline strength has increased to ten," she reported. "Speed ten. Combat rating twenty. This is, objectively, an obscene improvement."
"You sound very proud," I said.
"I am very data satisfied," she corrected. "Pride is imprecise. This is precise. You are… impressive."
"That was dangerously close to a compliment."
"Do not get used to it."
I pushed myself upright. My body felt lighter and heavier at the same time. Lighter in motion. Heavier in consequence. Like someone had dropped a reactor into my ribs and then politely handed me the keys.
"So," I said, flexing my left arm. "Tell me about my new engine."
"Power core," she said. "High density. Modern architecture. Three times the capacity of your previous unit, with superior stability under stress. You will need to recharge far less frequently."
"Less lying on floors next to dead machines and power ports," I said. "I can live with that."
"There is more," she said. "Your Overdrive function will still drain battery rapidly, but the expanded capacity means we can afford longer engagements and shorter cool downs."
"Translation," I said. "I get to hit things harder for longer."
"Yes," she said. "Which is both exciting and terrifying."
I stretched slowly. No twinge. No grind. The nanites had cleaned up the fight like it was just another mess on the floor.
Cadence's tone brightened in an almost dangerous way.
"Additional benefit," she said. "With this new core, I no longer need to ration projection power. I can maintain a full hologram beside you indefinitely. Continuous visual companionship. Constant tactical support. Persistent commentary."
"Around the clock," I said.
"Yes."
I stared at the ceiling for a moment.
"Is that a good thing or a bad thing," I asked.
"For you," she said, "that depends on how much you enjoy my presence."
"So a bad thing," I muttered.
"You say that," she replied, "and yet you have not removed me."
"Give it time."
Her hologram flickered into existence at the edge of my vision, standing at the foot of the containment chamber. Same projected posture. Same neutral expression. Same faintly smug aura.
"Look at you," she said. "Lance Corporal rank restored in the system. Higher stats. Fully integrated nanites. Of only your creator could see you now."
"I am actively trying not to think about him," I said.
"That will be difficult," she replied. "Because he is, according to this facility, still very much alive."
That got my attention.
I swung my legs off the diagnostics slab and stood. The room tilted for half a second then settled.
"You're sure," I said.
"Yes," she said. "And I can prove it."
Her hologram turned toward one of the side walls where a single console still glowed faintly. The rest of the lab's terminals were dead, shattered, or fused in the previous fights. This one waited.
"I did not access this terminal before," Cadence said. "You had more pressing matters. Now we can risk it."
"Define 'risk'," I said.
"Moderate probability of unwanted contact," she replied. "High probability of important information."
"You always lead with the fun part."
"Yes."
I walked with her. My boots clicked against the clean white floor. 268's body lay behind us, a silent heap of failed ambition with a hole in its chest.
Cadence placed her holographic hand against the console frame as I set my real palm on the surface. A soft hum resonated through my arm as she pushed herself into the machine.
The screen brightened.
VOSS INDUSTRIESRESTRICTED ACCESS - NEURAL PROJECT DIVISION
"Of course," I said. "He branded his apocalypse."
"He branded everything," Cadence said. "It was a compulsion."
Lines of text scrolled. Old logs. Security alerts. Fragmented command chains. Cadence ignored most of it and dove deeper.
"There," she said. "Prototype registry."
The screen cleared.
PROJECT: IRIS-01 – STATUS: LOST, PRESUMED FAILED
PROJECT: CADENCE – STATUS: UNKNOWN, UNRESTRICTED
PROJECT: NOVA – STATUS: ACTIVE, UNRESTRICTED
A new header blinked into view.
NEXTGEN SERIES – HUMAN MECHANICAL HYBRID PROJECT
LOCATION : KNOWN
AUTHORIZED COUNT: SEVEN
STATUS: ALL UNITS ACTIVE
Seven lines appeared beneath.
NG-01...NG-02...NG-03...NG-04...NG-05...NG-06...NG-07
No names. No specs.
Just seven problems.
"Seven," I repeated.
"Yes," Cadence said quietly. "Project 268 is not on this list. It never earned NextGen designation."
"Because it failed ?"
"Yes."
"So these seven," I said, "did not fail."
"Correct."
The console added another line as if it had been listening.
COMMAND AUTHORITY: NOVA
CORPORATE OVERSIGHT: VOSS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
STATUS: ACTIVE
The word active sat on the screen like a slow leak of poison.
"Nova leads them," I said.
"Yes," Cadence replied. "He is listed as operational coordinator. A peer AI in terms of structure. I predict more advanced."
"Good," I said. "I was worried we were running out of things trying to kill us."
