The garden did not resist Allium's passage through the forest.
It shattered around him.
Branches snapped as he tore through the undergrowth, roots splitting beneath his heels. Leaves burst into the air, flung outward by his wake. Trees leaned aside too late. Stone fractured beneath his steps.
It looked reckless.
It wasn't.
Every stumble, every sudden veer, every unnecessary sound was deliberate. Noise as strategy. Motion as misdirection. A pattern designed not to lead—but to break being followed.
Behind him, the leylines jittered.
Cold distortions snapped left, then right, then folded inward on themselves, struggling to recalculate a target that refused to remain consistent.
A voice slipped between trunks and shadow, layered and too close to belong to one place.
"You are wrong…"
"…off…"
"…you do not move like you…"
Allium laughed.
Not breathless.
Not strained.
Loud. Unhinged. Joyfully defiant.
It rolled through the forest like a thrown gauntlet.
"Hey bug man!" he shouted. "Ever tried listening to music?! Might make you bearable!"
The pressure shifted.
Meters away, the group heard it through comms.
Jax muttered, the tone reserved for leadership decisions he already hated. "I hate this plan so much." He moved with brutal efficiency, visor slicing through faint distortions ahead.
Rose ran lightly beside him, frost flaking behind her boots without sound.
"He's doing it," she said. "Have faith, Jax."
Weaver did not so much run as glide, threads guiding his steps where terrain betrayed him.
"For now," he said. "But he might learn."
Thane adjusted his pace, making sure nothing on his person whispered.
"…He's actually kinda funny."
At the second node, Cassidy knelt hard in the soil and punched the new frequency in, fingers flying over the interface as Solara light bent strangely around the stake.
"Second node is ready," she said into comms. "I'm locking the frequency now."
Her Mark flared.
Sharp. Immediate.
Cassidy froze.
She looked down at her wrist.
"Wait," she said, breath tightening. "Don't come yet. My Mark is warning me about something."
Allium heard her.
And kept moving.
Because Khelos was adapting.
The predator flickered between angles—above the canopy, beneath the soil, between roots and shadow—but every reappearance found Allium doing something no logic would have predicted.
"You are fractured…"
"…wrong shape…"
"…you taste different…"
Without warning, webbing fired from the dark.
Fast. Precise.
It wrapped around Allium's torso, pinning one arm mid-motion.
Instinct took over.
Orange flared.
He blasted the net apart in a violent flash that lit the forest for a split second.
And that was all Khelos needed.
"….fake…."
The click carried satisfaction.
Allium's smile vanished.
"Shit," he muttered, dropping into a stance—but nothing came. No trick. No misdirection.
"He's on to me," he said into comms. "Cassidy, we need that node now."
Cassidy was already recalculating, hands shaking as she ran the numbers again and again, her Mark still burning hot.
"Come on," she hissed. "What am I missing?!"
She stared at the stake, at the energy flow refusing to stabilize.
"I don't understand," she said, voice cracking. "The Mark is still upset and I can't get this to fully activate."
Rose answered immediately.
"Hold position. We're moving to you."
Then—
Khelos spoke.
Not through the forest.
Through the comms.
"….signal is changed… no more pain…."
Every voice cut out.
Every step halted.
Cassidy felt it then.
Pressure.
An absence of logic, like the rules of distance had folded inward. Reality around her warped, the forest bending toward her instead of away.
Her heart slammed against her ribs as the air beside her split open.
Khelos stepped out of the rip.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
"Uuuuhhh…" Cassidy breathed. "He's by me—"
Static swallowed her words.
Khelos clicked softly as he approached the node, eye-stalks rotating to study the stake.
With one swift motion, he tore it free.
Held it.
Examined it.
"….dangerous… loud…."
He snapped it in two.
Cassidy stumbled back, panic flooding her system. She turned to run—
And the forest ran with her.
Roots shifted. Paths folded. Every step she took kept her exactly where she was.
She spun—
And stopped.
Because Khelos had paused.
Allium burst through the trees, sprinting straight at him, arm drawn back, power coiled and screaming.
Khelos raised an arm to block—
Allium didn't strike.
He dropped.
Slamming his palm into the ground where the node had been.
The half-built frequency ruptured.
Light detonated outward, raw and unstable, ripping Khelos fully from the dark.
The scream that followed was wrong—layered, metallic, furious.
He thrashed as the clicking escalated into rage.
"….deception!…. Pain!…."
Reality distorted violently.
Without hesitation, Allium grabbed Cassidy and threw her clear of the distortion, hurling her out of the collapsing field.
She hit the ground hard and rolled.
When she looked up—
Allium was still inside.
The distortion sealed.
Allium stood alone with Khelos.
And this time—
Khelos had him exactly where he wanted him.