The containment chamber lay in ruins. Shattered glass glinted across the floor like frozen lightning. The lights flickered in a dazed stutter, struggling to recover from the gravitational shockwave Rourke had released. A metallic tang filled the air—a scent like scorched circuitry and bent steel.
Rourke sat hunched forward in the chair, breathing hard, sweat dripping down his temples. Every pulse of his heart still echoed with a faint gravitational tremor, like his body hadn't fully decided whether normal physics applied to him anymore.
Inspector Vehr didn't approach. He stood at a distance, studying Rourke as if observing a newly discovered predator.
"You said I'm dangerous," Rourke managed, voice rough. "I don't feel dangerous."
Vehr's expression hardened. "You don't have to feel dangerous to be dangerous."
Rourke rubbed his forehead. "What's a Gravity Wielder?"
The female agent answered coldly. "An impossible being. A myth. An anomaly. A mutation that shouldn't survive long enough to take its first breath."
Vehr shot her a warning glance, but she continued anyway.
"No human body can contain raw gravitational distortion. Cells collapse. Bones shatter. Organs implode in seconds. Gravity Wielders die before they ever learn to speak."
Rourke stared at her. "Then how am I alive?"
Silence.
Even the alarms seemed hesitant to interrupt.
Finally, Vehr exhaled and stepped forward, hands clasped behind his back. "That's precisely why we need answers. You shouldn't exist, Talon. Yet you're sitting there breathing."
"And you think I… what? Absorbed something? Was exposed to something?"
Vehr tilted his head slightly, considering. "Possibly. There are artifacts—ancient remnants from civilizations that predate human expansion—known to imprint gravitational anomalies onto living hosts."
Rourke blinked. "Artifacts? On Dock Nine? That place can't even afford good coffee."
"We don't know," Vehr said. "Which is why we're taking you to the Central Dominion Research Core. There, they have the equipment—and the authority—to determine what you are."
The female agent added, "And what to do with you."
Rourke's jaw clenched. "Meaning what?"
"If you're unstable," she said, "they'll neutralize you."
Rourke shot to his feet. The chair screeched backward. "Neutralize? I haven't done anything wrong!"
"Sit down," Vehr ordered.
"No."
The female agent reached for her weapon.
Rourke raised both hands instinctively—
And the room trembled.
Only slightly. Just enough for Vehr to lift a hand, stopping his partner. "Holster it."
She hesitated. Then obeyed, though her eyes remained locked on Rourke with a mixture of caution and fear.
Vehr approached carefully, like a man trying not to startle a volatile star. "Listen to me, Talon. You didn't do anything wrong. But what lives inside you could tear this ship apart if you lose control. We need to know the limits of your… ability."
Rourke swallowed. "I don't want to hurt anyone."
"Then cooperate."
The tension in the room thickened.
Slowly, Rourke sank back into the chair, fingers trembling. "I didn't ask for this."
"Most anomalies don't," Vehr replied.
The chamber door hissed open.
A Dominion engineer stepped inside, wearing thick protective plating and carrying a reinforced case. His eyes widened at the destruction.
"Void take me," he whispered. "What happened in here?"
"Later," Vehr said sharply. "Bring it."
The engineer opened the case, revealing a compact metal sphere—dense, seamless, and etched with Dominion insignia. A faint hum vibrated from its center.
Rourke frowned. "What is that?"
"A gravitic nullifier," Vehr said. "It creates a pocket of stabilized space. When activated, it should suppress any gravitational distortion within a three-meter radius."
"Should?" Rourke repeated.
"We've never needed to use it on a living subject."
The female agent tapped her datapad. "Activating containment sequence."
The sphere lifted from its casing, hovering between Rourke and the inspectors. The air around it thickened, bending subtly inward as if folding around an invisible point. The hair on Rourke's arms rose.
A deep, resonant thrum rolled through the chamber.
Rourke's chest tightened as the echo inside him reacted—pulling back, resisting, pushing.
Vehr watched the readings. "Steady…"
Rourke gripped the chair. "Something's happening—"
The nullifier pulsed.
Rourke felt as though part of him was being peeled away—some invisible thread pulling at the pressure that lived beneath his skin. Not painful, but wrong, like being tugged toward a direction that shouldn't exist.
The pulse inside him fought back.
The nullifier's lights flickered.
"Levels spiking!" the female agent shouted. "He's destabilizing the node—!"
"I'm not doing anything!" Rourke yelled.
The sphere vibrated violently.
Then—
CRACK.
A bolt of fractured blue energy burst from the nullifier, slicing through the air like shattered light. The blast hammered into the far wall, leaving a smoking crater. Sparks exploded from the device as it fell to the floor, dead.
Vehr swore under his breath.
The female agent stared at the broken sphere. "That was our strongest nullifier."
Rourke's breathing came in sharp, uneven gasps. "I can't control this… whatever it is."
Vehr stepped closer, expression grim but not unkind. "Then we need to teach you how."
Before Rourke could respond, the entire ship lurched violently to one side, alarms flaring throughout the corridor outside. The metal floor vibrated with a force distinct from Rourke's own—external, massive, and deliberate.
The female agent's eyes widened. "We're being boarded!"
"Impossible," Vehr snapped. "We're deep in Dominion territory—"
A deafening clang echoed through the hull.
The lights strobed red.
A voice boomed over the comms, urgent and terrified:
"Hostile vessel detected! Unknown class—unknown signature—breaching our aft hangar!"
Vehr cursed. "Protect the subject. He may be their target."
"Who?" Rourke demanded. "Who's targeting me?!"
Vehr met his eyes with a dark, steady certainty.
"Gravity Wielders," he said, "aren't supposed to exist. But the things that hunt them absolutely do."
Another impact rocked the ship.
Rourke felt the pulse inside him surge in response.
Something was coming.
And it wasn't Dominion.