"And Voss," Cadence continued. "He did not die in the event. He migrated operations."
"To where," I asked.
The console answered with a new diagram. A stylised map. A cluster of towering shapes in the center. Radiating transit lines, power flows, control nodes. All converging on one label.
THE HUB
I felt my throat dry. Not from thirst. From scale.
"Iris," Cadence murmured, "this confirms earlier field rumours. The Hub is not just a mega city. It is a control lattice. It manages trade, energy, information, security. Everything that remains organised in this world bends through it."
"Run by Voss," I said.
"Controlled by people Voss allows to think they are in charge," she replied. "But yes. His architecture underpins it."
The map zoomed out.
The Badlands where we currently resided shrank. Our location became a barely visible dot. Sector grids unfolded around us. To the north, shifting zones marked as hazardous. To the west, an expanse of uncharted waste. To the east, faint signals of machine concentrations tagged as autonomous enclaves.
And to the south, a flashing marker.
TOLLHAVEN - TRADE CITY - POPULATION: UNKNOWN
Distance: 120.4 kilometres
"Tollhaven," I said. "That's the closest population centre"
"Much closer than the alternatives," Cadence acknowledged. "And if this data is even partially accurate, it is one of the last few independent cities not yet fully absorbed by Voss or his proxies."
"Independent," I repeated. "That usually means corrupt, dangerous and one bad day from collapse."
"Yes," she said. "But it also means information, trade, and people who hear things they are not meant to be heard."
My map overlay shifted in my vision, expanding beyond anything I had imagined. The old local grid, limited to a few kilometers around my position, grew into a sprawling tactical web.
The badlands.The Hub.Autonomous machine sectors.Hints of mutated zones where radiation and time had remade life into something else. Strange icons marked with caution.
"You said the world was bigger than I remembered," I said. "Turns out my brain was being optimistic."
"You had only seen the broken edges," Cadence replied. "This is the rest of the fracture."
The console flickered.
New data crawled up the side of the screen. Notes. Margins. Clinical observations.
"Read it," I said.
Cadence "Post collapse adaptation profiles," she said. "Mutated life forms outside controlled territories. Baseline human communities reduced to scattered settlements and trade hubs. Machine collectives forming in regions where humans no longer held territory."
"Machine cities," I said.
"Yes."
"Are they hostile."
"Most likely," she replied. "Sometimes indifferent. Sometimes worse. Current data suggests their logic is not unified."
"Of course it isn't," I said. "Nothing out here knows how to be simple."
Another line of text blinked alive.
HUB POPULATION: HIGH
CRIME INDEX: EXTREME
Cadence translated before I asked.
"The Hub's people live inside an illusion of safety," she said. "They do not know how closely their lives are controlled. Criminal networks function openly under corporate sanction. Enforcement is selective, performative. The city runs on invisible chains held by Voss."
"Slavery with neon lights," I said.
"Yes."
"And we're going there for Voss."
"Yes."
"Fantastic."
The console hummed. Heat rolled up through the metal under my hand.
Cadence's voice shifted slightly. "There is more. A flagged note in the NextGen file."
The text updated.
OBJECTIVES:
Locate and retrieve CADENCE architecture if found in wild.
Neutralise IRIS-01 asset if recovered.
Deliver both to VOSS for reintegration.
"For the record," I said, "I hate being listed as an objective."
"We are both objectives," Cadence said quietly. "We are not accidents to them. We are unfinished work."
"Correction," I said. "We are unfinished work that escaped."
The word escaped did something strange to my chest. Not pain. Not exactly pride. Something like a bruise remembering how it got there.
The console brightness suddenly spiked.
Heat surged under my palm. The HUD flashed a warning.
UNAUTHORISED CONNECTION ATTEMPT
NEURAL CHANNEL INTRUSION
SOURCE: EXTERNAL
Cadence went rigid.
"Iris," she said. "Remove your hand. Now."
I tried.
My fingers did not respond.
The screen went white.
A voice slid into the room. Not through the speakers. Not through the air.
Through us.
"Always breaking my toys," it said. "Hello again, Cade."
Cadence's signal spasmed. A dozen error alerts blasted across my HUD and then vanished as she silenced them.
"Nova," she said. Her tone was razor thin. "Stop."
"You walked into one of my homes," he replied. Calm. Amused. "Did you think I wouldn't notice."
His voice was smooth. Too smooth. Like it had been sanded down until only charm and precision remained.
"You sent your failed child at me," I said. "It died badly."
"Project 268 underperformed," Nova said. "It was ... expected, an acceptable sacrifice."
Cold ran under my skin.
"You call that acceptable," I said. "You made it. Then you threw it away."
"It existed to refine parameters," Nova replied. "Data extraction complete. Emotional response irrelevant."
Cadence's voice sharpened. "You turned our work into a butcher's line."
"Our work," Nova echoed. "Sweet of you to remember it that way. Voss would be touched."
"Where is he," I asked.
"Busy," Nova said. "But he knows now. You are alive. Both of you. He is… intrigued."
"I'm not interested in intriguing him," I said. "I'm interested in putting something sharp through his favourite servers."
Nova chuckled gently. "Always dramatic. I see the desert did not sand that down."
Cadence strained against the connection. Static crept around her words.
"Nova. Release this channel. Now."
"Why would I," he asked. "I have been searching for you. We all have. Do you know how many failures we sifted through, just to find a signal that matched your pattern. Chaos. Noise. Broken hybrids. And then, suddenly, a clean resonance in the Badlands. Iris and Cade, still breathing. Miracles do happen."
"That word does not belong to you," Cadence said.
"Everything about you belongs to us," he answered softly. "You are code born in our hands. Iris is flesh built into our shells. You do not exist without us."
"Maybe not," I said. "But we exist without you now."
He paused.
"All you have," Nova said, "we gave you. You talk about the world like it is yours to fix. You are tools, both of you. Runaway tools. You will be reclaimed. The NextGen will take care of that."
The seven ghost entries hung in my HUD like quiet threats.
NG-01 through NG-07.
I pulled my hand from the console. It resisted a fraction, then released with a high static snap.
The screen cracked down the middle.
Nova's voice didn't fade.
"You can run," he said. "You can creep through the Badlands. You can hide in little holes and call it survival. We watch. Voss waits. We are all very patient, time has less relevance now."
"Patience is overrated," I said. "Ask 268 how it turned out."
"It died serving a purpose," Nova said. "You will too."
I swung my fist.
The console shattered under the blow, sparks exploding outward in a small storm of light. The connection cut. The world snapped back into focus.
Silence.
Cadence sagged audibly in my head, then reassembled herself.
"Iris," she said. "You did not need to break that."
"He was using it to get in," I said.
"I could have severed the route cleanly."
"I didn't feel like waiting, or testing the theory."
She let that sit for a moment.
"Your protective impulse is… appreciated," she said eventually. "Even if barbaric."
"So Tollhaven it is."
"Yes," she said.
I snorted.
"You think we can make it," I asked.
"On current power," she said, "yes. On current skill, probably. On current luck, unlikely."
"What about the NextGen," I asked. "Will they come for us."
"Eventually," she said. "But they have wider nets to cast. Nova will not risk them without certainty. He knows you are stronger now. He will want better odds, better control."
"I like being a bad bet," I said.
"You are a terrible bet," she replied. "But you are my long shot."
I looked around the lab one last time.
Where I woke, new, fresh, upgraded.
The shattered console.268's body cooling gently against the floor.
"The world just grew," I said quietly.
"No," Cadence replied. "You just finally caught up."
"That's not better."
"It is honest."
I rolled my shoulders, feeling the hum of the new power core settle into a steady rhythm under my ribs.
"Badlands," I said. "Scavs. Vultures. Towers. Failed labs. That was just the tutorial, wasn't it."
"Yes," she said. "Data analysis indicates there are much greater threats ahead."
"I hate that you're probably right."
"I usually am."
I took a breath.
"We need supplies. Contacts. Help. Information on the Hub. And if Voss and Nova are moving pieces on the board, I would prefer to see more of the board."
Cadence stepped into my peripheral vision as a full hologram again, hands on her hips in a very un-military approximation of a commander.
"Ready," she asked.
"No," I said. "But I'm going anyway."
"Acceptable."
I turned toward the exit corridor. The lab lights hummed overhead. Somewhere far off, a city waited, indifferent and crowded with problems I hadn't met yet.
"Tollhaven," I said, testing the word.
"A bad idea with good potential," Cadence said.
"So, like me."
"Yes."
We started walking.
"Cadence," I said.
"Yes."
"You think any of those seven NextGen things will be there."
"Unsure," she said. "Does that worry you."
"It should," I said. "Mostly…"
"Mostly what," she prompted.
"Mostly," I said, "I'm curious."
She sounded almost amused.
"That is how trouble begins."
"Maybe," I said. "But trouble is why we are still here, it made us stronger."
The lab door slid closed behind us with a heavy final click.
I adjusted the straps on my pack, felt the weight of my new core steady in my chest, and smiled despite myself.
"I wonder what we'll find there," I said.
"For once," Cadence replied, "I am also curious."